The Marsyas Paradox and its contribution to the origin of the violin.
From the late medieval period and right the way through the Renaissance we see an abundance of images of Apollo and Orpheus playing the lyre, yet the evidence of a revival of lyre playing to support such images is remarkably absent. There are reasons why we should see so many images of this antique instrument, […]
The Trumpet and Lyre in Jacques Besson’s Theatrum Instrumentorum et Machinum
Jacques Besson was born a protestant around 1540 in Grenoble. In 1559 he published an alchemical book about how to extract oils and waters from simple compounds. In 1567 his Le Cosmolabe described an extraordinary invention that could be used for navigation, surveying, cartography and astronomy. Two years later, on his visit to Orléans, Charles […]
Hogarth and the Senses: Music at William Hogarth’s House, my virtual musical exhibition.
For six months in 2025, Hogarth’s House in Chiswick is hosting a wonderful exhibition in collaboration with St Mary’s University in West London. It’s a long story, but after I was asked if I could lend an eighteenth century violin things got complicated and before long I was up to my neck in the delightful […]
Knowledge Exchange: Newark School of Violin Making.
I’ve been working for years with Peter Sheppard-Skaerved at the Royal Academy of Music on numerous projects about understanding and interpreting the history of the violin. As part of Knowledge Exchage, a Research England funded project, I was invited to film something about the craft of violin making. I thought I could either do it […]
FORENSIC CASEBOOK: A Storioni label that almost had us fooled.
Recently I was asked to take another look at a violin I have known for many years. It has the outward appearance of being late-Cremonese work by Lorenzo Storioni, except that in almost every critical detail it fails to satisfy any of the key factors that would enable a Cremonese attribution. Esteemed colleagues have suggested […]
FORENSIC CASEBOOK: Alternatives to UV photography to illustrate varnish restoration.
Ultra Violet light reflects off the surface coatings of an instrument, which is normally very helpful for being able to see evidence of retouch and other interventions of interest when producing a condition report. However, a think coat of shellac that is invisible to the naked eye and used as a protective measure will mask […]
Camillo Sivori: Hearing the ghost of Paganini
It was long before lockdown that my good friend Andrew Krastins swore solemnly swore me to secrecy during one of our periodic meet-ups at Rules or Simpson’s in the Strand – the world’s most appropriate places to enthuse about the nineteenth century world of the violin. His remarkable investigations on the British Library’s wax cylinders […]
“That Neat Kind of Acer”: Sources for Italian maple in 1669
Balkan maple is particularly prized for violin making, but it’s reputation ultimately relies on violin makers regarding it as a good and logical match for the wood that we find on Italian violins from the Cremonese Golden-Period. As far as I know, we don’t have documentary support for this idea, simply the experience and observations […]
Pernambuco in 17th century Amsterdam
Our understanding of the use of Pernambuco wood for violin bow making suggests that it did not really come into vogue until the end of the eighteenth century and the time of the François Xavier Tourte. It is certainly not expected to find pernambuco bows from before then, but an understanding of the trade routes […]
FORENSIC CASEBOOK: Crack repairs covered by a varnish that becomes opaque under ultraviolet light.
The violin in question was made by John Frederick (II) Lott (b.1804, d.1870). He is known as Jack Lott to differentiate him from his father, and because this was the name used by the novelist Charles Reade who wrote his biography, ‘Jack Of All Trades’. It is a copy of a Stradivari with a 1716 […]
