Posted on July 24, 2020May 8, 2025 by Dale Phillips Area Tuning the Violin Area Tuning the Violin by Keith Hill Originally published as Guild of American Luthiers Data Sheet #283, 1984 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume One, 2000 See also, Hints for Area Tuning the Violin by Keith Hill Announcements of “discoveries” of the “secrets” of Stradivarius usually are not worth the ink used to print them. When they appear, everyone reads them with the customary curiosity. Then away they are filed along with the hundreds of other such claims. They get dredged up again when someone writes yet another book on the violin. Mindful of this possible fate, I would like to offer an explanation of a discovery that I have made. It is not of the “secrets” of Stradivarius; rather it is, I believe, the acoustical system utilized by the ancient Italian violin makers. The system is simplicity itself. It is possible for anyone who understands it and has normal hearing to use it. Moreover, it requires no measuring equipment save the ears and possibly a monochord. Furthermore, the thicknesses and their inexplicable variants, which so annoy our modern sense of decency when we observe them in the finest violins by Stradivari and Guarneri, occur naturally as a result of this system. Because it is so simple, it is, of course, the last place one would think to look for the answer. I expect that once you are equipped with the following information, you will go to your nearest antique Italian fiddle and look to see if what I am saying is actually there. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on July 8, 2020May 8, 2025 by Dale Phillips Hints for Area Tuning the Violin Hints for Area Tuning the Violin by Keith Hill Originally published in American Lutherie #1, 1985 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume One, 2000 See also, Area Tuning the Violin by Keith Hill In my article “Area Tuning the Violin” I presented my discovery of one of the theoretical principles governing the acoustical quality of the violins made by Stradivarius and his numerous Italian contemporaries. Because I believe that the area-tuning principle is the most important of all the acoustical principles pertinent to violin making, I deemed it best to present it in isolation. I would be less than open with you if I did not say that the American Acoustical Society and the Catgut Acoustical Society both rejected the worthiness of the area-tuning principle. I feel that their reasons were full of vested self-interest. I tell you what I told them: Paying attention to flexibility of free plates is a waste of time and attention. Consider the following points. First, thousands of violins have been made using this notion for the last century, yet no consistently superior results have been produced. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on June 1, 2020May 19, 2025 by Dale Phillips Antonius Stradivarius in South Dakota Antonius Stradivarius in South Dakota by Joseph R. Johnson Originally published in American Lutherie #12, 1987 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Three, 2000 When the name Antonio Stradivari (1644–1737) is mentioned, images of fine quality violins, master craftsmanship, and exorbitantly large price tags come to mind. Stradivari is known to the world primarily as an excellent violin maker. However, the members of the violin family were not the only stringed instruments that he made. Stradivari’s output also included a harp, three known guitars, and patterns for lutes, mandolins, mandolas, and violas da gamba. The Shrine to Music Museum in Vermillion, South Dakota, is home to the “Rawlins,” one of three extant guitars made by Antonio Stradivari in Cremona, Italy, between 1680 and 1700. The second is in the Ashmolean Museum at Oxford University in England. The third, much altered and in need of restoration, is privately owned in Italy. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on May 21, 2020May 8, 2025 by Dale Phillips Systems Analysis of the Violin Systems Analysis of the Violin by A.F. Standing Originally published as Guild of American Luthiers Data Sheet #173, 1981 My first introduction to the violin was my father’s playing, and I remember, young as I was, a fascination with its strange shape and even stranger sound. From that time to this I had no further contact with the instrument until I met professionally (we are computer programmers) a young lady whose many talents include that of violin making. My interest in old crafts led us into many discussions on the design, construction and adjustment of the violin. As I borrowed, and read, the articles she had collected, I became more and more astounded as from their arcane depths arose the musty odor of eye of toad and toe of newt. With my curiosity and interest aroused it seemed a good idea to consider each part of the violin, the problem it solved, and its interaction with the remainder of the instrument. In this way, once, the basic operation of the instrument was understood, all the second order effects that make all the difference in the real world could be considered as perturbations from the basic instrument. This article was written in an attempt to see if I could, with no musical knowledge or experience whatever, determine by thought alone the modus operandi of the violin. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
Posted on May 4, 2020May 16, 2025 by Dale Phillips Free Plate Tuning, Part Two: Violins Free Plate Tuning, Part Two: Violins by Alan Carruth Originally published in American Lutherie #29, 1992 and Big Red Book of American Lutherie Volume Three, 2004 See also, Free Plate Tuning, Part One: Theory by Alan Carruth Free Plate Tuning, Part Three: Guitars by Alan Carruth Before I get into plate tuning proper I’d like to digress a bit and discuss the rationale behind the process, and a couple of other things I find it useful to keep in mind while I’m working. And I can’t think of a better way to begin than by telling you about one of my more elaborate experiments. Fig. 15 gives the relevant information on my fourth and fifth violins. The idea was to check out the influence of asymmetric back graduations by building a pair of closely-matched fiddles with that as the only variable. The one-piece backs were cut from the same plank of bird’s-eye maple and the tops were cut from a red spruce 4×6 that I took out of the wall of my house when I put in a new chimney. The molds were routed using a template. Archings were checked for height at over two dozen points on each plate and were held to .2MM. Graduation, weight, and frequency data is as shown. The delta f mentioned is the frequency drop obtained when a 5G weight was stuck to the plate in an active area of the given mode. Fittings and so on were matched as closely as possible, and the two bridges were cut back to back from the same piece of maple. Become A Member to Continue Reading This Article This article is part of our premium web content offered to Guild members. To view this and other web articles, join the Guild of American Luthiers. Members also receive 4 annual issues of American Lutherie and get discounts on products. For details, visit the membership page. If you are already a member, login for access or contact us to setup your account.
