Speaker 1: Hey, everybody, it's me Josh, and for this week's select,
Speaker 1: I've chosen our episode from September of twenty sixteen, on
Speaker 1: the Strata Various Violin. It's where we get to the
Speaker 1: bottom of whether strata various violins really are that much
Speaker 1: better than others, or whether everyone in the music world
Speaker 1: is just really into brand names. I think you'll be
Speaker 1: pleasantly surprised. And I mentioned the movie The Red Violin
Speaker 1: that like, this episode is worth checking out too, so
Speaker 1: enjoy them both.
Speaker 2: Welcome to Stuff you should know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 1: Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark, There's
Speaker 1: Charles W Chuck Bryant, and there's Jerry Roland. Yeah, Jerry said.
Speaker 2: Right before she pressed record, I'm sleepy three two to one.
Speaker 1: Oh really, Yeah, I didn't hear you didn't even notice that,
Speaker 1: did you. I was just remember or practicing what I
Speaker 1: was going to say.
Speaker 2: Oh, sorry, we'll go ahead.
Speaker 1: I just did. Oh it was successful.
Speaker 2: You're practicing. Hey, welcome to the podcast. Should we talk fiddles?
Speaker 1: Yeah, Chuck fiddle d D let's do.
Speaker 2: I bought one a few years ago. By the way,
Speaker 2: it took one lesson.
Speaker 1: And you became an expert.
Speaker 2: Yep, No, that's just me, man, That's how things go
Speaker 2: with me. I have a lot of things that I've
Speaker 2: been like, I'm going to do this.
Speaker 1: Got a lot of balls in the air.
Speaker 2: Yeah, specifically musically. I bought a steel guitar and didn't
Speaker 2: learn to play that and sold it. I bought a
Speaker 2: keyboard and was going to learn to play piano, didn't
Speaker 2: do that, Okay, bought the violin. I'm keeping a violin.
Speaker 1: Though, So you're stimulating the economy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, pretty much. And I usually keep just like sell
Speaker 2: that and use that money to buy the next thing.
Speaker 2: I don't play. Yeah, but I don't know, like I
Speaker 2: know how to play guitar. So I'm kind of realizing
Speaker 2: at my age, like maybe that's all it's going to be.
Speaker 1: You're a guitar man. And like Bread said, yeah.
Speaker 2: But used I used to want to be like man
Speaker 2: by the time I die. I want to be able
Speaker 2: to play all the stringed instruments. Yeah, that was my goal,
Speaker 2: and I've learned one.
Speaker 1: I mean that's more than some people. I don't I
Speaker 1: don't know how to play any stringed instruments.
Speaker 2: So yeah, but you don't care too it sounds like no.
Speaker 1: I mean I well, so you consider the piano a
Speaker 1: stringed instrument. It's got strings, so yeah, is it percussion
Speaker 1: or is it string or is it both?
Speaker 2: Well, a little hammer hits the string percussion interesting, where
Speaker 2: as a harpsichord is plucked.
Speaker 1: Yeah, talking piano, Yeah, I wish I could play the piano.
Speaker 1: I'd like to learn that one day.
Speaker 2: Right. My brother took lessons as a kid and my sister,
Speaker 2: but I didn't. Oh yeah, Scott can still play a
Speaker 2: little bit today of.
Speaker 1: Course, Hey Scott, super bro.
Speaker 2: Uh So the fiddle a little history here before we
Speaker 2: get into the man the fiddle or violin. There's no difference,
Speaker 2: by the way, is that right? Yep?
Speaker 1: It's one pronounced one way and the others pronounced it
Speaker 1: the other way.
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's a little and I thought there was a
Speaker 2: difference when I bought mine. I was like, well, what's
Speaker 2: the difference, And it's just in how you play it.
Speaker 1: They were like, hillbillies play fiddles, yeah, other people play
Speaker 1: violins exactly.
Speaker 2: So the fiddle at first was not a well regarded instrument.
Speaker 2: It was thought of as a sort of a cheap
Speaker 2: tavern instrument, you know, like you'd get drunk and hop
Speaker 2: upon the table at the tavern, really and beat out
Speaker 2: a little Irish jig. Really yeah, and it didn't have
Speaker 2: a good reputation. Wait when, well, I mean this is
Speaker 2: the sixteenth century.
Speaker 1: Okay, So then initially yeah, okay, yeah, I'm with you.
Speaker 1: Then I'm with you, okay, hanging on.
Speaker 2: And even in parts of Italy, at first the church
Speaker 2: ordered the destruction of violins. They were so like look
Speaker 2: down upon. And then a lady named Catherine de Medici
Speaker 2: got on board and she was like, this thing is wonderful. Sure,
Speaker 2: I'm gonna order thirty eight of them for my court
Speaker 2: from the guy named Nicholas Amati, who was the grandson
Speaker 2: of the great violin maker Andrea Amadi. Actually she probably
Speaker 2: bought them from Andrea if it was the fifteen hundred, right,
Speaker 2: and yeah it was fifteen sixty four, and that was it.
Speaker 2: Things started to change, and that's literally what kind of
Speaker 2: led the violin down a path of respectability.
Speaker 1: Yeah. Once you introduce it into court, sure people tend
Speaker 1: to follow suit. Yeah. Yeah. So the Amades lived in
Speaker 1: a place called Cromona, Italy, right, and Crimona because the
Speaker 1: Amadis lived there, who were basically the de factor inventors
Speaker 1: of the violin, cello, and viola as we recognize them today.
Speaker 1: Because that's where they were from. Kromona became the center
Speaker 1: of violin production. Yeah, stringed instrument production, plain and simple. Yeah,
Speaker 1: which is pretty neat, like the idea that that's where
Speaker 1: violence came from and that they're that recent in origin. Yeah,
Speaker 1: And of course that goes further back than that, like
Speaker 1: loots were obviously around long before the violin. Sure, but again,
Speaker 1: if you look at a violin today and say, oh,
Speaker 1: it's a violin, you can thank the Amadis of Cremona
Speaker 1: for making that recognizable to you.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And here's another cool little fact. The the you know,
Speaker 2: the fancy beautiful shape of a violin is not for esthetics.
Speaker 2: It is all about the sound that it makes.
Speaker 1: The violin doesn't give a damn weather you think it
Speaker 1: looks good.
Speaker 2: Well, it turned out to look beautiful. But all those
Speaker 2: curves allow for equal resonance of all the notes, which
Speaker 2: if it was more basically shaped, Yeah, certain notes would
Speaker 2: be sound better than others.
Speaker 1: Huh.
Speaker 2: So that allowed the entire fingerboard to sound wonderful.
Speaker 1: Well. Plus, also, if you look at a violin face on. Sure,
Speaker 1: if you go down the sides in the middle, it's
Speaker 1: cut in. Yeah, those are called seabouts. Those actually have
Speaker 1: a practical purpose, I'm sure, in addition to helping produce sound,
Speaker 1: but it allows the bow to play the strings on
Speaker 1: either side without hitting the body of the violin. Yeah,
Speaker 1: pretty clever.
Speaker 2: It's really hard to play. I can't stress that enough.
Speaker 2: It's like I thought, this is not so different than
Speaker 2: a guitar, Like I'm just holding it under my neck
Speaker 2: and using a bow instead of fingers.
Speaker 1: That's got to be a pretty big difference.
Speaker 2: It's a huge difference.
Speaker 1: Yes, fingers, bows totally different. You're born with one the other.
Speaker 1: You have to like buy well.
Speaker 2: It's a combination of pressure on a string, angle of
Speaker 2: the bow on the.
Speaker 1: String, pressure from your parents.
Speaker 2: Placement of the bow on like as far as how
Speaker 2: far down it is, up and down the violin speed.
Speaker 2: It's like there's like ten different things that go into
Speaker 2: making a sound on a violin that you have to
Speaker 2: do successfully all at once. It's really really hard. Yeah,
Speaker 2: Like I was intimidated and went in the closet. You go,
Speaker 2: maybe my daughter will play one day and then we'll
Speaker 2: be waiting for her. Nice so we'll see. But should
Speaker 2: we go over the parts? I know you mentioned the seabout.
Speaker 1: Sure, seabout's my favorite. So you take it from there.
Speaker 2: Well, if you look at a violin, you got the
Speaker 2: very above those little tuning pegs which are contained in
Speaker 2: the peg box. You've got the scroll, which is that
Speaker 2: kind of a curvy, lovely fancy piece at the top.
Speaker 2: Then you have the neck and the fingerboard. The neck
Speaker 2: goes from basically down to the body of the violin,
Speaker 2: but the fingerboard continues on through it. The upper about,
Speaker 2: the lower about, and then that seabout you mentioned, which
Speaker 2: is also called the waist. Then you have your two
Speaker 2: f holes cut on either side.
Speaker 1: Ye, the fancy holes, Yeah, they look like f's.
Speaker 2: Then you have your bridge, which is the very thin
Speaker 2: piece of wood that keeps the strings you know, off
Speaker 2: of the violin body itself and taut. Then you have
Speaker 2: your tail piece at the bottom where the strings end,
Speaker 2: and then the all important chin rest. And that's a violin.
Speaker 1: Bam, go make one. Now I'm leaving. So again, there
Speaker 1: was the amadis that came up with the violin you
Speaker 1: just described, that's right, And one of the amadis the
Speaker 1: grandson of Andrea Amadi, who I think is credited with
Speaker 1: inventing the violin basically. But his grandson, Nicola taught a
Speaker 1: young man by the name of Antonio and Antonio Strataviri.
Speaker 2: Ooh, that name sounds familiar.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Antonio STRATAVII was born in Cremona. They're not sure
Speaker 1: when they think, probably about sixteen forty four.
Speaker 2: His life is a bit of a mystery, his young
Speaker 2: life at least, right, not a lot of great records
Speaker 2: on it.
Speaker 1: You know what, This just jogged my memory. We never
Speaker 1: explained why Alexander Hamilton would shave two years off of
Speaker 1: his age, even though we specifically said we were going to.
Speaker 1: Well that's all.
Speaker 2: Should we follow up now?
Speaker 1: Probably not, okay, I think people would get mad.
Speaker 2: Yeah, if you want to know, right in and we'll
Speaker 2: tell you, or maybe we'll post it on such means.
Speaker 1: I think that's better. Yeah, but who cares. We're talking
Speaker 1: Strataveri now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, we've moved on, all right.
Speaker 1: So Strativery there's not very good records about his youth,
Speaker 1: I think, as you said, but he pops up in
Speaker 1: sixteen sixty six at the very latest.
Speaker 2: That's right.
Speaker 1: A violin pops up in sixteen sixty six. I should
Speaker 1: say it has an inscription on it and a label actually,
Speaker 1: and if you translated to English, it says made by
Speaker 1: Antonio Stradiveri of cremona pupil of Nicoro Amadi in sixteen
Speaker 1: sixty six, well done the year of Satan.
Speaker 2: And that means he was either a pupil, which it
Speaker 2: clearly says, sure, or a bit of a bit of
Speaker 2: a stretch of the truth and a bit of a
Speaker 2: ruse in a career move.
Speaker 1: Really.
Speaker 2: Yeah, there's some people that say, and that's why I
Speaker 2: was wondering it says people believe some people believe he
Speaker 2: was a pupil.
Speaker 1: Yeah, I didn't get with the well it says he was.
Speaker 2: A pupil and the inscription right. But the other thought
Speaker 2: is that maybe it was a bit of a career
Speaker 2: move to say I was taught by the grade Amadi.
Speaker 1: Right, who's dead now and can't say otherwise?
Speaker 2: Maybe, but uh, who knows. I bet he was probably
Speaker 2: a pupil.
Speaker 1: Actually he wasn't dead, so that would have been pretty
Speaker 1: gut seacher to have done that, because Amadi didn't die
Speaker 1: for many years, many more years after sixteen sixty six.
Speaker 1: So I think the common consensus is that he was
Speaker 1: a pupil of Amadi.
Speaker 2: He would have said, he's stealing my business, so what up?
Speaker 1: But with that, right, man, this thing is going to
Speaker 1: be lousy with that, all right?
Speaker 2: So sixteen sixty six, you are correct. He builds his
Speaker 2: very first violin on his own. He continues to build
Speaker 2: violins on his own in his attic, which was apparently
Speaker 2: the tradition attic violin building.
Speaker 1: Was it?
Speaker 2: That's what it said?
Speaker 1: Huh.
Speaker 2: I guess that was just like where you would put
Speaker 2: your workshop. Okay, who knows, maybe it I don't know.
Speaker 1: Have you ever seen the movie The Red Violin? Yes,
Speaker 1: great movie, agreed, like, stick with it.
Speaker 2: I think I might have seen that on your recommendation
Speaker 2: years ago, probably if I'm not mistaken. Yeah, really good
Speaker 2: movie though. Yeah. So he's making violins. He moves into
Speaker 2: a home in sixteen eighty and he started to get
Speaker 2: some recognition as a great builder and maker of violins,
Speaker 2: a great craftsman.
Speaker 1: He did, and he was still kind of living in
Speaker 1: the shadow of the Amadis. But when Nikola Amadi died
Speaker 1: in sixteen eighty four, by this time everyone said, this
Speaker 1: guy is Kremona's best maker. Of violins. Yeah, which since
Speaker 1: Kromona was the world capital of violin making. They were
Speaker 1: made elsewhere, but Kromona was like the place where the best.
Speaker 2: Were made, the krem of the Cromona.
Speaker 1: Right. That made him the world's best violin maker. And
Speaker 1: he hadn't even entered his golden period yet.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and he's making more than violins. He's making cellos
Speaker 2: and guitars and mandolins and harps pretty much anything with.
Speaker 1: Strings except harpsichords.
Speaker 2: Who knows, he might have made a harpsichord.
Speaker 1: I'll bet that'd be worth a lot probably.
Speaker 2: So all right, should we take a break here, Yes,
Speaker 2: all right, we'll get into more craftsmanship right after this.
Speaker 2: All right, So Strativari is following in Amadi's Amadi his footsteps,
Speaker 2: but he's also like, you know what I'm gonna. I'm
Speaker 2: gonna start tweaking this thing, Yeah, and craft my own
Speaker 2: brand of violin. And he does so. He said, I'm
Speaker 2: going to use some new materials, maybe some new finishes.
Speaker 2: I'm gonna I'm gonna make that seabout a little straighter
Speaker 2: then you're used to.
Speaker 1: Yeah, man, then f's a little straighter the f holes
Speaker 1: is it straighter? Was that the deal, I think so.
Speaker 2: And then we altered the f hole some and uh
Speaker 2: something with a scroll too, Is that right?
Speaker 1: He made it more amazing.
Speaker 2: And he made the the scroll larger scroll, the f
Speaker 2: holes not only straighter but longer, larger scroll, and a
Speaker 2: and a straighter and stronger seabout that was like mechanically
Speaker 2: that those were the biggest differences.
Speaker 1: Right, But he also crucially came up with his own
Speaker 1: formula for a varnish. It's a very easily recognized, deep,
Speaker 1: deep red brown varnish. That's right, that his violins have.
Speaker 1: It's very handsome. But a lot of people, as we'll
Speaker 1: see later, believe that it's possibly the varnish that made
Speaker 1: Strata various violins so great because when he made these changes,
Speaker 1: not only was he making these changes to the shape
Speaker 1: and appearance of the violin, he was also like a
Speaker 1: master wooden layer. Like. The craftsmanship that his violins had
Speaker 1: were just unparalleled. There were flawless, flawless works of art
Speaker 1: as musical instruments, So in addition to just being a
Speaker 1: flawless work of art, they also sounded better than anything
Speaker 1: anything that could possibly compare be compared to it. And
Speaker 1: what's really exceptional about strata varius is it's not just
Speaker 1: one of those things where like, oh the name is
Speaker 1: actually what is really driving it. A stratavarius violin that's
Speaker 1: three hundred years old today is probably better than any
Speaker 1: violin that's been produced in the last three hundred years,
Speaker 1: including a brand new one, only now getting to the
Speaker 1: point where they can they've discovered techniques where they can
Speaker 1: start to replicate the sound of a strata varius. That's
Speaker 1: how good this guy's violins were. That that it's not
Speaker 1: a joke, it's not hyperbole of how great the strata
Speaker 1: various violins were. They are still the ones that this
Speaker 1: guy made by hand, are still the best violins in
Speaker 1: the world.
Speaker 2: Yeah, that's the most really.
Speaker 1: Saying something for sure, considering how much progress we've made
Speaker 1: in the last three hundred years and just about.
Speaker 2: Everything, and and these are you know, for the the
Speaker 2: finest tuned ears in the world. Like clearly there are flawless,
Speaker 2: amazing instruments and violins being produced since then. But for
Speaker 2: the true like aficionado, they can spot the difference. Apparently,
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, like you and I can't.
Speaker 1: No, But people whose job it is to identify and
Speaker 1: praise strata various violins. Say that comparing it to a
Speaker 1: non stratavarius, like a knockoff or something, is like comparing
Speaker 1: a Ferrari to a school bus. Yeah, well, it's like
Speaker 1: that obvious.
Speaker 2: For people like saying things like that.
Speaker 1: It's a great quote.
Speaker 2: We're just a couple of schmumps. What do we know?
Speaker 1: So it just went.
Speaker 2: It might be a new gag. So he and his
Speaker 2: first wife had six kids. He was good at having kids.
Speaker 2: He and his second wife, His wife sadly died in
Speaker 2: sixteen ninety eight. He got remarried and had five more
Speaker 2: kids with wife number two. He was great at making
Speaker 2: violins and making children. Yes, crafting children. He's great at it,
Speaker 2: crafting little babies.
Speaker 1: Yeah, they called them the mice tro in the bedroom,
Speaker 1: you know what I mean?
Speaker 2: And I think a couple of his sons even went
Speaker 2: on to follow in his footsteps.
Speaker 1: Is that right from his first marriage?
Speaker 2: Right? They were at second lot they.
Speaker 1: Were schmumps, though they couldn't hold a candle to their
Speaker 1: father's work.
Speaker 2: So let's talk about the golden period from seventeen hundred
Speaker 2: to seventeen twenty to twenty five, depending on who you
Speaker 2: had talked to, This was the Golden Period where these violins,
Speaker 2: I mean, he had really honed his design at this point,
Speaker 2: and the materials that he used and everything kind of
Speaker 2: all coalesced into making the best violins in the history
Speaker 2: of the world.
Speaker 1: Right, it was like Lebron's tenure at the Heat.
Speaker 2: Oh, well, we'll see his career is not over yet. Yeah, wow,
Speaker 2: you're calling it now, huh.
Speaker 1: I mean he he made a case for a resurgence
Speaker 1: this past season, but we'll see if he can repeat it. Okay,
Speaker 1: he was playing on five hundred cylinders with the Heat.
Speaker 1: It was just perfect because he didn't have to be
Speaker 1: the team leader. He could be one of like the leaders.
Speaker 1: That team had several leaders, and he could be one
Speaker 1: of them. It wasn't like the whole team just pushed
Speaker 1: upward towards Lebron.
Speaker 2: See, a lot of people have the opposite view that
Speaker 2: that was. You know, anyone can get on a team
Speaker 2: of superstars and win championships, but no, not necessarily to
Speaker 2: be the one leader is a bigger accomplishment.
Speaker 1: I'm very curious to know how, say, like the Golden
Speaker 1: State Warriors are going to be next season with Durant
Speaker 1: and Steph Curry and Klay Thompson on there. Thompson knows
Speaker 1: so much. But like Steph Curry and Kevin Durant, they're
Speaker 1: like two of the greatest players that have ever lived,
Speaker 1: ever lived, not just their playing right now, how are
Speaker 1: they going to gel the idea that Dwayne Wade and
Speaker 1: Chris Bosh and Lebron James were all able to keep
Speaker 1: their egos in check and come together to work together
Speaker 1: and lead a team together. I think that's harder than
Speaker 1: this just being like, forget it, I'll do it myself,
Speaker 1: you think, yes.
Speaker 2: All right, So Stratavari is making his mark on the world,
Speaker 2: getting his reputation, and he's making a lot of money.
Speaker 2: He wasn't one of these. It's like after he died
Speaker 2: they later realized how great he was. He was a
Speaker 2: rich man. Yeah, making and selling these violins.
Speaker 1: Yeah, apparently there was a phrase richest stretta vari Yeah,
Speaker 1: like richer than an astronaut is what we would say today.
Speaker 2: Yeah. He was one of the more famous guys in
Speaker 2: Italy at the time, for sure.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and rightfully so.
Speaker 2: His crowning achievement supposedly is in seventeen sixteen when he
Speaker 2: built the Messiah And this is the only violin that
Speaker 2: he never sold that he kept in his workshop till
Speaker 2: the day died.
Speaker 1: It was his head stash violin.
Speaker 2: And this violin has rarely been played. Apparently. One of
Speaker 2: the sort of things unspoken rules when this thing's been
Speaker 2: sold and passed down is that don't even play it.
Speaker 2: This one should remain pristine.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's basically as close to a mint condition strata
Speaker 1: various as you can find in the world. Oh it's
Speaker 1: not close, it's meant yeah, but I mean a couple
Speaker 1: of people have played it. Oh really, Yeah, it's not
Speaker 1: been unplayed.
Speaker 2: Okay, a couple of bad eggs in there, a couple
Speaker 2: of super lucky violin plays that screw your unwritten rules.
Speaker 1: Yeah, well this is before the Ashmullyan got their hands
Speaker 1: on it.
Speaker 2: Okay, So post seventeen twenty, post golden period, he still
Speaker 2: produced violins and things, but apparently his eyesight was going,
Speaker 2: his hands were not as steady, and they weren't quite
Speaker 2: what they were during the golden period. I'm sure they
Speaker 2: were still wonderful violence.
Speaker 1: Oh yeah, he's still churning out the good stuff, but
Speaker 1: nothing like that golden period.
Speaker 2: And he worked into his nineties, so he was building
Speaker 2: violins for you know, seventy years.
Speaker 1: He worked up to his death. As far as I understand,
Speaker 1: I think so so yeah. But that golden period stuff
Speaker 1: that was there was the Messiah from seventeen sixteen, the
Speaker 1: Allard from seventeen fifteen, the Bets from seventeen oh four.
Speaker 1: Those are just a few of the ones that he
Speaker 1: made during this period that are still around today. He
Speaker 1: made I saw a thousand, also saw fifteen hundred stringed
Speaker 1: instruments during his career, amazing about six hundred and fifty
Speaker 1: survived today. And there they tend to have names, especially
Speaker 1: the ones from his golden period. As you just heard,
Speaker 1: they have names, and they're usually the name of the
Speaker 1: most famous UH player who owned it.
Speaker 2: They weren't like a skippy and old roy right, Barnabas
Speaker 2: Barnabas the violin right.
Speaker 1: So there's a there's a superstition among violinists that the
Speaker 1: more you play a violin, the more a particular person
Speaker 1: plays violin, the more that violin takes on the character
Speaker 1: of that player, right, so much so that a violinist
Speaker 1: or even a cellist or a violist can come along
Speaker 1: afterward and play that person's violin. Yeah, and it will
Speaker 1: say it will sound much more like the person who's
Speaker 1: violin it is than the person playing it.
Speaker 2: Wow.
Speaker 1: And there's there's a further superstition that the more you
Speaker 1: play a violin, the better it sounds.
Speaker 2: Well, that's not a superstition, that's fact, right, any instrument.
Speaker 1: So there is a study from I think nineteen ninety
Speaker 1: six that I came across that found that the more
Speaker 1: violin wood is vibrated, the more the dampening coefficient is lowered.
Speaker 1: The lower the damping coefficient, the longer a note resonates.
Speaker 1: The longer a note resonates, the richer the sound. And
Speaker 1: so just playing it right, because you're vibrating the wood
Speaker 1: when you're playing a violin, the more you do that,
Speaker 1: the more frequently you do that, the better the violin's
Speaker 1: actually going to sound. So astoundingly, the more you play
Speaker 1: a violin, the better it sounds.
Speaker 2: Well, that's true for any instrument, is it. Yeah, it's
Speaker 2: called breaking it in. Oh, So it's like a pair
Speaker 2: of genes you can identify with that.
Speaker 1: Sure, I love genes.
Speaker 2: You know, a pair of genes five years in or
Speaker 2: better than they are when you come off the shelf. Yeah,
Speaker 2: it's the same thing. It's breaking it in, especially strings
Speaker 2: with anything with the fingerboard. That fingerboard just you know,
Speaker 2: wears in those frets wear down a little and it
Speaker 2: does get a little bit attuned I think to your style.
Speaker 1: Yeah for sure. Yeah, very interesting.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I'd like to do more on musical instruments here
Speaker 2: and there. Okay, I'm putting it out there, all right,
Speaker 2: all right, well let's take another quick break and we
Speaker 2: will get into all the controversies surrounding just why these
Speaker 2: things sound so good and all those theories. Pretty interesting stuff.
Speaker 1: So, Chuck, I gotta say, you did a good job
Speaker 1: putting this one together. Okay, sure, I'm interested in it.
Speaker 2: You know we I had that stuff from the B
Speaker 2: Side podcast for like two months back in the day.
Speaker 1: People still call for it.
Speaker 2: And we covered this very briefly. Oh really, yeah not.
Speaker 2: We didn't do right by it. So that's why I
Speaker 2: was like, you know what, that's a good topic. Nice,
Speaker 2: I mean, dust that one off. Nice. So there have
Speaker 2: been many many theories over the years, like if the
Speaker 2: strat is so revered in legendary that people experts, scientists
Speaker 2: are bound to want to crack that nut. Yeah, like
Speaker 2: why yeah, like what's the deal.
Speaker 1: And it's not. Again, this is it's objectively better than
Speaker 1: other violins, the ones that strata vary made.
Speaker 2: Correct some of the theories. The old theories back then
Speaker 2: was that he would soak the wood in salt water.
Speaker 2: Not true, that the wood was coated with volcanic ash,
Speaker 2: not true. That dragon's blood was used in the varnish.
Speaker 1: That may have been true, Okay, George R. Martin came
Speaker 1: up with that one.
Speaker 2: Probably so, and then i'll, you know, we'll get into
Speaker 2: the more modern theories. There's really well, there's a couple
Speaker 2: of leading theories. One is the wood, yeah, this ice
Speaker 2: age wood, which we'll talk about, and the others the varnish.
Speaker 1: Right, go, okay, Well, the Strativari was working during what's
Speaker 1: known as Europe's Little Ice Age, which is a period
Speaker 1: of unusually, very unusually colder temperatures, and I think they're
Speaker 1: still trying to figure out what the heck happened. And
Speaker 1: as a matter of fact, we need to do like
Speaker 1: an irregular ice age podcast and we'll talk about it then.
Speaker 2: Yeah, But the.
Speaker 1: Upshot of it was that because of the colder temperatures,
Speaker 1: the spruce that was used by Strativari in the manufacture
Speaker 1: of these violins grew slower but more evenly steadier, so
Speaker 1: that the wood that was harvested from these bruce trees
Speaker 1: was much more uniformly grained. Right, So just basically really
Speaker 1: high end wood was produced by this little ice age.
Speaker 1: The problem with that being the reason that Strata Vari's
Speaker 1: violins were so great, is that that wood was also
Speaker 1: available to violin makers elsewhere in Europe, and their violins
Speaker 1: don't sound anything like a Strata Vary.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: So the little ice age theory, while still I think
Speaker 1: out there has I think that really kind of goes
Speaker 1: a long way to undermining it.
Speaker 2: Yeah, like they were, people were really excited about that
Speaker 2: at first, and I think they're like, yes, not proof.
Speaker 1: It's a cool theory. It is cool, little ice age.
Speaker 2: There's another dude at Texas A and M I named
Speaker 2: Joseph Nagavary nagie Vary, what a unique name. And he said,
Speaker 2: it's all about this varnish, this cremones. Cremones varnish. Is
Speaker 2: that not right?
Speaker 1: Yeah? Cream and ease.
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think that's what they say.
Speaker 1: Start your morning right with cremin ese.
Speaker 2: So he published an article in Scientific Journal Public Library
Speaker 2: of science one. It's capitalized for some reason, and he says,
Speaker 2: you know what's going on here. It's this varnish that
Speaker 2: he used. Let me analyze it chemically, and what he
Speaker 2: found out was it's very unique in that it has
Speaker 2: these things in there that you would not expect to
Speaker 2: be in a varnish, like borax and chromium. And he said, so,
Speaker 2: what I think is going on is this stuff. He
Speaker 2: added this stuff to the varnish to protect it that
Speaker 2: would against damage an infestation, But what it really did
Speaker 2: was actually weakened the wood and made it porous where
Speaker 2: it should not be, and that created more tone, a
Speaker 2: more booming, rich, powerful tone. Right.
Speaker 1: Pushback his well, his theory is not entirely out of
Speaker 1: left field, like it's it's pretty much accepted that if
Speaker 1: you put the wrong kind of varnish on a violin,
Speaker 1: it's going to ruin the sound. Sure, so his whole
Speaker 1: thing was, well, why couldn't you stumble upon some varnish
Speaker 1: that actually enhanced the sound, And that was his idea
Speaker 1: that that's that accounted for strata areas violin sounding like that. Yeah,
Speaker 1: I think he did get a lot of pushback. There
Speaker 1: seems to be even if He's right. There seems to
Speaker 1: be a desire among the people who collect and play
Speaker 1: strata various violins is that we'll never understand what makes
Speaker 1: it special. We don't really want to know what will
Speaker 1: make it special.
Speaker 2: Yeah.
Speaker 1: There's a guy who was widely quoted. He's a violinist
Speaker 1: from America's name is James EANs Ends EANs Man, Well, James.
Speaker 1: His his whole view is that he's played a number
Speaker 1: of strata of various violins and other stringed instruments, and
Speaker 1: he said that there's probably a thousand things that make
Speaker 1: them special. Yeah, and we could never possibly know what
Speaker 1: all those thousand things are, and there's never just going
Speaker 1: to be just this one thing that is the key
Speaker 1: to what made strata varius violins so great.
Speaker 2: Yeah. I think I watched a BBC documentary that was
Speaker 2: really pretty great and they interviewed another violin maker and
Speaker 2: he said, you know, it was the right place, right time.
Speaker 2: Thing like this guy came along. Maybe they had this
Speaker 2: good wood that was special, maybe he had this varnish
Speaker 2: that was special.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but they were in the hands of somebody special too.
Speaker 2: Well. That was his point was that other people were
Speaker 2: using some of these same things and they turned out
Speaker 2: very different. He said he was so good at what
Speaker 2: he did, Like that's the secret. He was just better
Speaker 2: at doing this than other people.
Speaker 1: Right, Like how Chris Bosh and Dwayne Wade brought the
Speaker 1: best out of Lebron James.
Speaker 2: Well, where I think this Texas A and M Professor
Speaker 2: aired was that he was so bold as to even
Speaker 2: posit the idea that it may have been an accident,
Speaker 2: and that like.
Speaker 1: I would say bold is an appropriate term.
Speaker 2: Yeah, Like they turned out this good on accident. He
Speaker 2: didn't know this varnish was going to do that, or
Speaker 2: the wood may have been even pre treated with these chemicals,
Speaker 2: and he kind of lucked into what it ended up being. Yeah,
Speaker 2: and not that he wasn't talented, but like that's why
Speaker 2: they are what they are.
Speaker 1: And people were like, whoah, blasphemy.
Speaker 2: Yeah, out heretic. So how much of these things cost
Speaker 2: a lot?
Speaker 1: The end I saw, I mean, the numbers are all
Speaker 1: over the place. Like one thing, we'll say that the
Speaker 1: the record was three point five four four million dollars. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and then later on the record was broken with three
Speaker 1: point six million dollars with the Molitor stratavaries owned famously
Speaker 1: by Milwaukee brewer Paul Mollitor. That's where that one got
Speaker 1: its name.
Speaker 2: Well, yeah, I agree. And then this says, in June
Speaker 2: twenty fourteen, the Kreutzer at a pre sale estimate of
Speaker 2: seven and a half million to ten million, but it
Speaker 2: failed to reach the reserve price.
Speaker 1: Right But then later on another one sold in twenty
Speaker 1: eleven for sixteen million, So apparently nobody's really keeping tabs here.
Speaker 1: I looked down the internet. I couldn't find anything approaching
Speaker 1: a comprehensive list of how much these things had gone for.
Speaker 1: But the fact is millions of dollars, tens of millions
Speaker 1: in some cases, from what I understand. And there are collectors,
Speaker 1: very very wealthy collectors who are driving the price of
Speaker 1: strata various violins and other string instruments through the roof,
Speaker 1: where if you were smart enough to buy one for
Speaker 1: a few hundred thousand dollars twenty thirty years ago, it's
Speaker 1: worth easily ten twenty times that now.
Speaker 2: Yeah, and it's kind of a shame that these aren't
Speaker 2: in the hands of the great players of the world,
Speaker 2: you know.
Speaker 1: Well, they're in the hands of the great players of
Speaker 1: the world who come from very wealthy families.
Speaker 2: Yeah, or who, like you said, bought one twenty or
Speaker 2: thirty years ago, right, and that's their you know, their
Speaker 2: go to But.
Speaker 1: Yeah, it's it's just another fat piggy thing to buy
Speaker 1: and own and possess. The one I have is the
Speaker 1: most expensive one, right, Fortunately, the one that's so so
Speaker 1: valuable that it's frequently cited as priceless is the Messiah. Yeah,
Speaker 1: and that is owned by the Ashmoley and at Oxford University,
Speaker 1: so that one's not up for grabs, which is cool
Speaker 1: because all the other ones are just operating under that level.
Speaker 2: Yeah. And the lady in the BBC documentary as a violinist,
Speaker 2: and she got to hold the Messiah with gloves.
Speaker 1: And it's called that because there's a Nativity scene in
Speaker 1: laid on the back I believe.
Speaker 2: Oh I don't think it's the back. I think it's
Speaker 2: in the little tail piece. Oh okay, But this thing
Speaker 2: is gorgeous. And she was allowed to hold it with
Speaker 2: gloves is like white cotton gloves, And the whole time,
Speaker 2: even though I knew that wouldn't happen, I was like,
Speaker 2: don't drop it. Yeah, you know those slippy little cotton gloves. Sure,
Speaker 2: and it just made me nervous watching it.
Speaker 1: Did you ever see that video of things that were
Speaker 1: very expensive things that were accidentally oken that I made
Speaker 1: years back?
Speaker 2: I remember that.
Speaker 1: It's just like it was tough to make. I bet
Speaker 1: it's tough to watch too.
Speaker 2: Yeah. So over the years there have been many, many,
Speaker 2: many many fakes. As as soon as he died, they
Speaker 2: started pumping out forgeries, and not even forgeries, like just
Speaker 2: mass produced violins that they would throw a label on that.
Speaker 1: At the time, in the nineteenth century, eighteenth and nineteenth century,
Speaker 1: the people buying the violins knew that they were like
Speaker 1: knockoff manufactured fakes.
Speaker 2: Yeah, largely in Germany, right right, But they weren't like, yeah,
Speaker 2: they weren't.
Speaker 1: They weren't being duped. It was like this is this
Speaker 1: is in the style of Stratavarius or whatever. Yeah, largely
Speaker 1: in Germany and Czechoslovakia. And the thing is, though, is
Speaker 1: over time these what are now pretty old violins because
Speaker 1: they were again made in the eighteenth and nineteenth century. Yeah,
Speaker 1: they I had labels on them that would say like Stratavarius,
Speaker 1: cremonsis fachibot Onoh, and then say like sixteen seventy nine
Speaker 1: or something like that. Right, So, if you find one
Speaker 1: of these violins and your attic, yeah, and it looks
Speaker 1: pretty old. It literally says an Italian. This violin was
Speaker 1: made by Stratavarius in sixteen seventy nine. You could be
Speaker 1: forgiven to think that you have just found a Strativarius
Speaker 1: violin and all of your money problems are over. You
Speaker 1: can go buy more meth than you'll ever be able
Speaker 1: to do in your entire life.
Speaker 2: It might say made in Germany too, though.
Speaker 1: That's a big giveaway, it is. Yeah, And apparently if
Speaker 1: you're an appraiser of this kind of thing, you were
Speaker 1: so sick of people calling you that you can't even
Speaker 1: hide it when you're interviewed in an article. Yeah.
Speaker 2: The one guy even said that. He's like, people get
Speaker 2: angry when you tell them it's not he said, because
Speaker 2: they think they've got a lottery ticket and you have
Speaker 2: to break it to him. And he said, they get
Speaker 2: mad on these phone calls.
Speaker 1: Right, and they're like, well, do you have twenty bucks
Speaker 1: from men?
Speaker 2: It's pretty funny. Uh, do you got anything else?
Speaker 1: Yeah? If you find a violin and you look it
Speaker 1: over and it says Stratavarius and you look even further
Speaker 1: and it doesn't say made in Germany.
Speaker 2: Fake.
Speaker 1: If it doesn't say that, I know, but it's still
Speaker 1: probably a fake. Well you can. There's a Smithsonian article
Speaker 1: about it that has basically step by step what you
Speaker 1: can do and who you can submit photos to to
Speaker 1: get it basically pre appraised, well not appraised, but just
Speaker 1: looked at. And they can usually tell from the photos like, no,
Speaker 1: it's a fake.
Speaker 2: Like step one, leave it out in the sun and
Speaker 2: let it let it get rained on a couple of
Speaker 2: times if ants are attracted to it, not as strata exactly.
Speaker 1: Yeah, but one of the appraisers makes the point like
Speaker 1: they're about six hundred and fifty in the world and
Speaker 1: they're all basically accounted for it.
Speaker 2: We know where they are.
Speaker 1: Yeah, and even when we don't know where they are,
Speaker 1: we know we would know the one that we don't
Speaker 1: know where they are when they surface.
Speaker 2: Yeah. They stolen one.
Speaker 1: Yeah, there was one that was famously stolen thirty something
Speaker 1: years ago from a concert violinist and it was a
Speaker 1: stratavarius and it was in the attic of a Milwaukee
Speaker 1: thief's house and I guess he died and his girlfriend
Speaker 1: took it to an appraiser who's like, uh, this is stolen.
Speaker 2: I know who's this is crazy.
Speaker 1: So it's a very small community. So the idea that
Speaker 1: somebody's just gonna walk up with like a real strata
Speaker 1: varius that had previously been unknown is it's just most
Speaker 1: likely not going to happen.
Speaker 2: Yeah. The one of the other appraisers said, it's like
Speaker 2: finding a new rem brand. He said, we know what
Speaker 2: he painted, right, we know where they are.
Speaker 1: Yeah, now they got computers painting rem brands.
Speaker 2: Oh yeah, I remember that.
Speaker 1: Yeah.
Speaker 2: I think a guy left his strata in the cab
Speaker 2: a few years ago too.
Speaker 1: Was it, Joshua Bell? Sounds like something that I would do.
Speaker 1: He's wacky.
Speaker 2: I can't remember. I believe that happened, though I remember
Speaker 2: to get it back. I think so.
Speaker 1: Only in New York, right, jeez?
Speaker 2: Can you imagine? No?
Speaker 1: Because again, like these are concert violinists who have almost
Speaker 1: been entrusted by humanity with these things like here, this
Speaker 1: is a very expensive violin. Yes, but we are giving
Speaker 1: this to you because we think you will enrich this
Speaker 1: and with your playing and maybe someday it'll be called
Speaker 1: your last name Stratavarius. Play it well, don't leave it
Speaker 1: in the back of a cab.
Speaker 2: And then that guy had to get on Craigslist and
Speaker 2: buy a one hundred dollars fiddle right yep to play
Speaker 2: first chair at the Philharmonic.
Speaker 1: Yeah, Chuck, Yes, you got anything else?
Speaker 2: I got nothing else.
Speaker 1: I don't either. Good job putting this together, man.
Speaker 2: Thanks.
Speaker 1: If you want to know more about Stratavarius, you can
Speaker 1: search the internet for it, because we don't have an
Speaker 1: article on how stuff works. Since I said, uh, Internet,
Speaker 1: it's time for listener mail.
Speaker 2: Recall this from my good buddy Becks Rebecca Bloomfield. She's
Speaker 2: one of my pen pals.
Speaker 1: Okay from the stuff you should know want see in
Speaker 1: prison over the years.
Speaker 2: She sure is. No, she's not. She's a delight though,
Speaker 2: and she backed me up on my comments about women
Speaker 2: in science, so I felt good about it, so I
Speaker 2: wanted to read it. She made me feel better. I
Speaker 2: hope you guys had a great time in the UK.
Speaker 2: By the way, she just missed our show and I
Speaker 2: think in London by a couple of days, since she
Speaker 2: was very bummed out.
Speaker 1: Does she live there or was she visiting?
Speaker 2: I think visiting. She now lives somewhere else, so she said,
Speaker 2: I know you did. I just listened to the delightful
Speaker 2: history of steam. Anyway, I'm writing to say, bloody well done.
Speaker 2: Is that a curse word?
Speaker 1: I think like it's like.
Speaker 2: Very okay, great, well done, Chuck on your comment on
Speaker 2: what we could have achieved of women had been allowed
Speaker 2: into the stem fields from the start. I know this
Speaker 2: sort of comment could be a minefield for guy, but
Speaker 2: I can assure you you made your point really well.
Speaker 2: I'm normally the first to jump on non feminist comments
Speaker 2: or man's plaining. That's what I was afraid of, So
Speaker 2: she said, I'm usually the first to jump on the
Speaker 2: man's plaining. And when you said it, I just said yes, yes, Chuck,
Speaker 2: very loudly in my office. I even startled the dogs.
Speaker 2: Raising children is very important, but men can do it too.
Speaker 2: All humans of any gender should have a choice to
Speaker 2: what they do with their lives that should not be
Speaker 2: predetermined because of their gender. So good on you, Chuck.
Speaker 2: Makes me happy to know that the next generation of
Speaker 2: women are being raised by men like you. And that's
Speaker 2: from Beck's Bloomfield And she is a graphic designer for
Speaker 2: Little Red Robot Design Ooh, Shout Out and just a
Speaker 2: nice lady.
Speaker 1: Nice. Well, thanks a lot Be's Can I call her that?
Speaker 1: Or should I just call her Rebecca?
Speaker 2: No, you're in the club.
Speaker 1: Okay, Well thanks a lot Bes for that email and
Speaker 1: for shouting. We appreciate that kind of thing certainly. If
Speaker 1: you want to get in touch of this, you can
Speaker 1: tweet to us at sysk podcast. You can hang out
Speaker 1: with us at Facebook dot com slash Stuff you Should Know.
Speaker 1: You can also send us an email to stuff podcast
Speaker 1: at HowStuffWorks dot com and as always, joined us sort
Speaker 1: o at home on the web, Stuff youshould Know dot com.
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