Word: stradivari
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Classical musicians and music lovers believe that prized string instruments are enriched by the generations of virtuosi who have played on them. In the case of the great Cremonese instrument maker Antonio Stradivari, whose violins and cellos have been the choice of the world's best musicians for three centuries, this belief is coupled with the theory that Stradivari was an inimitable genius on the scale of Mozart and Beethoven. What else could explain why Stradivari's instruments remain the best in the world so long after the death of their creator...
...varnish. That's the theory of Joseph Nagyvary, a professor emeritus of biochemistry at Texas A & M University. In a study published last week in the scientific journal Public Library of Science ONE, Nagyvary argues that Stradivari probably had no idea what made his instruments special because the crucial factor, an externally applied varnish on the wood, was beyond his apprehension or control. (See pictures of things money can buy, including a violin...
...Using the ashes of minute wood samples, Nagyvary analyzed the chemical makeup of violins made by Stradivari and a contemporary Cremonese maker Giuseppe Guarneri del Gesù, whose violins are thought to be near equals to Strads. The ashes of the Strad's wood contained numerous chemicals - most notably borax and chromium - that suggest it had been aggressively treated with a varnish designed to protect against infestation. The analysis also found that the organic matrix of Stradivari's wood was damaged and weakened, almost certainly by the application of the mineral preservative, leading Nagyvary to speculate that the wood...
...There is a possibility here that Stradivari received the wood pre-treated and so did not even know these minerals in his wood were the crucial factor for the sound, and this is why, despite almost surely having apprentices, the art of his instrument making was not passed on," he says...
...Nagyvary believes this evidence upends the widespread belief among instrument makers that only the strongest wood can produce a lush, full sound. According to Nagyvary, the opposite is true. He also says it casts doubt on the working hypothesis of many scientists that Stradivari worked during Europe's "little ice age" of the 15th-17th centuries, in which low summer temperatures led to slow but uniform growth in the Spruce trees used for instruments, and that the wood's uniform density explains the instruments' high quality of sound. Last year, researchers in The Netherlands and the U.S. used medical imaging...