Famous People

Southland Times, Issue 21091, 24 May 1930, Page 23

Famous People

ONE MINUTE BIOGRAPHIES. Who: ANTONIO STRADIVARI (Stradivarius). s Where: Italy. When: Seventeenth to eighteenth centuries. Why famous: Most celebrated of .Italian violin-makers. Experts have unearthed certain obscure details of his life, finding that the first authentic record of his residence at Cremona, with which city he was associated throughout his career, is of the year 1666. The date appears on the original label of one of his violins, which bears also the master’s mark —a Maltese cross and the initials A. S., within a double circle. It is assumed that he had already spent seven or eight years as an apprentice to Nicholas Amati, by whose work Stradivari was influenced for a considerable period. At the outset he seems to have been merely an unusually clever- craftsman, making violins after, the small proportions of the Amati model. But between 1684-1700 took place many important experiments, resulting finally in the creation of the "Long Strad,” an instrument more exquisitely balanced and proportioned than any the world had ever known. Then, with the dawn of the eighteenth century, dawned also the era of Stradvari’s greatest achievement. No part of his task was beneath Stradivari’s meticulous care; the selection of the materials, the designing of the patterns, the fashioning of each least detail of the instrument —be it violin, violoncello or viola. His recipe for the varnish, which produced those marvellously rich amber tones or the light reds, he inscribed on the flyleaf of the family Bible which a member of his family proceeded to destroy. No genuine portrait of the master remains, but one who knew him has described his personal appearance. It seems he was tall and thin. In win ter he wore a white woollen cap, replaced in summer by one of white cotton; his apron was of white leather. Sheldom did this working costume vary because seldom was its wearer outside of his workshop. Such was he who, according to the memorial tablet on his house at Cremona, “brought the violin to a perfection and left to Cremona an imperishable name as master of his craft.