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In Reply to: Wrong question… posted by David Aiken on April 4, 2007 at 13:44:46:
"Violins and other musical instruments don't reproduce music, they are used to make music. How an instrument sounds depends on how it is played. Good instruments do a number of things better than poorer instruments: they offer a wider range of tonal shadings, they offer a wider dynamic range, they project sound better, they are easier to play than really bad instruments but this particular difference should disappear relatively quickly as the quality of the instrument improves."Actually David, from personal experience I can tell you that this is not the case. Professional violinists hate to be with an inferior instrument because it GREATLY limits what they can do with the sound. It is like asking Gary Kasparov to play chess without some pieces (I was told he played a match once starting a pawn down as a handicap and afterwards swore never to do it again because it was too distressing) or asking a painter to compose a work with only 8 colors in his palette.
According to my ex, the Strad she played on for about 7 months was one of the hardest instruments that she had played, not because it was harder to get good sound, in fact there are many instruments no matter how well played will not sound as good as a Strad even merely competently played, but because the palette is so broad it takes time and talent to master.
She once had three top class instruments to try out: A Stradivarius (and a good example of the breed from the early 1720s), a Guarneri del Gesu (not the best but still world class sound), and a Guadinini (wonderful from about the same period). The sound of the three couldn't have been more different (it was measurable as well and we did it just for fun), The strad was bold and rich with extreme powers of projection. The Guarneri sounded powerful as well but very dark by comparison with comparatively less upper octave energy (this playing the very same notes in the same way). Finally, the Guad was light and airy and quite beautiful sounding but lacking the projection capabilities of the other two, making it better suited to chamber music.
In fact the cheap violins all sounded more similar rather than different. They all sounded more or less like hollow boxes of wood with vibrating strings than what these masterpieces sounded like. No matter how well they were played the beauty of the music was diminished. Musicians go mad to play top instruments because it can literally make or break an audition or concert. Its like riding in the Tour de France on a bike with one wheel!!
"In the end, a Stradivarius may produce a different sound simply because of the way the player feels about it,"
No, it sounds different because it IS different and shockingly better and more powerful sounding than most other violins...the difference in the hands of a professional is not subtle.
Follow Ups:
nice to hear confirmation from personal experience.
I had hoped that I had made your point that "Professional violinists hate to be with an inferior instrument because it GREATLY limits what they can do with the sound" when I said of good instruments that they "… offer a wider range of tonal shadings, they offer a wider dynamic range, they project sound better…". You definitely said it better than me on that point.You're right about good instruments taking time and effort to master. There's no doubt about that and it also takes skill. A good instrument in the hands of an amateur won't produce anything like what a skilled player can produce from it, even before they spend the time and effort learning to get the best from it.
You're right about cheap instruments sounding similar. It takes skill and effort to make a responsive instrument and good instrument makers work miracles. I had a classical guitar made for me by a local maker over 40 years ago now, and he was very good. Watching him make instruments, lutes and other renaissance fretted instruments as well as guitars, was an education in itself. It also makes a cheap lie out of Sonus Faber's advertising claim that their speakers are made in the tradition of fine instruments. A speaker cabinet and a musical instrument are 2 entirely different things and a lute, violin or guitar built the way Sonus Faber build their cabinets is not an instrument I'd like to own :-)
You quoted my statement "In the end, a Stradivarius may produce a different sound simply because of the way the player feels about it," and responded "No, it sounds different because it IS different and shockingly better and more powerful sounding than most other violins...the difference in the hands of a professional is not subtle."
I agree wholeheartedly. The point I was making was a continuation of my previous paragraph, that even if the Strad and something else 'sounded the same'—whatever that meant by whatever test someone crazily designed to try and prove or disprove that statement—it would still sound different because of the difference in the way the player felt about it. That's simply one of the things that makes trying to measure instruments an almost pointless task. Standardised mechanical playing won't bring out the range of what the instrument can offer, and once you remove the standardisation and let the player include their response to the instrument in the way they play it, you've ensured that they'll do something different with each instrument and you've destroyed comparability again in a different way.
I envy your wife her time with the Strad and the other instruments you mention, and I envy you your time with her and them. I really don't think you hear the best of many instruments in a performance venue. Individually at least, many instruments are best heard and appreciated in a living room, at much closer distances, more moderate levels, and in what is essentially a much more intimate environment in every way. There's something you get there, when there is a personal interaction between the listener and performer, that you can never get elsewhere. Who cares if part of that is simply your emotional response to the moment rather than a real difference in sound, though I'll swear there is that difference. It's those sort of musical moments that keep me coming back to music in other settings, whether live or recorded. It's those moments that give me my reference for how a particular sort of instrument sounds and, more importantly, for how music sounds. They may not be the most brilliant performances but they're the performances that stick in the heart in a special way and show me at least just what the value of music is.
Does that put my comments in a more agreeable perspective for you? :-)))))))))
Hi David,
Thanks for the follow up. I hope I didn't come across too aggressive. I think its great that you have such experience with guitars. I have friend her who plays Flamenco semi-professionally and he just HAD to have a guitar from one of the great makers in Spain. Just sounds better.The acoustic power of a violin is a bit shocking in a moderate sized room. In a big hall it is easy to think it a small sounding instrument. It is not at all and I was stunned more than once when I realized the instrument was pressurizing the whole room! I could feel my ears pulsing physically! I used to sit and listen to her practice for hours. She thought I was nuts but I loved it.
You are right about making the connection with the instrument to get the best sound. It seems that it just has to "feel right" in the hands and under the chin and the action on the strings etc. She also was playing for a short time a Kappa (another very old violin from the 1690s) and it was noticeably smaller than the other violins and for whatever reason she never got comfortable on it and complained about it also sounding small and being difficult to get good sound.
I also took a lot of joy in recording her rehearsals and a couple of concerts (string quartet and solo). I have some nice tapes now of those times (DAT and R2R analog).
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