Misidentified for decades, the instrument of the famous 20th century cellist is still in the ownership of his widow. Tax policy is why it was misidentified.

A rose by any other name is still a rose.

The same could be said of the 1733 Goffriller cello. The prized instrument of legendary cellist Pablo Casals, it was hiding in plain sight, believed to be an instrument from the violin shop of violin maker Carlo Bergonzi of…

The crossover between visual and performing arts is not uncommon. But in his championing of Cubism, Picasso found his inspiration to paint in violins.

Art historians know all about Picasso. They understand his oeuvre (“Cubism,” primarily), his various periods (Blue, Rose, Analytic Cubism, Synthetic Cubism), and the fact he frequently incorporated violins and guitars into several of his paintings.

But not everyone is a student of visual art. If that’s your jam, or…

All aspects of orchestral music making – performers, conductors, composers, and instrument makers – have resisted women’s involvement. Until the 20th century.

The place of women in music and instrument-making history follows a familiar path. The fairer sex has always been there, playing instruments, singing in the higher octaves that few men can achieve, composing, and making the instruments. But of course, they were relegated to subservient roles, hidden from the mainstream…

Patronage of artists has always been essential. But different ways that high priced instruments find young prodigies ensure those strings get bowed.

The arts, music in particular, have always survived due to generosity of the wealthy. Mozart – whose behaviors excluded him from support from the Church – found his support in a certain Baron Gottfried van Swieten, who also funded the work of Ludwig von Beethoven and Joseph Haydn. Hungary’s wealthy Esterhazy family also supported…

Austria’s von Trapps might have a movie made about them, but the musical contributions of the Klotz luthiers are celebrated with a statue and a school.

The Catholic Church, as well as with many other Christian denominations, has a, shall we say, evolving history with the use of instrumental support of liturgical music. The chants and polyphonic a capella style are considered the original, and therefore most pure, expression of praise and worship.

So how is…

While scribbling difficult formulas about E=mc2 on a chalkboard, it may have been Mozart’s Violin Sonata in C that coursed through his considerable brain.

We may have Mozart to thank for E=mc2.

The most famous scientific equation in the world, given us by none other than Albert Einstein, is a product of the man’s genius. As a theoretical physicist, his theory of relativity is one of many contributions he made to the development of quantum mechanics. He was…

As the first chair of one of the world’s great orchestras, the LA Phil concertmasters often extend their credits by working on great cinematic scores.

The casual fan of orchestral music knows the first-chair violinist, the concertmaster, is the “number one,” the best of the violinists. They are the ones who tune the orchestra before the concert begins, shakes the hand of the conductor, and signal when it’s time for the orchestra to take a bow. It’s a prestigious position and…

To understand stringed instruments of the European Middle Ages, it helps to understand medieval music itself.

The Medieval Era, roughly 500 CE to 1400 CE, was the time when the Church of Rome was the dominant ruling body and religion. Musically, the Catholic churches engaged people in the great cathedrals and humbler provincial churches with sacred music that was at times drawn from secular, folk melodies. It was characterized by chants, primarily in the monophonic (one voice,…

The violin Joshua Bell can’t let out of his sight has twice, and for many years, been in the hands of thieves. Yet it helped save the lives of 1,000 people.

The French poet, dramatist, novelist, writer, journalist, and critic Theophile Gautier is credited for birthing the phrase, “All passes, art alone endures.” Technically, it was “enduring” within a longer passage (“All passes, art alone enduring stays to us; the bust outlasts the throne, the coin, Tiberius…”). But a tour of…

The smaller of the two parts of stringed instruments, the bow, is remarkably complex and made of several parts, historically derived directly from nature.

To understand the parts of the bow used in stringed instruments – in Western music, the violin family (violin, cello, viola, bass, and the viola da gamba) – it helps to understand what is provided by nature. The bows both ancient and modern are an assembly made of animal, vegetable, and mineral origins.

But…

Every fine violin from the Italian luthiers has a story. But in the case of those played by Itzhak Perlman, the life stories of these instruments are bigger

It’s an understatement to say that Itzhak Perlman has a storied career. And it’s erroneous to say that in the past tense – the 76-year-old virtuoso has a full tour schedule for 2022. He began winning competitions as a child prodigy, has performed with some of the greatest orchestras in the world and before Queen…

The “Swedish fiddle” is not purely a product of this Scandinavian country. But its biggest fans are probably in Stockholm, Gothenburg, Malmo and Uppsala.

To understand the history of the Nyckelharpa – referred to in some circles as the Swedish fiddle – actually requires digging into the history of all stringed instruments.

The Nyckelharpa has existed in one form or another format least 600 years, and is generally considered an instrument of Swedes. Given how…

The Austrian-born violinist had many stringed instruments over his long career. And he had fine taste in violins – commensurate with his playing.

The career of violinist and composer Fritz Kreisler (1875-1962), while brilliant, is fairly consistent with other European virtuosos of the late 19th and 20th centuries. He was discovered to be talented at a young age, he studied under leading teachers at the time (at the Vienna Conservatory and later in Paris), won…

Here’s to thinking outside of the (string peg) box. But from a 21st century perspective, covering the aluminum with faux wood was a poor aesthetic choice.

Perhaps one of the more curious aspects of musical expression is the unfettered creativity of instrument makers. It began with plucking strings stretched across the hard shell of gourds that, arguably, led to Stradivarius violins and electric guitars.

So it was a natural part of violin construction that in the…

While considered subservient to the violin, the bow rose to much greater importance in the confluence of Tourte, skilled violinists, and the French Revolution.

Frenchman Francois Tourte is widely credited with inventing the modern violin bow, in almost universal use today by violinists of all levels of ability. But given he worked about 200 years ago (he lived from 1747 till 1835) – while…

The Ukranian-American virtuoso played four priceless instruments in his career. But one Strad was his favorite, and he renamed it for his wife.

The virtuoso violinist Nathan Mironovich Milstein (1903-1992) had a remarkable career by many indicators – his training, his colleagues, his interpretations of works from the Romantic period, and his own life journey from the Ukraine to America during a tumultuous era. Among his many distinctions is the fact he performed in concert up to the…

There is more time to learn things in the pandemic. So this age of at-home learning is perfect for taking up or refreshing musical skills on an instrument.

When the coronavirus shut down much of the world in mid-March 2020, in-person music instruction failed to meet the criteria for “essential work.” But musical instructors and institutions wasted no time in launching online music education.

And that education came in a broad range of types of…