What Features Distinguish a Bergonzi Model?

[Michael Appleman]

1 hour ago, Joel Pautz said:

 It seems like he adopted Strad's 353ish mm body length, but used a longer neck so as to keep the Strad long form stop length? 

This is an interesting point that invites reflection and research. Starting in the early 1700's, one starts to see more and more violins from different makers with long-ish body stops, I can think of some Joseph Filius' and of course Alessandro Gagliano just to name a couple. Unfortunately, we don't have (m)any examples with original necks so we can only guess what the original string length was, but I can't help wondering if there was an interest that grew from older Brescian violins, through the Rogeri copies, to the long Strads, that got more and more makers interested with experimenting with longer body stops and (probably) longer string lengths?

[sospiri]

18 hours ago, Michael Darnton said:

OK, I'll take Sospiri's question seriously.

First, Robert Bein observed that violinists see violins as though through welding glasses (with a vague and unrefined impression of shape and color). Violin makers who aren't exposed to a lot of violins, and armchair experts have the same problem. In this case, I'd say that the things you are seeing are there in a small way, but not of sufficient density to overpower the actual points of identifying Bergonzi. This is an easy mistake to make if you aren't sufficiently skilled to tell different makers apart accurately, and in this regard heads are the hardest test of all and the last thing most people figure out. There is also the additional problem that it's rare that makers don't ever change how they do some things through time, and the opposing need to consider that there are some things they keep constant through time. So it's never just a matter of looking at two objects and seeing how they are the same or different in small details in isolation.

So, yes, I see some commonalities with Guarneri heads, as well as Rugeri, Stradivarl, and the entire Cremonese school, but that's not enough to say that any of those makers, all working in a similar tradition with a variety of commonalities, made those Bergonzi heads.

Second, I think you have your Guarneri family makers mixed up, but that's because you are following Roger H, who has his end-period Guarneri family makers and violins mixed up, in my opinion. 

Also, If you could see the real violins, you should immediately understand that the Guarneri heads you are comparing to Bergonzi don't bear nearly as much resemblance in 3D--for instance, that it's possible to look at two violins from the side and get an impression that can't survive at all when looking at them from the front or back.

If I may comment on something else, the reason you have such a lack of credibility around here is because your comments are often poisoned with aggressive contrarianism, in that you seem to feel the need to make your mark as being the only one who sees the obvious thing that only you see. That is not because you are smarter; it is because you are way short of knowing what you are talking about to the necessary depth to see your own errors (thus the reference earlier to Dunning/Kruger.)

And yet I considered every one of those points before I posted.

[J.DiLisio]

I think of Carlo Bergonzi as a bold stylist of his time.  It seems plainly obvious that he was making conscious choices to break with tradition while retaining the traditional methods and overall form.  It's similar to what DG was up to but taken in a different direction and executed with more precision.  The clean, straight lines of the scroll, ovular ff eyes, and narrow waist all add a sleekness that I imagine looked very modern for the time.  You can almost see the infant strands of Italian Futurism   
 These details might be lost to the average eye which is why I think Roger H refers to Carlo as a maker's maker.  You need to have some knowledge of the process as well as context to appreciate what he was doing.