ANCIENT AND MODERN BOWS

I wanted to devote this post to a topic we started last week while talking about certificates  (THE CERTIFICATES OF AUTHENTICITY);  ancient bows. We will analyse, in particular, the strongest and weakest points of this kind of instruments.

Violin bow Persoit

As you may know, if the most important school for the making of instruments has its origin in Cremona, the seat of bow making is, with no doubt, Paris.

While in Italy the fathers of violins were Guarnieri, Stradivari, Ruggeri, etc., in France we find great masters such as Tourte, Persoit, Peccatte, Sartory, just to name a few. These ones are the hand-crafter who made the development of the complex modern bow architecture, possible.

It was not just by coincidence that during ‘800 it was a common thought among musician that the best combination was to own an Italian violin and a French bow; from here famous quote “Cremona Violin and Paris bow” comes from. I can guaranty that during ‘800 it was a proper and right way of thinking. In those times France, and Paris in particular, hosted extremely skilled hand-crafters, that set the fundamental basis of bowmaking. For example, think that without Tourte, Pernamuco wood would be completely unknown, while now it is unique and practically it has no replacement when we have to make a modern bow.

I wish to inform you that Tourte, before devoting his life making bows, was a watch maker and this should induce you to think about, he was working near a dyeing mill and thanks to this particular neighbourhood and his particular talent, (I personally think of him as genius) he could get in touch with the knowledge of Pernambuco. The Cesalpina Echinata, its scientific name, was brought to Europe not to make bows but for a completely different purpose. The Pernambuco wood has several color shades, among them we find a very bright red, almost black one, it is sufficient to keep it in your sweaty hands and it stains your fingers. Furthermore the tannins are so strong and long lasting that they cannot be washed away with soap. If you have pernambuco stains on your skin, the only thing that can take away any trace is lemon. Pernambuco was used to dye fabrics, so only in this way Tourte could get acquainted with this wood.

Let’s come back to our saying “Cremona Violin and Paris bow”. As already told, during ‘800, this quote was really a correct one but it is not the same nowadays. During ‘800, in fact, the violin of the great makers of Cremona were already ancient but the bows were already the modern ones! The modern bow was born at the end of 1800 and all the greatest French bowmakers have made their bows in this century. Obviously the bows they made were new so the ancient sentence so used in ‘800, could be changed into “Ancient violin and modern bow”

Viola bow D. T. Navea Vera – (Click to enlarge)

As I told several times, the instruments are totally different from bows. A bow is a shock-absorber. The wood fibers, after having absorbed for 30 years the weight of the musician arm get tired and are no more able to carry out their work in a proper way. Of course the ancient bows often have very charming and intriguing tone qualities but they loose power, crystal clarity and push properties. Obviously each bow has its own history, if you are lucky enough to find a bow made by a great master of the past that has not played for long, you can obtain all from it: power and charm. In my personal experience, after having seen many bows, I can say that this may happen even if very very rarely.

I hope you do not misunderstand but I feel a charm for French bows. I still remember my childish joy when once in a small workshop in New York a dealer showed me, one by one, a range of fantastic pieces: a Sartory violin bow belonging to his first period, then a Dominique Peccate, one of the best bow I ever seen and after those ones the history of bows: a transition bow by Maline, a very rare piece. I thought I entered a magical world.

But if my passion is right because I study bows and have a great passion for them, I cannot share the same opinion with that one of some musicians. When you play, in my opinion, you need a bow that can guaranty great power, clarity and must be reliable. Nothing as a modern bow can meet all these requirements. Obviously not all modern bows are alike, many of them have a poor quality but some of them are really excellent. Furthermore also French bows may differ one from the other.

It is much different if you own a Peccatte, a Sartory, a Voirin and, just to make an example, a Bazin or Morizot. The former were great a hand-crafter and brought innovations, the latter were hand workers in the bow world and they made bows that fit the mass. Furthermore also the bows made by great masters loose their fibers thus decreasing their power qualities. Obviously I will describe more deeply this topic as I do not expect you will believe just my words so the next blog will deal with the “VELOCITY OF THE SOUND”

So long

Paolo