Word: guarneri
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...around 1800, an already notorious teen-age violinist arrived in Leghorn to play a concert-with no violin. His name was Nicolo Paganini, and he had pawned his fiddle to pay off a pressing gambling debt. A wealthy merchant offered to lend him a matchless Guarneri del Gesu and, when the performance was over, refused to take it back. "The Guarneri is yours," he cried. "My hands shall never profane the violin which you have touched...
Popular superstition had long suspected him of a pact with the devil: How else could a man do with a violin what Paganini did? The Genoese enshrined his Guarneri in the city hall-though they were still uneasy about its late owner, and the Pope himself had to launch an inquiry into Paganini's orthodoxy before he could be buried in consecrated ground years later...
...around the glass case, solemnly break the seal and lift the violin out for an annual tuning and workout. In latter years, a distinguished violinist has been invited to do the job. This year Genoa took out some extra Paganini memorabilia, asked French Violinist Zino Francescatti to give the Guarneri its annual tuning. Perhaps because Francescatti is Paganini's lineal musical descendant (his father studied with Paganini's only real pupil), Genoese decided to give him a still greater honor: a half-hour concert in the city hall, to be played on the legendary Guarneri. His program...
...merchant marine, won his master's ticket, later fitted out a complete marine laboratory aboard a tuna clipper, and put it at the disposal of U.S.C. He also plunged into music, began buying up the finest cellos until he owned one of the best collections-Amati to Guarneri-in the world. When the Los Angeles symphony orchestra tumbled into the red, he reorganized it, filled up its coffers-and for two years played at its first cello desk...