Klarinet Archive - Posting 000161.txt from 1997/04

From: Steve Senderoff/Trisha Vierling <steve@-----.COM>
Subj: Re: Strativarius
Date: Sat, 5 Apr 1997 10:14:10 -0500

>Date: Fri, 4 Apr 1997 19:24:24 -0600
>From: "Tracy J. Skondin" <tjs0005@-----.EDU>
>Subject: Strativarius

>Actually, scientists have virtually accomplished strativarius quality, key
>word- virtually. A professor at Texas A&M had studied varnish shavings
>from a strativarius and believes to have found the secret. The pines that
>were used to make these violins were shipped into Venice through salt
>water. Well, the wood absorbed the minerals from this water which gave it
>a denser quality even after drying out. The magic varnish that he had
>was supposed to have been a secret but with this shaving this professor
>did some analysis' and found precious stones in it. In his search to find
>the formula he decided to grind up precious stones and add them to his
>varnish and had some of the world's best violinists play on it and they
>could hardly tell the difference. But, no matter how minute the
>difference was, it still existed. Food for thought...

>En Cristo,

>Tracy Jay

welllll...

The professor you refer to, Prof. Nagyvary, is a prof of biophysics at
either University of Florida or FSU...SEM microprobe (?) analysis was done
on both top (spruce) and rib&back wood (maple) and this indicated immersion
in salt water prior to construction..varnish analysis did indeed show
presence of shell and mineral material...his ideas were incorporated into a
series of new instruments by a luthier friend and the results were very
promising when compared to real strads...

that being said, I think most talk about gear, etc is good talk over a few
beers, but far less important to music making than the gear behind the
mouthpiece, as a former teacher of mine (Jerry Stowell) told me...when he
played my horn, he sounded like Jerry Stowell, and I, alas, still sounded
like Steve...

regards, steve

===================================================================
Steve Senderoff............Trish Vierling
Steve@-----.com

"...Ya run your E string down oh, I don't know, about three frets...anyway,
it corresponds to the third note on the A string...here's ya tuning..."
.........Tommy Jarrell