Power and majesty: Domenico Montagnana ‘Farina’ cello 1730

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The 1730 Domenico Montagnana cello known as the ‘Farina’ is part of a rare breed: one that survived the rigours of the 19th century intact. Most large-size cellos were reduced in size during that time, owing to the demands of new repertoire and the changing needs of the player. By the end of the century, the number of uncut Montagnana cellos – and indeed those of his contemporaries, such as Matteo Gofriller and Francesco Gobetti – was minimal, which is why examining the ‘Farina’ feels somewhat like looking into a crystal ball to view an instrument almost as it came from the maker’s workshop ‘alla Cremona’.

Of course Montagnana was based in Venice; however, the label of the ‘Farina’, like other instruments from that time, reads: Domenicus Montagnana Sub Signa Cremonae Venetia 1730 (‘Domenico Montagnana, under the sign of Cremona, Venice, 1730’). Even in those days, the town of Amati and Stradivari was revered for its instrument making prowess, and the makers of Venice looked to them for inspiration.

Montagnana himself was born in Lendinara, around 50 miles south-west of Venice, and only came to the city of canals when he was a teenager. It seems likely that he apprenticed in the workshop of Matteo Sella, and may also have had contact with Matteo Gofriller, then the leading cello maker of the day. His close contemporary Francesco Gobetti began around the same time, and may have sold his instruments through Sellas’s shop. Where Gobetti’s instruments appear strongly influenced by Gofriller and to a lesser extent Stradivari, Montagnana worked on his own model, which gives his instruments a distinctive look – even though they vary wildly between each other.

Montagnana became a member of the Venice instrument making guild in 1711 and either that year or the year after, he opened his workshop ‘alla Cremona’ in the Calle dei Stagneri, making mostly violins, cellos and double basses. Soon after that, he married Caterina Berti, a native of the San Bartolomeo area of Venice, and the couple had six daughters over the next eleven years. As well as making and repairing his own work, Montagnana sold bows, strings and old instruments. From around 1720 onwards, when Gofriller was in decline, he was possibly the most successful maker in Venice. He died in 1750, the same year as J.S. Bach, and his shop was taken over by Santo Serafin’s nephew Giorgio Serafin, who also married one of Montagnana’s daughters.

Montagnana’s cellos look like they sound. They tend to have a dark, colourful, complex appearance with a tone that can be described as broad and full, which can fill a room or a concert hall. They always seem to have more to give, and the ‘Farina’ is no exception. For the whole of the cello’s recorded history, it has been prized for its inimitable tone quality and projection, which have made it a favoured instrument for soloists.

Montagnana’s cellos have a tone that can be described as broad and full, which can fill a room or a concert hall

On 22 December 1900, a certificate of authenticity was drawn up by the London firm of W.E. Hill & Sons, for a ‘violoncello’ sold by them to ‘W.B. Paterson Esq. of 23 Warwick Road, Maida Hill’. The certificate states that the cello was made by Domenico Montagnana of Venice, and that the label is original. It also says that the cello’s dimensions are ‘uncut, in fact as left by the maker’, but it does not include measurements.

The certificate goes on to state that they (W.E. Hill & Sons) ‘first learned of the existence of the cello through Signor Piatti, who, during a visit to Cologne many years ago, met with it in the possession of Jean Maria Farina, the well-known maker of Eau-de-Cologne’. They say that ‘subsequently it came to this country [the UK], but its previous history is quite unknown.’

W.B. Paterson would have been William Bell Paterson, who was born in 1852 in Glasgow, Scotland. An amateur cellist and fine art dealer, he opened an art gallery at 33 Renfield Street in Glasgow in 1892 and sold fine art paintings. He must have had some success, because not only could he pay for a Montagnana cello from Hills in 1900, but he also opened a London branch of his gallery in the same year, at 5 Old Bond Street. At the time, the Hills shop was at 140 New Bond Street.

‘Signor Piatti’ would have been Carlo Alfredo Piatti, one of the most important cellists of his day. Born in 1822 in Bergamo, Italy, he played in the Joachim Quartet and was the first to edit the six Boccherini cello sonatas. He also wrote two concertos and twelve caprices for cello, among many other works. Piatti is known to have owned a number of fine instruments including, coincidentally, a different Montagnana cello of 1730.

The cello’s namesake Jean Marie Farina was most likely the contemporary owner of the Farina perfumier. The company’s history is somewhat difficult to keep track of, since several members of the family shared the same name in slightly different forms. The firm was founded in 1709 by the Italian-born Giovanni Maria Farina who, when he moved to Cologne, Germanicised his name to ‘Johann Maria’. His name also appears later as ‘Jean Marie’. The current owner, an eighth-generation descendant, also bears the name Johann Maria. The Jean Marie who owned the Montagnana cello was born in 1809 and died in 1880, and is best remembered in Germany for campaigning for trademark protection. Farina is now the world’s oldest perfume company still in existence, having been making eau de cologne since 1709, and its illustrious list of customers has included Mozart, Beethoven, Napoleon and Queen Victoria.

We know that the next owner after W.B. Paterson was May Mukle (pronounced ‘Mook-luh’). She received the cello by a wealthy donor, who may or may not have been Paterson. After hearing her perform in a concert, the donor invited her to choose any instrument she liked from the Hill collection in London, and the Montagnana was her choice.

May Mukle was one of the first female cellists to have enjoyed an international reputation as a first-class solo cellist. She was born in 1880 into a musical family; her father, Leopold Mukle, was an organ builder and the inventor of a coin-operated music machine, an early jukebox. One of his creations, an ‘orchestrion’, can be seen at the Birmingham Science Museum, UK.

May Mukle was one of the first female cellists to have enjoyed an international reputation as a first-class solo cellist

May Mukle started taking cello lessons at the age of nine. She became a popular performer and counted many of the day’s leading musicians as friends; she played chamber music with Pablo Casals, Jacques Thibaud, Lionel Tertis and Albert Sammons, and also played in several string quartets. She had several sisters, one of whom, Anne, played the piano. They formed a trio with the American violinist Maud Powell and the three of them performed in tours all over the British Isles, South Africa, Hawaii, Canada and the US.

Mukle continued to perform on the ‘Farina’ into her late seventies. In 1959 her wrist was broken in a car accident, but she recovered and started playing again as soon as she could. She died in 1963 at the age of 83. One year later, the Royal Academy of Music instituted the May Mukle Prize in her honour, which is still awarded to a cello student every year.

On 15 December 1969, Jacques Francais of New York sold the cello to musician Bernardo Altmann. He wrote a certificate stating ‘that the cello in the possession of Bernardo Altmann of New York, bearing a label Domenico Montagnana, dated 1730, is a genuine instrument of this maker in all its parts’. He added that ‘the instrument is a characteristic example of the maker’s work and is in its original size’. He included measurements.

Altmann was born in Buenos Aires, Argentina, and was a cellist in the New York Philharmonic from 1952, when he was hired by Dimitri Mitropoulos, until his retirement in 1996. After he retired, the Montagnana became the property of Robert Jamieson of Minneapolis, Minnesota.

Jamieson was born in Santa Monica, California, and started playing cello when he was seven years old. As a teenager he played professionally in the Brodetsky Ensemble. He served in the 370th Army Air Force Band and Armed Forces Radio Service during World War II. In 1946 he won the Los Angeles Philharmonic’s young artist competition. Aged 23 he joined the LA Phil as assistant principal cellist. He was also a studio musician and played for many motion picture soundtracks in Hollywood.

Bob, as he was known, moved to New York in 1948 and joined the New York City Opera and Ballet, toured with the NBC Symphony under Arturo Toscanini, and studied and performed at Tanglewood. He became principal cellist with the Minneapolis Symphony (now the Minnesota Orchestra) in 1951 and stayed in that position until his retirement in 1991. He acquired the ‘Farina’ in April 1988, and played it in the orchestra and various chamber groups up until he died in 2018 at the age of 94.

The cello now has a new life with Ilya Finkelshteyn, principal cellist in the Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra, faculty member of the University of Cincinnati College Conservatory of Music, and a frequent performer at the Mostly Mozart Festival in New York City.

The ‘Farina’ is a magnificent example of Montagnana’s work, made when he was at the height of his powers and demonstrating all the hallmarks of his style. The back is of two pieces of quarter-cut maple with broad, deep flames. The same wood has been used for the ribs, while the scroll and pegbox are of the typically plainer-figured, but excellent-quality maple cut off the quarter, but not on the slab. The spruce used for the table is of medium-width grain in the centre, broadening to wide grain in the flanks.

The ‘Farina’ was made when Montagnana was at the height of his powers and demonstrating all the hallmarks of his style

The abundant famous Venetian varnish is of a rich, dark red colour, with a fascinating array of textures and patinas. In the areas where the varnish has worn off, a beautiful golden amber ground is revealed.

The body is not long, but the bridge sits low on the table, giving the cello a long string length. This can be challenging for some players, but is a revelation for those who can handle it. As with most uncut Montagnana cellos, the outline is wide in the upper bouts and corners, and deeply swept in at the C-bouts, with big, broad lower bouts.

Despite the cello’s robust appearance, it is not a heavy instrument. The maple back and sides are of low density, as is the spruce top. Montagnana had a feel for archings that allowed him to sculpt them for strength where strength was needed, and graduations and rib thicknesses that have allowed the cello’s various owners to enjoy its wonderful sound for almost 300 years.

The workmanship shows the hand of an experienced craftsman: beautiful but not fussy. Montagnana was undoubtedly competent and sure in the carving and shaping of each part. Perhaps the most unusual thing about the cello’s design is that the linear width of the upper bout is close to that at the upper corners.

Unfortunately, since the neck of the cello has been grafted, we have no way of knowing the original string length. But thankfully the rest of the cello, apart from wear, distortions and repair work due to age, is as it left Montagnana’s shop.

The certificate, signed by Jacques Francais in 1969, included linear measurements for the cello as follows. It can be assumed that they were taken over the arch using a tape measure:

Montagnana, and most Italian master luthiers, used an inside mould of their own design, which they would be encouraged to make after years of experience working in masters’ shops. The shape of the rib structure, and then the outline of the body of the cello, would be defined by the mould’s shape and dimensions.

Over years of use, edges become worn and sometimes repaired. Slight changes in the shapes of the ribs might occur because of necessary repairs. These dimensions, along with the block dimensions, rib heights, arching heights and shapes, and the plate graduations, would define the air volume of the instrument. All of these factors would influence the sound.

Linear dimensions of the purfling can be difficult to measure using rulers, CT scans or tape measures, but a trammel does the job nicely. Using a trammel, one can measure exactly to the inside edge of the purfling at the manor extremities of length and width.

Using the trammel gives the following linear measurements of the back, taken from just inside the purfling:

Once an instrument has been CT-scanned, we can also measure the linear proportions, volumes, wood densities and masses.

Linear measurements of the inside of the ribs at the midpoint of the rib heights using CT are as follows:

The stop length on the cello is the position of the notches in the f-holes, which are usually measured with a tape measure over the arch. On this cello, the stop length is 414mm. Montagnana placed the f-hole notch originally about 4mm lower at 418mm, but someone later filled those notches and made new ones higher for a more manageable string length.

With a 28cm neck length, the resulting string length is about a centimetre longer than the usual 69cm, depending on how the bridge is placed in relation to the notches in the f-holes.

When examining an instrument like the ‘Farina’, it is constructive to consider the kind of technology and resources that would have been available to luthiers of the time. The use of compass and straightedge in designing instruments would have been well known to luthiers in Venice. Some scrolls of the early Cremonese makers have pinpricks along the crest, which indicate the use of compasses or dividers. And it has been demonstrated countless times that an instrument outline can be formed simply using straight lines and circle arcs.

Now, today’s luthiers are increasingly moving away from making direct copies, and instead using the work of Montagnana and his ilk as inspiration for their own models and patterns. We can admire and appreciate the brilliant genius of makers of the past, who gave us so many beautiful masterpieces to see and hear, while also building on the knowledge of these past makers using the modern tools and materials we have at our disposal. And we can take heart in knowing that, 300 years ago, a skilled cello maker like Domenico Montagnana was able to create this thing of beauty, whose powerful and magisterial voice still shines out through the centuries, even despite having nothing but knives, gouges, a breathtaking knowledge of wood and a genius for form and construction.

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