From an article on CT scanning for luthiers by Rudolf Hopfner in the January 2018 issue

Eric Benning's workshop in Los Angeles

Christian Bayon’s method for making a bass-bar from the February 2018 issue

Setting up a luthier’s photographic studio with Ian McWilliams, from the October 2017 issue

A titanium frog made by Christophe Landon featured in the August 2017 issue

Domenico Dragonetti's Vincenzo Panormo double bass, featured in the December 2017 issue

1/6

show caption

Recent lutherie articles

  • Creating and playing with a bow with a new type of titanium frog (August 2017)
  • Results of an experiment revealing the chemical composition of Stradivari’s wood (August 2017)
  • Alberto Giordano examines the 1708 ‘Dancla’ Stradivari violin & FREE POSTER (July 2017)
  • Friends and colleagues pay tribute to bow maker, author and expert Bernard Millant (July 2017)
  • ‘Digital Amati’: pioneering new software for designing instrument forms (September 2017)
  • A research project designed to find how changing an instrument’s top or back affects its sound (September 2017)
  • The miraculous restoration of the ‘Mara’ Stradivari cello, after it was smashed to pieces in a shipwreck (October 2017)
  • ‘The Friends of Stradivari’: John Dilworth examines some of the treasures of the Cremona-based organisation
  • Frédéric Chaudière examines a 1732 Guarneri ‘del Gesù’, which was discovered after almost a century languishing forgotten in a Buenos Aires opera house (November 2017)
  • The little-known history of violin making in Brazil (November 2017)
  • The first of two articles examining Stradivari’s final years reveals how his making career was intertwined with the history of Cremona (December 2017)
  • How English double bass makers such as Panormo and Kennedy were influenced by the appearance of Domenico Dragonetti and his Gasparo da Salò in 1794 (December 2017)
  • Innovations in CT instrument scanning (January 2018)
  • The second of two articles on Stradivari reveal his relationship with a future Pope, and the eventual fate of his grave (January 2018)
  • A c.1790 F.X. Tourte receives the most detailed analyses of a bow ever produced by The Strad (February 2018)
  • We examine eight instruments from throughout Jean-François Aldric’s career to track the evolution of his craft (February 2018)  

Forthcoming articles

  • Why so many luthiers are making instruments in groups of three or four (March 2018)
  • How an artefact from Stradivari’s workshop finally provided conclusive proof that instrument cases were made there (March 2018)   

Making Matters

Interesting points of interest for violin and bow-makers:

  • A comparison of slab-cut vs. quarter-sawn wood
  • Cut-down instruments
  • Novel uses for a bandsaw
  • Making a mini photographic studio in the workshop
  • Getting the right distance between an instrument’s strings on the bridge
  • Measuring the ‘boldness’ of an instrument’s arching
  • Changes in ‘blind testing’ experiments in recent years
  • Ground prep
  • Measuring wood density and why it’s useful to do so  

Trade Secrets

Master luthiers reveal their special techniques including:

  • Making a cello mould
  • A home-made device for bow winding
  • The ‘pastry bag’ approach to making plaster casts
  • A shop-made hand plane for fingerboards
  • Tools for perfectly squared edges
  • A different approach to the bass-bar  

In Focus

A close look at key instruments by great and lesser known makers, with recent focuses on G.B. Guadagnini, Nicolas Lupot, Antonio Stradivari and Giuseppe Rocca, to mention a few. 

My Space

A photographic peek into workshops around the world featuring, in the past few months, Theo Marks (Netherlands), Peter Erben (Germany), Eric Benning (USA), Ulrike Dederer (Switzerland) and others.

 

Subscribe today to ensure you don’t miss any further issues of The Strad.