What Jennifer Koh Plays

For the past ten years, Jennifer Koh has applied a Tourte bow to the 1727 Ex-Grumiaux Ex-General DuPont Stradivari, both on loan from a private sponsor. “The moment I played on this particular violin it was like I met my soul mate,” she says. “Arthur Grumiaux has passed on, and so have a lot of people who were present when he was playing this instrument, but the person who performed on this instrument stays in the instrument. You feel that connection with Grumiaux, and between Grumiaux and his audiences, when you play an instrument with this kind of history. It definitely has changed me as a player. With a great instrument, just like in a relationship, you can’t just impose yourself on it. The more you get to know the instrument and its different timbres and colors, you become very connected to it. Now it’s an extension of myself, and it’s become hard to imagine myself playing on anything else.”