l33tplaya

How would Don age the "wood?" Paddy Murphy as he appeared on Frank Hall's show: https://www.theviolinchannel.com/violin-made-entirely-from-car-parts-ireland-1972-paddy-moran/

Helix LT, not IT; it's a somewhat pricey guitar effects procesor, considered to be quite good, better than the run of the mill ones that are so common. https://www.musicarts.com/line-6-helix-lt-multi-effects-guitar-processor-with-backpack-main0388842

I have very sad news to report. Guido Lamell, a long time 2nd violinist for the LA Phil, and conductor of the Santa Monica Symphony Orchestra, died yesterday. He was an enthusiastic, accomplished teacher, musician, mentor, and conductor. I imagine there will be a much more focused, well-written obituary, but the below notice is all I could find. https://newdeaths.com/2021/07/15/guido-lamell-death-obituary-guido-lamell-cause-of-death/ This a huge and unexpected loss.

Jealous!!

Bow looks way too crude to be a Grand Adam...Not even close.

Franken-thuggery or art? Should we keelhaul Thackray and cover him with hot varnish? Or annoint him to the Cremona priesthood? https://www.newyorker.com/culture/cultural-comment/the-urge-to-destroy-a-violin #violintorture #drunkluthier #violinsadism

I use Anderson as well. If you buy 3 years you get a discount. And/or if you are a member of ACMP, perhaps a bigger discount: https://acmp.net/join-acmp/member-benefits

IIUC, Lloyd had 2 or more "classes" of bows: those made by his students, where he may have done some of the work,and those he actually made completely. I suspected given the weight, that those listed were more student bows. I think he also had different grades. He had two very fine bows here in SoCal that I tried, but he wanted 15K or more...I thought at least one of them was amongst the best I have tried, including comapred to a Simon, a Tourte, and close to a great Pajeot. The other wasn't too far behind. I just couldn't stomach 15K for an at the time contemporary maker; I didn't think most of that would be recoverable, and the intermediary was likely getting more than his fair share. Lloyd still did Tai Chi and was very active when I saw him just a few months before he died (COVID), even though he was somewhat retired. He still taught, however. Very talented.

C'mon. Thre is a clear difference in tone between most of Burgess's rejoinders, and sospiri's caustic remarks above. Though in this world, where some are on pins and needles, that difference might not be enough to avoid opprobrium, thankfully, maestronet seems to be, dare I say it, mostly saner. The difference here is that Burgess is trying to be funny - not that he always suceeds , and they usually aren't directed at people. With sopiri's comments, they appear to be either more personal or perhaps "digs" at certain forum denizens.

Very adroitly stated. I guess that's why you get the big bucks as site moderator in chief?

@matesic atmosphere and local color. It's a redneck thing, along with the dirty wife beater. He's nothing of the sort - a mere charlatan, a pretender back woodsman, obviously highly trained and mad skillz:

Sent you a PM. I know someone who only uses Pernambuco; may be able to get him to do it for about 2K or so. His violin bows are quite good, and getting better. I can't comment on his cello bows...

Like.

Like. I think I see the problem with some of this thread's discussion. I think GeorgeH. is trying to apply methods used in industrial processing, mostly for repeatability and traceability vs science. Science, and good science, can certainly be done in areas where one hasn't completely characterized everything in a system, or even understood most of it: cf, the discovery of tRNA in cell-free systems; the RNA tie club (somewhat analogous to Overlin Violin workshop?); the ability of Berg and Adler to discern much about the bacterial flagellar motor, before understanding anything about its exact mechanisms, via "simple" physical experiments (tethering the flagellum to the cover slip, and watching the bacteria spin through restricted media), etc. In the molecular biology world, examples abound. Conversely, in attempting to explain the scientific method, particularly regarding trying to characterize unknown, not "forensically" pristine samples, we do have some hand-waving and other non-scientific statements regarding the whys and wheretofors (Strads sound better, Cremonese instruments are different from other instruments, etc.). Sound quality and preference is subjective. On a slightly related note, some of the best work on discerning preference for general music quality might be had from Revel Lab's (Harman International) (Floyd O'Toole early work; now, Sean Olive and his co-workers) studies on headphone and IEM preference amongst widely varying sample (and characterized) populations. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/332210798_A_Statistical_Model_that_Predicts_Listeners'_Preference_Ratings_of_Around-Ear_and_On-Ear_Headphones is a recent summary of some of this, and esp. references therein. They had both trained and untrained populations from different groups of people; training was done at Revel and on line. Only selected people who passed their test were included in the trained population. Summary - all populations had similar broad preferences for "good" and "bad;" the audiophiles differed from untrained listeners only in slight preference for some music samples in the intermediate levels, and it was a relatively slight difference. I digress a bit. The relevance is that there are broad, similar sound preferences, if I may slightly over generalize, (yes, this was for headphones, but they used certain, broad music samples. We could do the same for violins, but this work would neeed to be funded, and I can't see violin makers coming together to do this. It has been 10 -20 years' of work or more at Revel (Harmon International), with Sean Olive and co-workers). 1) We are never, in this lifetime, going to be able to characterize that preference re violins to a degree that GeorgeH thinks is necessary before we apply the scientific method to his satisfaction. 2) We can and should continue investigation into wood charcteristics using state of the art equipment. We may find some wood charcteristic that explains the notion of Cremonese sound, or old instrument sound, or some form of wood treatment, accidental (preservative) vs purposeful, etc. We will never be able to do statistically valid experiments involving destructive testing, because of private ownership, and moral principles, amongst other factors. We may not need statistically valid experiemnts. The exception can also prove the rule... 3) The language of music preference, subjective reviews, etc. has progressed in the last 20 years or so (see The Absolute Sound, Stereophile, etc.) , and we should not stop trying to define that vis a vis violins. To wait until we have broad consensus on what is good vs not so good violin preference should not hinder investigation into possible methods of older violin construction. 4) We should be careful about applying overly broad statements or analogies ("wet towels") about Cremonese sound in attempting to justify research on specific sub categories of violins.

Or the one X-ray diffraction pattern from Rosalind Yarrow and Wilkins that Watson got his grimy* hands on: worth a 1 page paper in Nature that led to a Nobel prize. http://dosequis.colorado.edu/Courses/MethodsLogic/papers/WatsonCrick1953.pdf and https://www.exploratorium.edu/origins/coldspring/printit.html One can tell a lot from one *good* X-ray diffraction pattern, assuming the crystallization is adequate, and the heavy atom integrates properly. Now with Rietveld analysis and such, combining neutron and X-ray diffraction, one can tell more from less regular structures. So @GeorgeH, your screed makes little scientific sense. (Aside: OTOH, I agree with you about playing in. A few minutes - a few hours, maybe, if the violin hasn't been used in a long time, but after that it's likely all or mostly player adjustment.Also, most here aren't discussing the difference between the sound under ear and to the audience. Never mind the fact that as we age, our hearing changes, even those who don't suffer normal age-related hearing loss. I also note that many moons ago, David offered to sell me his Tone-rite or some such clone. I was gonna do it, then thought: if it didn't work for the great and p̶o̶w̶e̶r̶f̶u̶l̶ wise DB, it certainly won't work for me. ) In some near future date, we may be able to tell what has changed in wood structure from relatively new to old Cremonese wood. Associating that change with sound and perceived quality is the pseudoscience perhaps, but the observed structural changes are real, and could be gleaned from few samples. grimy* because Wilkins turned over the results to W & C without really obtaining Yarrow's permission, and she received insufficient credit. That X-ray result was everything. Had that X-ray result been given to Linus Pauling, he likely would have won another Nobel. Or even to a mentor, Max Delbrück.