The advertizing for the upcoming Cremona violin making competition, ouch!

[Dwight Brown]

I have a Heifetz number of 2 

better than that how about a Sousa number of 2!!

DLB

[LCF]

6 minutes ago, Dwight Brown said:

I have a Heifetz number of 2 

better than that how about a Sousa number of 2!!

DLB

Ooopah!

[LCF]

Symphony orchestras are so incestuous and working musicians so industrious it might be better to index it via being a pupil of, or pupil of a pupil of etc. Might have to draw the line at attending a masterclass. 

[Dwight Brown]

Does it count if you taught the guy to play shuffle board in a red neck bar in northern Michigan??

DLB

[LCF]

4 minutes ago, Dwight Brown said:

Does it count if you taught the guy to play shuffle board in a red neck bar in northern Michigan??

DLB

I would count it 

[LCF]

On 5/22/2024 at 5:47 AM, Whittler said:

.... I will probably utilize holly for purflings (it's invasive here in the Pacific NW U.S.)- another disqualifier.   

While I remember,  holly is good for purfling if you can get large straight pieces to slice up. Nice white as-is, stain it for blacks. 

[Whittler]

First, errata / mea culpa:

tooth-drawn [sic, teeth-drawn] Upon further consideration, tooth-drawn would be like a one-handed clap. 

  It may be observed that we all say things off-the-cuff which we don't nec. really mean. Often this can be due to any number of distractions, individual or shared (we're all snollygasterianistically inundated, for example, which has its effects). Upon further consideration, I believe I really meant that since Dr. Mark is clearly an intelligent, educated and cultured person, I'd imagine that he probably doesn't actually think that Vince Neil is an imitation of anyone or anything, and might have meant something else. Stating that someone may have meant such-and-such a thing in particular is a projection, and therefor presumption, and poor form. Sincere apologies for this faux pas. Also sincere apologies to Joey Chestnut for characterizing his profession as "gluttony" (even though, according to Merriam-Webster's, likely the most-used dictionary reference for Americans, def. 1, it is exactly that. Upon further consideration (on the heels of further investigation), I'm concerned about def. 2, and its implications. Gluttony has long been considered a moral / ethical flaw (and even one of the Seven Deadly Sins), whereas in actuality, much of the time, some people are simply plagued by certain physiological and psychological predictions toward over-eating (incl. some people who are personally dear to me, and good, moral, and decent human beings). Eating disorders can be very serious, requiring urgent and sustained medical treatment. This is not at all what professional eating is about. I'm learning that pro eaters are, as becomes evident upon visting the Major League Eating website, actual athletes, who train rigorously to perform their freakish feats of mass consumption, and they don't generally hurl afterwards (although it is said to occasionally occur). Also, there is more to their technique than just "jamming...down their gullet(s)"; there's evidently a real science to the chewing part, and efficiency in this regard is critical to successful competition. Two dogs simultaneously, followed by two buns simultaneously (dipped) seems to be the broadly-adopted, proven methodology. I'm not sure who developed this, but the better-ranked eaters, from what I can observe, overwhemingly seem to favor it, or a close variation thereof. You can see the top 50 competitors, with stats and photos on the site. Interestingly, only about three appear to even be what could be called heavy-set physically, and just one is really outsized, like a sumo build. Every one of the rest of them, both male and female, are lean and athletic. Many are actually skinny, or "wiry". I did not know that. 

LCF, thank you for explaining the meaning of BN. I'd heard of "Degrees of Separation from the Queen", etc., but not "Six Degrees of KB, and was interested to learn that it's somewhat derived from the Erdos Number. Love the way that guy dressed (is that a fat pen of some sort in his lapel pocket, ready for scratching out horribly complicated math formulas at a moment's notice?), and his wonderful eccentricity (no fixed home, a peripatetic math genius, apparently). Also not to be missed, is G.H. Hardy. His 6 New Year's resolutions and overall brilliant weirdness described in the Wiki personality section are well worth reading, imho. Have you actually directly worked in a movie with someone who has done the same with KB? If I understand correctly, according to the rules, that's the requirement for a BN of 2, and all games must have agreed-upon rules. I've realized another, rather serious, deficiency in the Cremona Rules, unfortunately.

"...some arbitrary violinist."  Perlman belongs here too- tough to select only one. Re. holly, I believe the stuff I've located will cut nicely, but it's still growing so will need considerable seasoning. For blacks I intend to look closely at trad. walnut shell staining, as it's said to remain very black for centuries. Wouldn't seem prudent to overlook or supplant something that well proven without good cause.  

Regards

 

[Whittler]

Actually, upon further review, maybe that's a cigar in the lapel pocket. Erdos is in his mature years in the Wiki photo, so they would have been avail. in aluminum tubes. 

The perceived serious flaw in the Cremona competition rules has been described in this very thread. In my own sort of ruminant way, amidst numerous other things going on, I've just realized it's significance. If I'm understanding correctly, the jury will reject any instrument which doesn't meet their very high standards for workmanship, excluding said instrument from my any further consideration. Doesn't that mean that numerous genuine Guarnerius instruments would be excluded and denied even a hearing, due to sloppy f-holes and various unrefined tooling marks? 

[Davide Sora]

14 minutes ago, Whittler said:

Actually, upon further review, maybe that's a cigar in the lapel pocket. Erdos is in his mature years in the Wiki photo, so they would have been avail. in aluminum tubes. 

The perceived serious flaw in the Cremona competition rules has been described in this very thread. In my own sort of ruminant way, amidst numerous other things going on, I've just realized it's significance. If I'm understanding correctly, the jury will reject any instrument which doesn't meet their very high standards for workmanship, excluding said instrument from my any further consideration. Doesn't that mean that numerous genuine Guarnerius instruments would be excluded and denied even a hearing, due to sloppy f-holes and various unrefined tooling marks? 

Do you mean the original Guarneri del Gesù, or the Del Gesù model violins?

[Whittler]

errata / edits: 

predictions [sic, predelictions] *auto-spell possession here- it tried again just now.

snollygasterianistically [sic, snollygosterianistically] *self-typo, possible Freudian slip.

Yes sir, I was referring to the original Guarneri del Gesu` instruments. I've never examined one, so rely entirely on the written opinions of respected, qualified experts (which, not being delusional, I clearly don't consider to include myself), who state that some of his workmanship tended toward inconsistent, somewhat sloppy execution- iirc, the f-holes, as mentioned. 

 

[Davide Sora]

1 hour ago, Whittler said:

Yes sir, I was referring to the original Guarneri del Gesu` instruments. I've never examined one, so rely entirely on the written opinions of respected, qualified experts (which, not being delusional, I clearly don't consider to include myself), who state that some of his workmanship tended toward inconsistent, somewhat sloppy execution- iirc, the f-holes, as mentioned.

It's hard to say, each jury could have different opinions. Furthermore, we do not know what del Gesù's violins looked like with all the varnish intact and without the wear of time. The charm that a lived-in ancient instrument exerts is an integral part of its appearance, and this would be missing. At the Cremona Triennale, there would be a serious risk of not reaching the minimum score threshold given by the luthiers (300 points out of 500). If you don't get them, you don't access the musicians' test; therefore, at most, it would end up in the lower part of the ranking.

Then we cannot generalize, from the point of view of workmanship the violins of Del Gesù are quite variable, some are good and others not, and even in his time he was certainly not the best in terms of workmanship. The artistic value attributed to them is not an objective thing, in a competition you cannot count on too subjective aspects if you want to meet the unanimous approval of the jury (which is essential to win).

 

[Marty Kasprzyk]

1 hour ago, Davide Sora said:

It's hard to say, each jury could have different opinions. Furthermore, we do not know what del Gesù's violins looked like with all the varnish intact and without the wear of time. The charm that a lived-in ancient instrument exerts is an integral part of its appearance, and this would be missing. At the Cremona Triennale, there would be a serious risk of not reaching the minimum score threshold given by the luthiers (300 points out of 500). If you don't get them, you don't access the musicians' test; therefore, at most, it would end up in the lower part of the ranking.

Then we cannot generalize, from the point of view of workmanship the violins of Del Gesù are quite variable, some are good and others not, and even in his time he was certainly not the best in terms of workmanship. The artistic value attributed to them is not an objective thing, in a competition you cannot count on too subjective aspects if you want to meet the unanimous approval of the jury (which is essential to win).

 

I think the musician's tests should be first.  If a violin sounds good enough it then can be entered in the worksmanship judging.  

[Whittler]

On 6/14/2024 at 9:09 PM, LCF said:

Ooopah!

Imagined the sound of shattering ceramic, so I searched. Nope- Sousa's heritage was German/ Portuguese. A missing m here?

[Whittler]

Lost a long-winded reply; usually the system saves partially completed texts when interrupted. I'm in a rural area with sometimes primaitive wifi, and will have to try later. 

[Davide Sora]

On 6/21/2024 at 2:30 AM, Marty Kasprzyk said:

I think the musician's tests should be first.  If a violin sounds good enough it then can be entered in the worksmanship judging.  

I think both judgments (luthiers and musicians) should be given to all instruments, without making one subordinate to the other. This was once the case at the Triennale, then at some point, the regulations were changed to lighten the load on the musicians and avoid hasty tests and hasty judgments, given that it is not possible to give a definitive acoustic judgment in a few minutes (seconds?) of testing. And also to give more weight to the violin-making aspect. In the end, whoever wins will be exhibited in a museum with very little (no?) chance of being played. This seems to me to be the most negative aspect of this competition.

[Whittler]

Appreciate reading everyone's comments. Recalling some other things from the Guarneri del Gesu` book now (from reading through it a bit more than 20 years ago- not researching). A man whose work was preferred to Stradivari's by some musicians of the caliber of, for just one very famous example, Paganini, is to be properly regarded (meaning in context), and of course is. I wonder how he was even able to sell the lesser examples of his work (iirc, from his later, financially and maybe health distressed period). Who would have purchased these, and for what price range (at the time, exclusive of today's historic / collectable value), compared to his best work? Also, I wonder if any of the apparently cobbled-together instruments sound good anyway, compared to his better ones, and whether first-chair musicians play any of these today. Upon further reflection, once again it appears that in the interest of correctness I might be compelled to retract / reverse my statement re. "the perceived serious flaw in the Cremona competition rules". Upon further reflection, I don't see how any full-time pro luthier in today's market could survive economically without very clean joinery and finishing, so the odds of some brilliant luthier being excluded on the basis of a few cosmetic flaws might be very slim to none, and therefore moot. Personally, I'm maybe more concerned (though as mentioned, less so than re. the compensation scheme for the competition winners), about the full-time pro requirement, as it does seem possible that perhaps very talented and worthy part-timers, or even gifted amateur luthiers could be excluded, to the loss of all. Perhaps a regional contest win at some level, or recognized expert appraisal requirement could weed out the hopeful-but-not-really-up-to-par aspirants, something like athletic trials. This in some way pertains to the ancient tale of Excalibur, considered by some historians to be a reiteration of earlier, pre-Saxon, Celtic practices, where anyone regardless of socio-economic class  could ascend even to the kingship on sheer proven ability. This was meant to prevent stagnation in the noble / ruling class by intermittently infusing "fresh blood" (in the days of warrior kings, too often literally). But back to matters relating to civilization, peace and humanities, of which music may be seen as a prime hallmark, I hadn't considered that there could be a volume of applicants burden which could affect the jury's ability to judge effectively and fairly. Also, it should be mentioned that organizing and executing such an international competition would not be quick or easy to do well, and noted that Mr. Burgess (who certainly would know) has stated that he feels it is still the best competition of it's kind. Further, Giuseppe del Gesu` Guarneri was not just a highly-regarded luthier, but also a human being- with all the economic and other survival pressures most or actually all people have to deal with. He was apparently, and may genuinely have been, committed to his spirituality, and perhaps chose to demonstrate this by his signature, including a faith-name (though it also or otherwise may have been a social conformity- I'm certainly no expert, just remembering only a few things from perusing a book many years ago). His lifetime of works have inspired and enabled very many musicians, luthiers, and countless human audiences for several centuries, and will continue to do so far into the future. Well done and Thank You, Giuseppe. Salutations and Blessings.

[Whittler]

 I absolutely agree that the winning instruments should be played, and regularly too, and suggest a better scheme for the prizes. Long before the Cremonese classic lutherie period, dating back to the Romans, (and before then to the Greek culture which influenced them), championship prizes were generally rather substantial, from what we can gather. The current Triennial rules to my discernment not only shamefully undervalue the winners' proven price (no way to treat a champion) and essentially commit these very fine instruments to formaldehyde, in a museum case, rather than doing what they were born to do (no way to treat a champion), but also egregiously miss the added real-market value, above the luthiers' proven price, of specific instruments which have won prizes in Cremona, the birth-place and ground-zero for viol-family instrument lutherie. It seems to me that royal, noble, and/or simply wealthy patronage / sponsorship has played an integral and very important part in the development and refinement of these instruments (and for that matter, for classical music itself) for every one of the most acclaimed makers, from early on. What about auctioning the winning instruments to pre-qualified bidders, even corporate entities, who would agree to donate the instruments to the foundation, to be played, examined, and appreciated long into the future? Bidding would start at the makers' proven market price, and they would remit a commission to the foundation upon final sale, just like any auction. Some patrons have ample means, and even receive tax benefits for charitable donations. Patrons' names, year of sponsorship, luthiers' names with pertinent info, incl. prize ranking, would of course go on a plaque in the place/s of exhibition, as well as in their cases, and maybe on the concert brochures / websites where the instruments are played. Thinking "Strings of the Champions", "Official Sponsors of the Cremona Triennale", etc. Win-win-win, no?

[Dr. Mark]

On 6/17/2024 at 10:57 PM, Whittler said:

I'd imagine that he probably doesn't actually think that Vince Neil is an imitation of anyone or anything

Vince Neil is a stage name.

On 6/23/2024 at 10:21 PM, Whittler said:

Further, Giuseppe del Gesu` Guarneri was not just a highly-regarded luthier, but also a human being- with all the economic and other survival pressures most or actually all people have to deal with. He was evidently strongly committed to his spirituality, demonstrating this by his chosen signature,

With little enough information we can imagine just about anything we want to. 

In the top rank of modern violin makers there appear to be many violins with, it seems (see previous sentence) little enough to consistently differentiate among them, in quality of tone or workmanship.  Most everyone seems to build the same way, and although varnishes differ there are enough formulations of 'good' varnish that differences are sort of lost in the noise. Color is pretty much standardized - bright red or blue violins aren't taken seriously.  Everyone knows what their options are because the world has shrunk and news travels fast.

It seems in the Brescia-Cremona glory days there were marked regional differences in construction and materials.  The best players played the best instruments they could find that they could afford, and played them hard.  What were considered best were violins from cities or provinces, not necessarily from makers.  Once a reputation was gained, which could take decades, it could be more years or decades before makers from elsewhere become aware of it, and even longer to acquire an example and work out what was different about it.  Then they would still have a collection of their own instruments that they needed to sell.  On top of that, any reputation could be misleading because knowledge and information exchange was comparatively primitive and a musical style that showcases certain tonal characteristics may not have caught on locally.  Peter of Mantua built high-arch instruments despite Stradivari and his own nephew's work.  There wasn't much in the way of market analysis.  Imagine playing the Cannon in an orchestra full of Stainers.

In time players decided there was something about Cremona and it topped out in reputation.  Stradivari's were beautifully constructed, owned by nobility, and had wonderful tone and playability.  But there was also something special about Barty Guarneri. And Carlo Bergonzi although he seems to have been a bit short of product.  All the best players played on Cremonas, adding to their reputation and history.  You heard them live or didn't hear them, and once Viotti, Rode, Spohr, Paganini, ... produced beautiful tone, the onus to create tone pretty much shifted to the player of these Cremonese violins.

Those days, and that opportunity, are gone and gone for good.  That's my story, but I'm not sticking to it necessarily.

 

 

[Whittler]

As mentioned, sure wish there were an edit function, to add or improve existing posts without having to post anew. 

* The Excalibur mention is meant to illustrate a principle very loosely, and actually wasn't entirely apt, as there likely isn't much degeneration in the level of lutherie winning prizes at Cremona.

* Also, I should have said "including responsible, good-citizen corporate entities"- definitely no bad actors- strictly defined, one would strongly prefer.

[LCF]

28 minutes ago, Whittler said:

As mentioned, sure wish there were an edit function, to add or improve existing posts without having to post anew. 

 

The edit function is available by clicking on the three dots at the top right hand side of the message window. 

I originally typed clucking rather than clicking, you can try that too. 

[Whittler]

On 6/23/2024 at 2:17 PM, Davide Sora said:

I think both judgments (luthiers and musicians) should be given to all instruments, without making one subordinate to the other. 

Certainly agree. I might venture to say, even amongst such learned company as may be found here, that the playing trials perhaps ought to take first precedence (meaning should be undertaken first). If an instrument does not sound great, should it, or would it ever take first place on points made up in further categories? Virtuoso and professional recording musicians are known sometimes to prefer beat-up, abused, oft-repaired, and even at times somewhat harder to play instruments if they can get superior tone from them. So long as an instrument's deficiencies do not impede an artist's best performance, tone trumps all. Are they not, first and foremost, sound-producing devices?

edit:

Marty said that before- agree with you, sir.

Thanks for the tip, LCF. An "edit" label could be useful to the techno-deficient there, imho. B'caaack!

[Whittler]

The Doctor is in- very glad to read your xlnt post, sir. Have further comments.

[Davide Sora]

2 hours ago, Whittler said:

Certainly agree. I might venture to say, even amongst such learned company as may be found here, that the playing trials perhaps ought to take first precedence (meaning should be undertaken first). If an instrument does not sound great, should it, or would it ever take first place on points made up in further categories? Virtuoso and professional recording musicians are known sometimes to prefer beat-up, abused, oft-repaired, and even at times somewhat harder to play instruments if they can get superior tone from them. So long as an instrument's deficiencies do not impede an artist's best performance, tone trumps all. Are they not, first and foremost, sound-producing devices?

edit:

Marty said that before- agree with you, sir.

Thanks for the tip, LCF. An "edit" label could be useful to the techno-deficient there, imho. B'caaack!

If this were the case (only the sound counts), why let the luthiers judge the workmanship? Musicians would be enough. Unfortunately, the sound is quite problematic to judge objectively, especially when you have to judge 300 instruments in a couple of days. An objective judgment is impossible, we tend to give too much value to competition, which in my opinion leaves the time they find. The real value for a luthier would be the possibility of comparison that they offer beyond the judgment of a few people (the jury), to see what other makers are doing, and a bit of advertisement for those who take home the medals.

PS After all these criticisms of the Cremona Triennale, I expect the same analysis and criticism of the regulations of all the other competitions, just to be fair and to not advertise only and always Cremona.

[David Burgess]

11 hours ago, Davide Sora said:

PS After all these criticisms of the Cremona Triennale, I expect the same analysis and criticism of the regulations of all the other competitions, just to be fair and to not advertise only and always Cremona.

There was a competition in Germany one year in which a surprising number of the winners just happened to be related to the judges....

14 hours ago, Whittler said:

I might venture to say, even amongst such learned company as may be found here, that the playing trials perhaps ought to take first precedence (meaning should be undertaken first). If an instrument does not sound great, should it, or would it ever take first place on points made up in further categories?

Most instruments are purchased by players, and most players (aside from student beginners) already know what they individually prefer in sound and playing properties. But they tend to know very little about the workmanship and artistry incorporated in the making of an instrument, so it can be argued that this is the area in which a competition can provide the most valuable or practical assistance.

[Dr. Mark]

22 hours ago, Whittler said:

Have further comments.

Oh, no thanks.  I have plenty and I need to weed out those that are off-topic.