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Stradivari 1713 ‘Boissier, Sarasate’ Violin: Sarasate’s Red Violin

2023-12-14T09:00:00

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One of the most admired instruments ever made by Antonio Stradivari, the ‘Boissier, Sarasate’ is in an excellent state of preservation. Roberto Jardón Rico examines the violin and its best-known owner, the Spanish virtuoso Pablo Sarasate

In his 1856 book Antoine Stradivari, luthier célèbre, the Belgian musicologist and critic François-Joseph Fétis listed the five violins he considered the master’s finest. They were, in order: the 1690 ‘Tuscan-Medici’, the 1715 ‘Alard’, the 1709 ‘Viotti’, the 1716 ‘Cessole’, and the 1713 ‘Boissier, Sarasate’. A few years later the Hill brothers confirmed Fétis’s opinion, and so have many experts since, most recently Charles Beare…

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