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