Is the research on violin acoustics a viscious circle?

[Dr. Mark]

2 hours ago, Don Noon said:

you could probably make the argument based on percentage of output that pros want to play, that Strad was not exceptional.  He just made a ton of 'em.

Isn't it more accurate to say that he made 'a ton of' (comparatively) exceptional violins?  I presume this because it's been argued in this forum that Strads are tonally superior to Stainers, and elsewhere that they're superior to Amatis, so one question is whether it would it have made a difference to Strad's ascendance if there were a thousand more Stainers or Amatis available?  Maybe if (the purely fictional) Burgevari, Sora del Gesu, and other similar makers were working back then in the Cremona tradition and made an equivalent number of instruments, then a Strad would today be only one of a dozen essentially equivalent products - although I think the market would still be arguing over tonal nuances and niceties of the varnish.

49 minutes ago, jezzupe said:

violin making is not about science...it's about how much you bench

So ... implying that 'the usuals' are today's preferred instruments?

The point is that there seems to be a lot missing from such blanket statements.  Certainly, as you indicate, the number of products and the size of the market figure in...

[Pate Bliss]

1 hour ago, jezzupe said:

but back to Violinworld, one thing I do ponder is, lets just say there was some massive AI breakthrough

The attraction is working with wood and playing something made of wood.  It's not something lesser than programming a synthesizer or being a D.J.  When AI can make violins or play, it can also write our literature and govern us, so we will have bigger worries.  Speaking of me watching TV, are you sure you aren't playing out the stock plot of the anarchist showing all the stodgy conservatives what for? 

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzALZjoIx0g

[jezzupe]

2 hours ago, Dr. Mark said:

Isn't it more accurate to say that he made 'a ton of' (comparatively) exceptional violins?  I presume this because it's been argued in this forum that Strads are tonally superior to Stainers, and elsewhere that they're superior to Amatis, so one question is whether it would it have made a difference to Strad's ascendance if there were a thousand more Stainers or Amatis available?  Maybe if (the purely fictional) Burgevari, Sora del Gesu, and other similar makers were working back then in the Cremona tradition and made an equivalent number of instruments, then a Strad would today be only one of a dozen essentially equivalent products - although I think the market would still be arguing over tonal nuances and niceties of the varnish.

So ... implying that 'the usuals' are today's preferred instruments?

The point is that there seems to be a lot missing from such blanket statements.  Certainly, as you indicate, the number of products and the size of the market figure in...

No, I was implying that the only science that matters to any particular instrument maker is the science of statistics in that if one only builds 10 instruments the chances/odds of making something great are much slimmer than if he/she/it built 100, "how much you bench=how much time are you spending at your bench building" and that one is much more likely to learn or discover "something"  applicable doing vs. sitting there doing a bunch of math and science

Quite simply if 2 people were stuck on a dessert island, one found a bunch of woodworking tools and the other a bunch coconut powered "science stuff" and then they spent the rest of their days working on "stuff" I'm quite sure the guy who built violins would know more usable information about building than the guy who was studying "why" but never built anything.

[jezzupe]

2 hours ago, Bill Merkel said:

The attraction is working with wood and playing something made of wood.  It's not something lesser than programming a synthesizer or being a D.J.  When AI can make violins or play, it can also write our literature and govern us, so we will have bigger worries.  Speaking of me watching TV, are you sure you aren't playing out the stock plot of the anarchist showing all the stodgy conservatives what for? 

 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VzALZjoIx0g

The imaginary scenario I was envisioning was a violin maker asking an AI a series of questions and the receiving a series of answers that "magically" made it so he, or anyone could have a roadmap to not only making great "Strady" sounding violins, but also "somehow" have the roadmap to any additional sonic element one might want....all from the carving of wood, and Bill you should know by now, I am a stodgy conservative, with a large imagination, I mean I could never dance in front of those people wearing that outfit, and furthermore I get "flashdance" and "footloose" confused ,"Kevin Bacon eh'"? well ya, everyone likes bacon

[Pate Bliss]

I never realized how graceless she was.  I think the panel was applauding because they thought there might be thugs outside

[GoPractice]

7 hours ago, Don Noon said:

Not that Strad was a hack, but you could probably make the argument based on percentage of output that pros want to play, that Strad was not exceptional.  He just made a ton of 'em.

Maybe Guarneri was exceptional.

Sample size matters.

And arguably, the variety of what DGD offered knowingly or not *wink wink* matters.

But for Maestro Cox, an amazingly gifted artists like Yura Lee became a violist ( that is the inspiration of for many. ) 

[Oded Kishony]

The main obstacles that I see with violin ‘acoustical’ work:

the difficulty in establishing causality. Because violins are so responsive and delicate (the good ones anyway) any changes in the bridge position post tension or lag in time between changes pretty much nullifies the ‘cause and effect’ impressions.

IMHO the academic approach to studying violins just hasn’t proven to be appropriate as can be witnessed by the dearth of practical results or even novel acoustic techniques resulting from this work.

Violin sound needs to be approached holistically, understanding that the bow/string/player generates many multiple modes simultaneously and that they change during each bow stroke. It’s what makes the violin so enthralling.

I also believe that not enough attention has been given to psychoacoustic effects, both objective and subjective.

 

Oded

 

[GoPractice]

Just now, Oded Kishony said:

 ( ... )

Oded

Genius...

[GoPractice]

23 hours ago, Dwight Brown said:

No, I'm not even good enough to be the squirrel trainer  but I love it so. I'm right here in Buda,TX hanging out with my fellow budists , my teacher David Holland is still up on two legs and often uses his Raguse bow. Doug told me a great story about it once. I do own a Raguse violin bow that I really think it is excellent.

One of these days I will become an International diamond theif, contribute a billion dollars to the endowment and talk them out of a cabin on Green Lake. A born again Neanderthal like myself has to have an ambition.

DLB

(Dinner, Lunch, and Breakfast!)

No No NO.

If anything, a Professor Emeritus is in order... I have no influence but if there is a better Neanderthal. If we were to discuss how badly the Neos were treated.

Would it be beneficial for any school of music to help budding artists into better understanding the knowledge of tools? and the love/ the symbiotic relationship? Oddly, the whiteboard/ chalkboard has been that tool for me. ( fellow neo )

[Dr. Mark]

 

6 hours ago, jezzupe said:

No, I was implying that the only science that matters to any particular instrument maker is the science of statistics in that if one only builds 10 instruments the chances/odds of making something great are much slimmer than if he/she/it built 100, "how much you bench=how much time are you spending at your bench building" and that one is much more likely to learn or discover "something"  applicable doing vs. sitting there doing a bunch of math and science

Quite simply if 2 people were stuck on a dessert island, one found a bunch of woodworking tools and the other a bunch coconut powered "science stuff" and then they spent the rest of their days working on "stuff" I'm quite sure the guy who built violins would know more usable information about building than the guy who was studying "why" but never built anything.

So you're saying that it would it have made a difference to Strad's ascendance if there were a thousand more Stainers or Amatis available?  And that Stradivari only made better instruments because he made more violins than these other laggards?

Your second paragraph is just saying that if you don't make anything then you can't develop the skills to make anything.  Big deal -  arguing the extreme case doesn't add anything here.   Maybe you want to argue that Strad's 1000th violin was better than del Gesu's 200th; or that Nicolo Amati's 200th violin was better than Strad's 100th.  Good luck with that.

About the only things I might be able to agree with you about is this:  If you make more violins, more of them will be better than your average violin.  Whether your average violin improves over time depends on whether you're learning anything useful.  If Barty Guarneri made the ten violins they would probably all be better tonally than any of Stainer's 100 violins by modern standards.  The former were built differently and have different tonal qualities.

 

 

 

[Dwight Brown]

5 hours ago, GoPractice said:

No No NO.

If anything, a Professor Emeritus is in order... I have no influence but if there is a better Neanderthal. If we were to discuss how badly the Neos were treated.

Would it be beneficial for any school of music to help budding artists into better understanding the knowledge of tools? and the love/ the symbiotic relationship? Oddly, the whiteboard/ chalkboard has been that tool for me. ( fellow neo )

I have had that idea forever!  I would love to see Interlochen have a violin making school.  It would fit right in.  Joe Maddy's son Richard was a violin maker.  I still use the bridge he made for my school/college viola.  They have added a few new majors including a full blown film school.  I think they should have the junior and senior music majors study pedagogy and do some student teaching.

One problem is the school is so much more expensive than in my time. Think Harvard money!  The do offer a lot of scholarships and go the extra mile to get them to school.  The new buildings there are fantastic a bunch of viola alumni Got together and named the new viola studio, my name is even on the plaque.  My avatar is me with my teacher.

https://www.interlochen.org

Just getting to be time for camp to start!

DLB

[jezzupe]

1 hour ago, Dr. Mark said:

 

So you're saying that it would it have made a difference to Strad's ascendance if there were a thousand more Stainers or Amatis available?  And that Stradivari only made better instruments because he made more violins than these other laggards?

Your second paragraph is just saying that if you don't make anything then you can't develop the skills to make anything.  Big deal -  arguing the extreme case doesn't add anything here.   Maybe you want to argue that Strad's 1000th violin was better than del Gesu's 200th; or that Nicolo Amati's 200th violin was better than Strad's 100th.  Good luck with that.

About the only things I might be able to agree with you about is this:  If you make more violins, more of them will be better than your average violin.  Whether your average violin improves over time depends on whether you're learning anything useful.  If Barty Guarneri made the ten violins they would probably all be better tonally than any of Stainer's 100 violins by modern standards.  The former were built differently and have different tonal qualities.

 

 

 

No, I don't think I said or implied any of that,that's all you, I am simply talking about probabilities related to the general reality of engagement, I mean I suppose someone could spend a lifetime "doing it wrong" and produce 1000 duds of unplayable garbage, but then again, the "general" rules that "most" people after say 50? would start to get the hang of it and improve one way or another, but of course that's just the average within the spectrum...50% above 50% below as they say.

What you seem to be talking about is the "unholy" phrase "natural talent" that somehow seems to always get parsed out of the "conversation" these days. Of course these things have subversive undertones where it's "naughty" to talk about someone being "more better" than someone else as we are all special snowflakes as they would say in the "education" system and well everyone deserves a trophy, we can all be happy communists racing to the bottom of evenness.

This relates to this drone like expectation that "they" {whoever} put in x amount of years, studying with so and so, at such and such place of higher learning and so therefore "they" must "know" as they are educated, this logically fallacy is what got millions of kids, hell now adults, eternally enslaved with student loan debt, basically falling for some mantra chanted from the start of sophomore year, that all they need to do is get "educated" and then they would know how to do whatever it was they chose and get a high paying job and pay off their loan, ad we see how that's turned out, just more victims of a layered usury scam

Because of course my little story of production discounted the fact that someone could put in half the time into any endeavor and be twice as good/successful as many people who have tried much harder for much longer.

If I'd been playing basketball for 10 years before Michael Jordan was born I still don't think my 10 year head start would do me much good.

Again I will simply state,  average people who have taken up violin making and have the same amount of time into it , but one has made 20 more than the other guy, the one with more product will have a better chance "statistically" of having more better ones, of course the other guy could be super talented and therefore his smaller amount of product is superior, either through time or talent put into it , or maybe God just liked him better

My only mention of Strad, or anything "names" wise would have been secondarily through Don , in that I do feel the amount as he pointed out, does matter, statistically, with the amount of good ones.

I am not really hung up on the dead guys, I see that as a weekend at Bernie's show with high dollar antiques that I don't want to pay for, I totally respect it, and understand it's importance in "where we are today" and how we got here, but as I've said, being overly concerned with what the handful of dead Italians did 250-400 years ago is nice nostalgia wise, but it really isn't great for marketing in the here and now if you make new instrument.

here again it's just a feedback loop with performers having "Italian" expectations and comparisons about such things, I prefer Hillary Hahn's sound, and that's not Italian , but hey, that's just probably me, and well her too

 

[Michael Darnton]

https://www.gocomics.com/frazz/2023/05/31

[David Burgess]

2 hours ago, Michael Darnton said:

https://www.gocomics.com/frazz/2023/05/31

On the other hand, the “inside of the box” can also serve as strong, self-reinforcing echo chamber for either those who are desirous of such things, or for those who fail to take adequate protective steps.

"Echo? What echo?"

[Violadamore]

18 hours ago, Oded Kishony said:

The main obstacles that I see with violin ‘acoustical’ work:

the difficulty in establishing causality. Because violins are so responsive and delicate (the good ones anyway) any changes in the bridge position post tension or lag in time between changes pretty much nullifies the ‘cause and effect’ impressions.

IMHO the academic approach to studying violins just hasn’t proven to be appropriate as can be witnessed by the dearth of practical results or even novel acoustic techniques resulting from this work.

Violin sound needs to be approached holistically, understanding that the bow/string/player generates many multiple modes simultaneously and that they change during each bow stroke. It’s what makes the violin so enthralling.

I also believe that not enough attention has been given to psychoacoustic effects, both objective and subjective.

 

Oded

 

Words of great wisdom.  Good to see you posting. 

IMHO, particularly with regard to chasing the "Stradivari secret", too much attention has been given to psychoceramics, who tend to favor simplistic approaches. 

[Violadamore]

20 hours ago, jezzupe said:

I mean I could never dance in front of those people wearing that outfit...............

Just sharing that mental picture with us is vandalism enough. 

[Don Noon]

1 hour ago, David Burgess said:

... “inside of the box” can also serve as strong, self-reinforcing echo chamber for either those who are desirous of such things...

Seems to me that the vast majority of buyers want what's in the box, for whatever reason you like.  I'm happy to work within the traditional design requirements, which is challenging and interesting enough.

Although, someday, I wanna make a 5-string fiddle.

[David Beard]

I think the main difficulty with improvement through acoustic study is that most of the efforts transform into making measurables more specific.

But, it seems 'good violins' embody the opposite of that. They have broader and less specific response.

[Pate Bliss]

45 minutes ago, Don Noon said:

Although, someday, I wanna make a 5-string fiddle.

Too wild for me!

I had this thought the other night.  Holding a good violin in your hands, how successful a strategy for making would be making a new violin that feels the same way in your hands?  Not playing, just the way it feels in your hands?  Proper dimensions, etc. being a given

[Dr. Mark]

17 hours ago, jezzupe said:

No, I don't think I said or implied any of that,that's all you,

So I read this and its precedent to mean that we agree there's more than numbers involved in making good violins.  Thanks for clarifying.

Now if we could only that agree that effort and desire are only part of the equation.  It looks like we also agree that aptitude figures into it.  Now let's add training and education, and let's add to that an ability to learn (or at least the desire needed to make up for any lack of ability), and let's add to that some good luck to be in the right places at the right times.

17 hours ago, jezzupe said:

Of course these things have subversive undertones where it's "naughty" to talk about someone being "more better" than someone else as we are all special snowflakes as they would say in the "education" system and well everyone deserves a trophy, we can all be happy communists racing to the bottom of evenness...

So let's talk about someone with a better education, in the violin world perhaps an apprenticeship with a top master:

17 hours ago, jezzupe said:

This [...the "unholy" phrase "natural talent" ...] relates to this drone like expectation that "they" {whoever} put in x amount of years, studying with so and so, at such and such place of higher learning and so therefore "they" must "know" as they are educated, this logically (sic) fallacy is what...

...is borne out by Stradivari, and del Gesu, and the other top Renaissance masters, and probably most or all of our top violin makers today.   Strad may have apprenticed at the workshop of Nicolo Amati, which he claimed on a label I believe; Guarneri dG was from a violin-making family tracing its roots back to Andrea Guarneri who certainly apprenticed to Nicolo Amati in the 1640s.  Dang that education!  F. Ruger, alas, didn't quite pull his oar even though he also apprenticed to Amati - must be that 'natural talent' thing and drone-like expectations...

N. Amati was from a violin-making family and he was lucky enough to have survived the plague, but it meant he needed apprentices.

17 hours ago, jezzupe said:

Again I will simply state,  average people who have taken up violin making and have the same amount of time into it , but one has made 20 more than the other guy, the one with more product will have a better chance "statistically" of having more better ones, of course the other guy could be super talented and therefore his smaller amount of product is superior, either through time or talent put into it , or maybe God just liked him better

...and I agree with you, given the condition of ceteris paribus - i.e. pure and perfect communism with uniform apportionment in all things related e.g. education and training, ability, available materials, effort, tools, attitude, environment, desire, mental health, luck, ... etc.  Can you think of a good reason to continue our conversation on this topic?  I think we've both stated our convictions pretty clearly now.

[Andreas Preuss]

On 5/30/2023 at 10:07 AM, martin swan said:

Does the desire to innovate really come from a need to produce a better instrument or is it to do with differentiating yourself from other makers in a very crowded and competitive field?

Let’s put it like this: I am a very curious person. I am curious about new ideas in design and its possibilities. 

There are certain things which certainly can be improved in terms of ergonomics and durability. To me this can’t be done without performers who are using  the instruments. 

Concerning classic violin making I am asking myself many questions. is it a goal to duplicate a certain sound quality from old instruments? Yes, but is it also a goal to go further and try to clone the sound of specific instruments? Is the equation correct that there is only one and only construction achieves a specific desirable sound? Certainly not. 

[Andrew tkinson]

17 hours ago, jezzupe said:

No, I don't think I said or implied any of that,that's all you, I am simply talking about probabilities related to the general reality of engagement, I mean I suppose someone could spend a lifetime "doing it wrong" and produce 1000 duds of unplayable garbage, but then again, the "general" rules that "most" people after say 50? would start to get the hang of it and improve one way or another, but of course that's just the average within the spectrum...50% above 50% below as they say.

What you seem to be talking about is the "unholy" phrase "natural talent" that somehow seems to always get parsed out of the "conversation" these days. Of course these things have subversive undertones where it's "naughty" to talk about someone being "more better" than someone else as we are all special snowflakes as they would say in the "education" system and well everyone deserves a trophy, we can all be happy communists racing to the bottom of evenness.

This relates to this drone like expectation that "they" {whoever} put in x amount of years, studying with so and so, at such and such place of higher learning and so therefore "they" must "know" as they are educated, this logically fallacy is what got millions of kids, hell now adults, eternally enslaved with student loan debt, basically falling for some mantra chanted from the start of sophomore year, that all they need to do is get "educated" and then they would know how to do whatever it was they chose and get a high paying job and pay off their loan, ad we see how that's turned out, just more victims of a layered usury scam

Because of course my little story of production discounted the fact that someone could put in half the time into any endeavor and be twice as good/successful as many people who have tried much harder for much longer.

If I'd been playing basketball for 10 years before Michael Jordan was born I still don't think my 10 year head start would do me much good.

Again I will simply state,  average people who have taken up violin making and have the same amount of time into it , but one has made 20 more than the other guy, the one with more product will have a better chance "statistically" of having more better ones, of course the other guy could be super talented and therefore his smaller amount of product is superior, either through time or talent put into it , or maybe God just liked him better

My only mention of Strad, or anything "names" wise would have been secondarily through Don , in that I do feel the amount as he pointed out, does matter, statistically, with the amount of good ones.

I am not really hung up on the dead guys, I see that as a weekend at Bernie's show with high dollar antiques that I don't want to pay for, I totally respect it, and understand it's importance in "where we are today" and how we got here, but as I've said, being overly concerned with what the handful of dead Italians did 250-400 years ago is nice nostalgia wise, but it really isn't great for marketing in the here and now if you make new instrument.

here again it's just a feedback loop with performers having "Italian" expectations and comparisons about such things, I prefer Hillary Hahn's sound, and that's not Italian , but hey, that's just probably me, and well her too

 

I hope nobody minds if I mention the name Stradivari in the same sentence as the words Chicken Sexer?

I used to be sceptical when I heard about instrument makers being able to use their hands and be able to magically judge the potential of wood or when to stop thicknessing etc, to be able to use their especially sensitive fingers along with other gifts to be able to get the results they desired in their violins or guitars. I suppose I doubted these things because, sadly, I don't have any abilities like this.

I then heard about the highly paid job of chicken sexer, a person who can very quickly and accurately judge if a very young chick is male or female, a talent that, it was believed, could not be learned but was a natural 'gift'. 

After hearing about these special natural abilities, sensitivities, I am now much less sceptical about some of the seemingly super human talents which have been attributed to some very gifted instrument makers.

Since I first heard about the chicken sexer, I have read that it is, in fact, a skill which can be learned but I presume that a few individuals will find it easier than most ordinary mortals and their abilities will very likely improve as they spend more time at their chicken 'bench'?

Perhaps we are fortunate that Cremona was not, as far as I know, a centre for poultry production, as Stradivari, with his innate special skills and sharp eye may have been tempted by the large financial reward away from the path he took and the many violin enthusiasts of today would be discussing and arguing about someone else?

[Dr. Mark]

 

51 minutes ago, Andrew tkinson said:

I hope nobody minds...

Next time, before you start do the following exercise:

Feet on the floor in a comfortable, relaxed standing position.

Deep breath...hold, and - now focus on your violin -how luscious and deep the varnish is, the sinewy curl of the scroll ...1...2...3.... now release.  And again deep breathe, focus...1...

[David Burgess]

1 hour ago, Andrew tkinson said:

Perhaps we are fortunate that Cremona was not, as far as I know, a centre for poultry production, as Stradivari, with his innate special skills and sharp eye may have been tempted by the large financial reward away from the path he took and the many violin enthusiasts of today would be discussing and arguing about someone else?

Nah. We could argue about whether Stradivari could have correctly identified trans-gender and gender-fluid chickens.

[Andrew tkinson]

25 minutes ago, David Burgess said:

Nah. We could argue about whether Stradivari could have correctly identified trans-gender and gender-fluid chickens.

David, I think this chicken topic should be moved to The 'Peckbox' message board!