Violin Craftsmanship Institute

Wow, this summer has been a whirlwind of activity and I am dreadfully behind on checking in with y’all. 

The first leg of my summer travels brought me to beautiful Durham, New Hampshire for the Violin Craftsmanship Institute. Thanks to a grant from the Rhode Island Foundation, I enrolled in the “Basic Violin Maintenance and Repair” class. The idea is that we would like to have a fully functioning workshop here at CMW and be able to do repairs ourselves.

The first order of business was to find a place to stay. Thanks to the Rous (as in Ben and Nahanni) and Cox (as is the violin maker Doug’s brother Chuck) families up in Durham, I stayed at the Cox family farm for the week.  It is a remarkable place, filled with friendly people and animals, tasty crops and bio-diesel fueled vehicles and machines.

Next on the to-do list was getting the right tools. A couple of days before the class began, I received the tool list of about 70 items, some of them highly specialized from Germany. There was no way I was going to be able to get this stuff in two days time, so CMW’s good buddy Dennis McCarten from McCarten’s Violins in Pawtucket helped out big time by lending me most of the stuff on the list. Thanks Dennis! 

I arrived in Durham the night before the class and got settled in on the farm. Everyone there was so kind and helpful. I had a small room in the guesthouse for the week, it was perfect.   

Day One. The class started the next morning at 8 am with the instructor, instrument maker Francis Morris of Great Barrington handing out a syllabus for the next five days. As there was much to cover, there was no dilly-dallying and we got started right away sharpening our tools on the grinder. As we quickly learned, a good repair person is useless without good sharp tools, so we spent most of the day at the tool grinder and sharpening tools by hand on our waterstones. I didn’t realize it was possible to light a steel sound-post setter on fire with the grinding machine, but I managed somehow.

The next day, we got down to business with cutting and shaping pegs. With deft skill and quick humor, Mr. Morris and the class assistant Arie Werbrouck (a very talented maker in his own right) held our hands as we learned to shave and fit new pegs into the violin peg box. Pegs are essential for tuning the instrument so we took most of the day getting it just right, or awfully close to just right, or in my case, very far away from just right. I went through about seven pegs before I got one that even remotely fit. While it was quite frustrating and humbling at times, it was also exciting as it felt like we were young apprentices in the master’s workshop. 

An added bonus to Day Two was a concert by Durham’s native son and former CMW violin teacher, Ben Rous. Ben, along with five of his friends, played some sextets at a Durham church. It was great to hear some chamber music and see old friends.

Day Three was sound post day. We spent the day standing up, setting and moving sound-posts. Sound posts stand up inside the fiddle and are crucial to an instrument’s sound and resonance. Frances and Arie were very picky about our posts. That is why they get paid the big bucks. We even made posts ourselves. My post was too short and wouldn’t stand up in my fiddle, but it was a good attempt, if I do say so myself. 

Day Four was bridges. Shaping, fitting and shaving, very precise stuff. At the end of the day, I had produced a bridge so fat that at the corner restaurant there is a sign that reads, “Occupancy 75, or Jesse’s Bridge.” While I was somewhat proud of my obese bridge, it was far too thick to produce a decent sound. Here is the said bridge below. 

The final day was tonal adjustments. Fascinating stuff. Essentially a violin, viola, or cello is a vibrating box. Anything that is done to that box can affect the sound, sometimes quite profoundly. If the bridge is moved a millimeter, it can affect the sound; if the sound-post is bumped over a fraction of a millimeter, that can affect the sound. Mr. Morris lectured for much of the morning about all the ways one can change the sound of a stuffed up instrument. While many makers or repair people are very secretive of their methods, Mr. Morris was very generous with his techniques. It was awesome. I tried a few adjustments on my fiddle, but because of my morbidly obese bridge, any tonal nuances went undetected. However on other people’s violins, you could really hear it. 

At the end of the week, I had many more questions than answers. It was a very humbling experience and I have the utmost respect for instrument makers and repair people now, not that I didn’t before but you know what I mean. I learned a tremendous amount in those five days and I am excited to continue learning the trade by apprenticing with a couple of people in Rhode Island. Before you know it, I’ll be working on our own stock of instruments at CMW… very exciting! 

After the Institute, I spent a few days in Maine at Bay Chamber Concerts playing viola in Carnival of the Animals and I also taught at Apple Hill Center for Chamber Music. Now, I’m off the Haiti tomorrow to teach for two weeks. Wish me luck!

-Jesse Holstein, PSQ