Consignor Prospectus 2017
Total Page:16
File Type:pdf, Size:1020Kb
Load more
Recommended publications
-
B&F Magazine Issue 31
No. 31 A VIOLIN BY PIETRO GIOVANNI GUARNERI, MANTUA, 1709 superb instruments loaned to them by the Arrisons, gave spectacular performances and received standing ovations. Our profound thanks go to Karen and Clement Arrison for their dedication to preserving our classical music traditions and helping rising stars launch their careers over many years. Our feature is on page 11. Violinist William Hagen Wins Third Prize at the Queen Elisabeth International Dear Friends, Competition With a very productive summer coming to a close, I am Bravo to Bein & Fushi customer delighted to be able to tell you about a few of our recent and dear friend William Hagen for notable sales. The exquisite “Posselt, Philipp” Giuseppe being awarded third prize at the Guarneri del Gesù of 1732 is one of very few instruments Queen Elisabeth Competition in named after women: American virtuoso Ruth Posselt (1911- Belgium. He is the highest ranking 2007) and amateur violinist Renee Philipp of Rotterdam, American winner since 1980. who acquired the violin in 1918. And exceptional violins by Hagen was the second prize winner Camillo Camilli and Santo Serafin along with a marvelous of the Fritz Kreisler International viola bow by Dominique Peccatte are now in the very gifted Music Competition in 2014. He has hands of discerning artists. I am so proud of our sales staff’s Photo: Richard Busath attended the Colburn School where amazing ability to help musicians find their ideal match in an he studied with Robert Lipsett and Juilliardilli d wherehh he was instrument or bow. a student of Itzhak Perlman and Catherine Cho. -
A Violin by Giuseppe Giovanni Battista Guarneri
141 A VIOLIN BY GIUSEPPE GIOVANNI BATTISTA GUARNERI Roger Hargrave, who has also researched and drawn the enclosed poster, discusses an outstanding example of the work of a member of the Guarneri family known as `Joseph Guarneri filius Andrea'. Andrea Guarneri was the first He may never have many details of instruments by of the Guarneri family of violin reached the heights of his Joseph filius at this period recall makers and an apprentice of contemporary, the Amati school, this type of Nicola Amati (he was actually varnish, in combination with registered as living in the house Antonio Stradivarius, but he the freer hand of Joseph, gives of Nicola Amati in 1641). Andrea's does rank as one of the the instruments a visual impact youngest son, whose work is il - greatest makers of all time. never achieved by an Amati or , lustrated here, was called. We should not forget he with the exception of Stradi - Giuseppe. Because several of the sired and trained the great vari, by any other classical Guarneri family bear the same del Gesu' maker before this time. christian names, individuals have traditionally been identified by a It should be said, however, suffix attached to their names. that the varnish of Joseph filius Thus, Giuseppe's brother is known as `Peter Guarneri varies considerably. It is not always of such out - of Mantua' to distinguish him from Giuseppe's son, standing quality the same can be said of Joseph's pro - who is known as `Peter Guarneri of Venice'. duction in general. If I were asked to describe the instruments of a few of the great Cremonese makers Giuseppe himself is called 'Giuseppe Guarneri filius in a single word, I would say that Amatis (all of them) Andrea' or, more simply, `Joseph filius' to distinguish are `refined', Stradivaris are `stately', del Gesus are him from his other son, the illustrious 'Giuseppe `rebellious' and the instruments of Joseph filius An - Guarneri del Gesu'. -
Violin Detective
COMMENT BOOKS & ARTS instruments have gone up in value after I found that their soundboards matched trees known to have been used by Stradivari; one subsequently sold at auction for more than four times its estimate. Many convincing for- KAMILA RATCLIFF geries were made in the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, but the science did not exist then. Forgers now are aware of dendro- chronology, and it could be a problem if they use wood from old chalets to build sophisti- cated copies of historical instruments. How about unintentional deceit? I never like to ‘kill’ a violin — reveal it as not what it seems. But if the wood does not match the claims, I investigate. I was recently sent photos of a violin supposedly made by an Italian craftsman who died in 1735. The wood dated to the 1760s, so I knew he could not have made it. But I did see strong cor- relations to instruments made by his sons and nephews who worked in the 1770s. So Peter Ratcliff restores and investigates violins from his workshop in Hove, UK. I deduced that the violin might have been damaged and an entirely new soundboard made after the craftsman’s death. The violin Q&A Peter Ratcliff was pulled from auction, but not before it had received bids of more than US$100,000. Will dendrochronology change the market? Violin detective I think it already has, and has called into Peter Ratcliff uses dendrochronology — tree-ring dating — to pin down the age and suggest the question some incorrect historical assump- provenance of stringed instruments. -
The Working Methods of Guarneri Del Gesů and Their Influence Upon His
45 The Working Methods of Guarneri del Gesù and their Influence upon his Stylistic Development Text and Illustrations by Roger Graham Hargrave Please take time to read this warning! Although the greatest care has been taken while compiling this site it almost certainly contains many mistakes. As such its contents should be treated with extreme caution. Neither I nor my fellow contributors can accept responsibility for any losses resulting from information or opin - ions, new or old, which are reproduced here. Some of the ideas and information have already been superseded by subsequent research and de - velopment. (I have attempted to included a bibliography for further information on such pieces) In spite of this I believe that these articles are still of considerable use. For copyright or other practical reasons it has not been possible to reproduce all the illustrations. I have included the text for the series of posters that I created for the Strad magazine. While these posters are all still available, with one exception, they have been reproduced without the original accompanying text. The Labels mentions an early form of Del Gesù label, 98 later re - jected by the Hills as spurious. 99 The strongest evi - Before closing the body of the instrument, Del dence for its existence is found in the earlier Gesù fixed his label on the inside of the back, beneath notebooks of Count Cozio Di Salabue, who mentions the bass soundhole and roughly parallel to the centre four violins by the younger Giuseppe, all labelled and line. The labels which remain in their original posi - dated, from the period 1727 to 1730. -
The Strad Magazine
FRESH THINKING WOOD DENSITOMETRY MATERIAL Were the old Cremonese luthiers really using better woods than those available to other makers FACTS in Europe? TERRY BORMAN and BEREND STOEL present a study of density that seems to suggest otherwise Violins await testing on a CT scanner gantry S ALL LUTHIERS ARE WELL AWARE, of Stradivari. To test this conjecture, we set out to compare the business of making an instrument of the the wood employed by the classical Cremonese makers with violin family is fraught with pitfalls. There that used by other makers, during the same time period but are countless ways to ruin the sound of the from various regions across Europe. This would eliminate one fi nished product, starting with possibly the variable – the ageing of the wood – and allow the tracking of Amost fundamental decision of all: what wood to use. In the past geographical and topographical variation. In particular, we 35 years we have seen our knowledge of the available options wanted to investigate the densities of the woods involved, which expand greatly – and as we learn more about the different wood we felt could be the key to unlocking these secrets. choices, it is increasingly hard not to agonise over the decision. What are the characteristics we need as makers? Should we just WHY DENSITY? look for a specifi c grain line spacing, or a good split? Those were The three key properties of wood, from an instrument maker’s the characteristics that makers were once taught to watch out perspective, are density, stiffness (‘Young’s modulus’) and for, and yet results are diffi cult to repeat from instrument to damping (in its simplest terms, a measure of how long an object instrument when using the same pattern – suggesting these are will vibrate after being set in motion). -
Searching for Giuseppe Guarneri Del Gesù: a Paper-Chase and a Proposition
Searching for Giuseppe Guarneri del Gesù: a paper-chase and a proposition Nicholas Sackman © 2021 During the past 200 years various investigators have laboured to unravel the strands of confusion which have surrounded the identity and life-story of the violin maker known as Bartolomeo Giuseppe Guarneri del Gesù. Early-nineteenth-century commentators – Count Cozio di Salabue, for example – struggled to make sense of the situation through the physical evidence of the instruments they owned, the instruments’ internal labels, and the ‘understanding’ of contemporary restorers, dealers, and players; regrettably, misinformation was often passed from one writer to another, sometimes acquiring elaborations on the way. When research began into Cremonese archives the identity of individuals (together with their dates of birth and death) were sometimes announced as having been securely determined only for subsequent investigations to show that this certainty was illusory, the situation being further complicated by the Italian habit of christening a new- born son with multiple given names (frequently repeating those already given to close relatives) and then one or more of the given names apparently being unused during that new-born’s lifetime. During the early twentieth century misunderstandings were still frequent, and even today uncertainties still remain, with aspects of del Gesù’s chronology rendered opaque through contradictory or no documentation. The following account examines the documentary and physical evidence. ***** NB: During the first decades of the nineteenth century there existed violins with internal labels showing dates from the 1720s and the inscription Joseph Guarnerius Andrea Nepos. The Latin Dictionary compiled by Charlton T Lewis and Charles Short provides copious citations drawn from Classical Latin (as written and spoken during the period when the Roman Empire was at its peak, i.e. -
1002775354-Alcorn.Pdf
3119 A STUDY OF STYLE AND INFLUENCE IN THE EARLY SCHOOLS OF VIOLIN MAKING CIRCA 1540 TO CIRCA 1800 THESIS Presented to the Graduate Council of the North Texas State University in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements For the Degree of MASTER OF MUSIC By Allison A. Alcorn, B.Mus. Denton, Texas December, 1987 Alcorn, Allison A., A Study of Style and Influence in the Ear School of Violin Making circa 1540 to circa 1800. Master of Music (Musicology), December 1987, 172 pp., 2 tables, 31 figures, bibliography, 52 titles. Chapter I of this thesis details contemporary historical views on the origins of the violin and its terminology. Chapters II through VI study the methodologies of makers from Italy, the Germanic Countries, the Low Countries, France, and England, and highlights the aspects of these methodologies that show influence from one maker to another. Chapter VII deals with matters of imitation, copying, violin forgery and the differences between these categories. Chapter VIII presents a discussion of the manner in which various violin experts identify the maker of a violin. It briefly discusses a new movement that questions the current methods of authenti- cation, proposing that the dual role of "expert/dealer" does not lend itself to sufficient objectivity. The conclusion suggests that dealers, experts, curators, and musicologists alike must return to placing the first emphasis on the tra- dition of the craft rather than on the individual maker. o Copyright by Allison A. Alcorn TABLE OF CONTENTS Page LIST OF FIGURES.... ............. ........viii LIST OF TABLES. ................ ... x Chapter I. INTRODUCTION . .............. *.. 1 Problems in Descriptive Terminology 3 The Origin of the Violin....... -
Metropolitan Pavilion Proudly Presents Italian Masterpieces in New York
NEW YORK March 15-17, 2013 - Metropolitan Pavilion proudly presents Italian Masterpieces in New York The inspiration Historical musical instruments represent a very precious heritage. They continue to inspire contemporary violin makers, and they are able to communicate to the general public the values associated with art, culture and human endeavor. Mondomusica New York will bring to the U.S. some of the finest instruments ever made in violin-making history. They come from three of the most renowned collections in Italy, and some of them have never before been taken out of Italy. The instruments Cremona Municipal Collection The Municipal Building of Cremona houses one of the foremost strings collections in the world. These instruments characterize the history of the greatest violin-making dynasty ever known, originating in Cremona from the first half of the sixteenth century and developing until the first half of the eighteenth century. Mondomusica New York makes it possible to admire: Andrea Amati - Carlo IX, 1566 - violin In 1966, due to the efforts of Alfredo Puerari with the expert advice of Simone Fernando Sacconi, two masterpieces by great violin makers born in Cremona returned to the town: the Carlo IX di Francia, a violin constructed by Andrea Amati in 1566, and the Hammerle, made by Nicolò Amati in 1658. Both instruments, purchased by the Provincial Tourist Board in Cremona, came from the Rembert Wurlitzer Company in New York, which in turn had obtained them from the banker Henry Hottinger, a famous collector. Andrea Amati was able to determine the fundamental characteristics of the violin family of bowed stringed instruments, which with some small variations of proportion with regard to violas and violoncellos, are still in use today. -
The Working Methods of Guarneri Del Gesů and Their Influence Upon His
9 The Working Methods of Guarneri del Gesù and their Influence upon his Stylistic Development Text and Illustrations by Roger Graham Hargrave Please take time to read this warning! Although the greatest care has been taken while compiling this site it almost certainly contains many mistakes. As such its contents should be treated with extreme caution. Neither I nor my fellow contributors can accept responsibility for any losses resulting from information or opin - ions, new or old, which are reproduced here. Some of the ideas and information have already been superseded by subsequent research and de - velopment. (I have attempted to included a bibliography for further information on such pieces) In spite of this I believe that these articles are still of considerable use. For copyright or other practical reasons it has not been possible to reproduce all the illustrations. I have included the text for the series of posters that I created for the Strad magazine. While these posters are all still available, with one exception, they have been reproduced without the original accompanying text. The Mould and the Rib Structure they were not, in their basic form, the result of any innovative mathematical composition. The elegance and purity of the violin form exer - cises such fascination that it has been the subject of The outline of a violin is only one element of its enquiry for more than two centuries; questions about complex design. It is still not known which was es - its design have generated almost as much interest as tablished first, the mould around which the violin the subject of Cremonese varnish and its composi - was constructed (which represents the chamber of tion. -
SAURET 24 Études-Caprices, Op
Émile SAURET 24 Études-Caprices, Op. 64 Vol. 2 (Nos. 8–13) Nazrin Rashidova, Violin Émile Sauret (1852–1920) control of the bow at the peak of the G and D strings, and ‘aria’ on the G string, showcasing the instrument’s 24 Études-Caprices, Op. 64 – Vol. 2 (Nos. 8–13) its distribution in the double-stopped material to follow, all capacity, tonal palette and the miraculous non-existence within the same piano dynamic range. The second section of ‘wolf notes’ on a string that is most prone to them. The The extraordinary 19th-century violin virtuoso, composer Paganini’s ‘Il Cannone’ of the same year. In Perlman’s [05:35], accompanied by a con spirito marking could leave second section embodies a sequence of sextuplets and pedagogue Émile Sauret carved himself an enviable hands, especially in his 1986 recording of Bach’s a player short-breathed in juggling a series of extreme accompanied by a delicatamente expressive marking in reputation during his lifetime and was acclaimed by the Chaconne, it is clear that it has the extraordinary ‘power registral leaps while retaining the suggested expressive the piano dynamic, encouraging a balanced control of the greatest musicians of the century, including Brahms, Liszt, and reserve’ that The Strad admired. marking: however, the ‘compactness’ of the Stradivari bow, thus securing subtle changes of the bow while Rubenstein, Tchaikovsky, Saint-Saëns and Sarasate, with The Stradivari embodies a different kind of quality and makes this a pleasurable challenge. tackling complex string crossings. whom he often played duets. refinement – though not itself lacking power and reserve – Étude-Caprice No. -
1 Fiddling with Value: Violins As an Investment?
Fiddling with Value: Violins as an investment? By Kathryn Graddy Brandeis University and Philip E. Margolis Cozio Publishing April 2008 The authors would like to thank Tim Engles, Jonathan Hamilton, Ben Hebbert, Blake Lebaron, Bill Taylor and Victor Ginsburgh for their comments. 1 JEL: D44, G11, L82 Keywords: Investment, Violins, Auctions, Repeat Sales Summary: This paper measures the returns to investing in violins using two different datasets. One dataset includes 75 observations on repeat sales of the same violins at auction starting in the mid-19th century and another dataset includes over 2000 observations on individual violin sales at auction since 1980. Overall real returns for the dataset on repeat sales for the period 1850-2006 have been approximately 3.3%. Real returns to the overall portfolio of individual sales since 1980 have been nearly 4%. While this return is lower than other standard investments, the price path has been stable with a slight negative correlation to stocks and bonds. 2 In this paper, we analyze the prices of violins using two different datasets: one dataset includes 75 observations on repeat sales of the same violins at auction starting in the mid-19th century and the other dataset includes over 2000 observations on individual violin sales at auction since 1980. The purpose of this paper is to give some indication as to whether violins are a viable alternative investment that might be part of a diversified portfolio and to determine if some types of violins have had higher returns than other types of violins. Despite the growing discussion of alternative investments in the economics and finance literature, the growing number of wealthy individuals, funds and syndicates that invest in violins, and the interest in violins as a collateralizable asset, the only previous study of violin prices published in an academic journal was a study by Ross and Zondervan of repeat sales of 17 Stradivaris (1989). -
'Fortissimo Di Voce, E Quasi Tenore' Part
‘Fortissimo di voce, e quasi tenore’ ‘Very strong of voice, and like a viola’ An evidence-based investigation into the historical reality of the 1724 Stradivari violin which Il Conte Cozio di Salabue sold to Niccolò Paganini in July 1817 Nicholas Sackman © 2018-2021 Revised following receipt of new information from the USA. The present writer wishes to place on record his gratitude to Ms Christine Windheuser (NMAH Archives Center, Smithsonian Institution) for her help in locating archived documents. In early 1817 Niccolò Paganini learned from Carlo Carli, in Milan, that the latter had for sale a Stradivari violin, dated 1724, which was the property of Il Conte Ignazio Alessandro Cozio di Salabue. Carli was Count Cozio’s banker and commercial agent; he was also a talented violinist who was good enough to play in quartets alongside Paganini. A letter sent by Paganini to Carli on 21 June 1817 (see below) demonstrates that Carli, on Niccolò’s behalf, negotiated the virtuoso’s purchase of the 1724 violin from Count Cozio. The Count’s price was 100 Luigi (100 Louis d’or 20-franc coins) but he was willing to allow a 5 Luigi discount to secure Paganini’s custom. It is possible – indeed, more than likely – that Count Cozio was expecting Paganini to use and advertise the Stradivari violin during his European concert tours, and the violinist’s admirers would then beat a path to Carlo Carli’s door to purchase more of the Count’s instruments. Documents written by Count Cozio demonstrate that this 1724 violin was one of twelve which the Count had obtained in 1774-75 from Paolo Stradivari (the youngest son born of Antonio Stradivari’s second marriage).1 There are no known documents within the Cozio archive at the Biblioteca Statale di Cremona which indicate that Count Cozio ever sold more than the one violin, of 1724, to Paganini.