Posted on 11/30/2011 8:48:15 PM PST by afraidfortherepublic
There are many guitarists that refinish the satin to give a clear coat just for the sound. It doesn’t seem that it would matter, and I can’t tell you what the reasons are. But I trust my guitarist friends to know what they are doing and to tell the real reasons they do it,lol.
There’s a lot of mystique to this stuff. If China starts putting out sub-$100 Strad sonic copies, no matter how good they sound, it won’t even put a tiny scratch on the market in the historical instruments. Though a lot of amateur fiddlers will be tickled.
That makes more sense that doing virtually the same thing 1000 times, lol. Not the best reporting.
I kind of wonder, if there were “improvements” to the sound a violin can make would there eventually become a new standard? As you say, the Mystique factor could play a large part in whether or not the sound would be considered an “improvement”.
It would be almost a sublime-to-ridiculous moment to see a big city Philharmonic release a recording “featuring the new Chinese Strad-alike in both string section and soloist!” Even if it sounded like it had gotten halfway to heaven.
I think the secret o the Stradivarius wasn’t merely the design and construction (which is all a CAT scan will show) but the very wood that he had available to make them with.
I think it had something to do with the “little ice age” and the wood that Stradivari had. I don’t think there is any way to duplicate it, without having the 17th century wood that he had.
Would it soon follow that original Strads end up on ebay for $999 with free shipping? Of course that would never happen because of the historical factor to the instruments, but a paradigm shift in violin sound quality could make them obsolete as a viable instrument for the Philharmonic.
****but the very wood that he had available to make them with****
A very good point. This reminds me of the Gibson wood importing brouhaha. There are only so many sources of the best woods, and we don’t have the true best woods around anymore.
yah... And more to the point: to find that sort of wood means going back in time.
One of the few American imports into China (and Japan) are Fender and Gibson.
Bingo. Not to mention that the same instrument can sound different with each player. It's similar to in Harry Potter, the wand choses the wizard. When lil miss was getting a new instrument the owner of the best place in the state worked with her for over an hour trying this one and that one. Some were beautiful, others caused ear bleeding. We kept going back to one each time. After she had decided on it, the owner played it to show her that their two sounds were different. It was futher proved when lil miss' teacher had the same brand but she also produced a different sound.
Well... even here I’d say not so fast, it reads like these guys measured the density of the wood too and found the closest thing possible, and it’s panning out with only three instruments built so far. Earth has no shortage of woods in a vast variety of densities from balsa to ironwood, and there are always synthetic materials.
This isn’t black magic. It’s science and technology making the previously impractical possible. I don’t think anybody studied the structure of these historic violins this closely before. It would have required dis-assembly of a known good violin and much manual work with a micrometer. Instead they used a smart X-ray.
India isn’t lacking any of the rosewood that Gibson uses, and doesn’t expect to run out. Rosewood grows wonderfully in India. The fuss originated from some overly pointy headed US bureaucrat who decided that India’s law for monitoring the export of rosewood was tighter than India itself was regarding it to be, and invoked the Lacey Act. Gibson was having fingerboard blanks made of rosewood in India then machining them to exact dimensions in the USA. India’s inspectors were giving the export of these blanks the nod. The screechy US bureaucrat said they took exception to this, that the fingerboard should be machined to exact dimensions in India. And nobody in India was complaining about the status quo! This is an utterly political problem, not a problem of natural resources.
So where can I buy one for my violinist daughter?
At any frequency (most apparent at an object's NVF ~ "natural vibrating frequency") the sound will be more sharp clear, harmonically dense and well-defined when emanated from a vibrating object with a smooth, glassy surface... in much the same way a tiled shower room will resonate more fully than a room draped in blankets.
Thickness and cellular density of the wood itself matters, as well, but ultimately, the smoothness and uniformity of the coating on the surface will have the final "say," so to "speak."
Just sayin...
Feel free to substitute “clear” or “glossy” for the term “silk” used in my previous reply.
Not to hijack the thread, but China is currently the #3 destination in the world, behind Mexico and Canada, for U.S. exports.
And I’ll bet your lil miss kept going back to the most expensive instrument in the place. In my experience, lil misses have an unerring instinct for that.
I guess the bottom line is that many people from the Strad era had access to the same woods but Strad had a great ear and access to much tested and maybe proprietary chems involved in the process. And there is no doubt that Strads do have a construction advantage that was due to his diligent experience.
To recreate that passion to sound with inferior construction materials is a losing proposition unless modern techniques can use available materials to match or better the old school.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.