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TO OUR READERS | REPAIRING DAMAGED VARNISH | CONDUCTING PROGRAMS | COMPARING BOW MATERIALS | MORE ON MAKER JOHN JUZEK To Our Readers Violinist Pablo Vasquez of Fort Wayne, Indiana, recently suffered a nightmarish accident. "A lapse in my attention got two of my left-hand fingers cut severely with a lawnmower blade. As a result, my life has taken some unwanted and not very nice turns. I will find out soon if my middle finger will come back to normal; it will be somewhat shorter and the shape may also be a factor. I would like to know if there are string players with similar experiences who have made a healthy recovery, physically and mentally. If there are any support groups, or just people I can contact, I would appreciate it highly." If you or someone you know has overcome a similarly serious setback, or if you’d just like to offer your support, write to Q & A. And if you have questions of your own, let us know—we’ll call on readers, our staff, and our contributing experts for their advice and ideas. If we print your question or comment in Q & A, we’ll also give you a year’s free subscription, gift subscription, or subscription renewal. Q I am new to the violin world and have a couple of questions for you. My father-in-law has his father’s old violin. He thinks it’s about 75 years old—or that’s how long it’s been in the family. I say that because the label said it was handmade in Germany, and the date on the label is 1913. It is a Carl Becker version of an Antonius Stradivarius. The question is, if a violin is in the heat for a long time (it was kept in the attic, we’re not sure for how long), can you bring moisture to the wood and reverse the effect of the dry air and heat? The heat did cause some damage to the finish (there is some pitting). Would this be a loss? Other than the pitting, it looks good. Is this a job for a professional repairperson? I thought maybe putting a humidifier in the case would keep the violin from suffering further damage. It doesn’t appear to be cracked, but the finish is crackly. —Brenda Schafer A Heat and dryness can damage an instrument, by causing either the glue to fail, cracks to develop, or the varnish to be degraded. The varnish on your violin is one of the most important factors in its sound and value, and the fresher it is, the better. The reason for this is that varnish is applied not just to protect the wood; it also contributes to the individual character of the sound. Violin varnishes vary widely in their composition and the way they age. They are designed to be fragile and are expected to wear; the tougher a varnish is, the more it restricts the vibration of the wood. If the varnish has been damaged, restoring it is a delicate process that requires experience and care to preserve as much of what is left of the original as possible. In this case it does sound as though your varnish has suffered some damage, but often what appears to be damage might in fact be no more than the normal aging of a varnish film. Obviously, the value of the instrument will determine whether it warrants the expense and time that would be involved. Any such evaluation—not only of the extent of the damage and the proper approach to restoring the varnish, but especially the instrument’s overall value—must be done with the instrument in hand. Other possible damage to the instrument, varnish aside, is also something that can be assessed only by a qualified repairer. Your description of the violin indicates that it is worth a closer look; to find someone in your area, consult the directory of the American Federation of Violin and Bow Makers at www.afvbm.com (you’ll see that Carl Becker, Jr., is himself a founding member) or Strings’ Resource Guide, available as the latest October issue and also on-line at www.stringsmagazine.com. When showing your instrument to a repairer, you won’t be charged for a preliminary evaluation—a quick yes or no, in other words—but do keep in mind that for any violin maker or repairer, time is money, so if you want more detailed information, be prepared to pay. Most repair shops do not charge for estimates of repair. As for the proper maintenance of your violin, there are a number of things you can do to keep it safe and sound, more than can be discussed here. Strings publishes a Guide to Commonsense Instrument Care that you might find useful. (In the interests of full disclosure, I must admit that I wrote it). It can be purchased through Strings by calling (800) 637-2852 or visiting www.stringsmagazine.com. —James N. McKean Q I am 15 years old and I play the violin. I go to the Governor’s School for the Arts, where my music director is teaching me conducting this fall. This is my chosen career. Do you have a list of annual, summer, or master-class programs for conducting? —Edward Ablang A A search of Strings’ Summer Study Guide (February/March) turned up a number of programs in the U.S. and Canada that include classes on conducting. A brief description of each follows, in alphabetical order; consult the Summer Study Guide for more details. The Festival at Sandpoint Training Programs, at the Schweitzer Institute of Music in Sandpoint, Idaho, includes a ten-day program in conducting. Write to PO Box 695, Sandpoint, ID 83864, or call (208) 265-4554. The Luzerne Music Center, at Lake Luzerne in New York, offers month-long Junior and Senior sessions in a variety of disciplines including conducting. Write to 7648 Ponte Verde Way, Naples, FL 34109; telephone (800) 874-3202; e-mail luzerneMC@aol.com. The National String Workshop, Repair Clinics, and Orchestral Conducting Seminar is primarily aimed at teachers but welcomes everyone from high-school students to professional performers. A week of a "whole-mind and -body approach to playing and teaching" includes conducting for novice and advanced students. Contact Dr. Janet Jensen at 720 Lowell Hall, 610 Langdon St., Madison, WI 53703; telephone (608) 265-5629; or e-mail chelcy.bowles@mail.admin.wisc.edu. The Orford Arts Centre, in Quebec, Canada, runs for several weeks and offers conducting classes given by Tomas Koutnik and Nurhan Arman. Write to 3165 Ch. Du Parc, Canton d’Orford, PQ J1X 3W3, Canada, or telephone (819) 843-3981. The Sewanee Summer Music Center, at the University of the South in Sewanee, Tennessee, provides a month of classes for students and adults in a variety of subjects, including conducting. Contact Leo Saguiguit at 735 University Ave., Sewanee, TN 37383; call (931) 598-1225; or go to www.sewanee.edu/ssmc. Sound Encounters is a ten-day program held at Ottawa University in Kansas; it focuses on chamber music and offers elective courses in conducting. Write to Alice Joy Lewis, 1001 S. Cedar #99, Ottawa, KS 66067, or call (800) 755-5200, ext. 5437. —Editors Q I am in the market for a bow. What is the difference between bows made with different materials, such as brazilwood, pernambuco, carbon fiber, and graphite? —J.C. Anderson A The type and quality of materials a bow maker chooses for making a bow stick has a tremendous influence on the playing qualities of the bow. While a talented and experienced violin maker can make a fine-sounding violin from less than the best maple and spruce, a bow maker needs the very best materials to make a fine-playing bow. Traditionally, that material has been pernambuco. It has been used almost exclusively by the great makers of the past and is still used by all makers today. This extraordinary wood comes from only one place, the state of Pernambuco on the central coast of Brazil. It began to be exported to Europe in the 1500s as a dye wood, but in the mid-1700s, French bow makers discovered that it had the ideal characteristics for bows. It is a very dense, hard, somewhat oily wood that is difficult to work, but when finished into bow sticks, it has just the right combination of strength, resilience, responsiveness, and elasticity. These qualities are what make a good bow so helpful in performing complex bow strokes, and no other material does the job as well. A very beautiful wood with a fine grain pattern, pernambuco can range in color from dark chocolate through red-brown, red, and golden orange up to yellow. However, the quality varies and from any pernambuco log, less than ten percent is usable for bows. In recent years, the supply of pernambuco has been decreasing and the government of Brazil has put severe restrictions on its export. Expect prices of $200–$1,000 for commercially-made pernambuco violin bows; bows by contemporary master makers can run more than $3,000. For a beginning student or someone with more modest needs (or a more modest budget), a brazilwood bow might be a good choice. Brazilwood comes from the same geographic area as pernambuco, and from other tropical areas as well. Because it is more plentiful, it is less expensive. It shares some of pernambuco’s characteristics—it is hard and dense—but it doesn’t have the same resilience. It is also not as responsive, making advanced bowing techniques more difficult. It is also less attractive than pernambuco, usually a dull dark brown with thicker grain lines. Brazilwood bows are usually priced from $75 to $200. That said, there are high-grade brazilwood bows that play as well as or better than inexpensive pernambuco ones. This may be due to the fact that while most brazilwood bows are made more quickly and inexpensively so that they can be sold cheaply, when more care is given to the selection of wood and manufacture, the playing qualities improve. Over the last ten years, carbon-fiber (also called carbon, graphite, or composite) bows have gained popularity with some musicians. They are synthetic bows, that is, made of composite materials (carbon fiber is a reinforcing material). The advantage of these bows is that they are more durable and dimensionally stable than wooden bows. Because the material is manufactured, one would expect uniformity, but I have found that they can vary from one bow to the next. I also think that they have a slightly different "feel" than wooden bows. Composite bows’ playing qualities are equal to or even a little better than pernambuco bows of the same price. The price range is wide, from $200 to $2,000. One of the more innovative makers is Benoit Rolland, a French bow maker who produces the Spiccato bow, which allows the player to fine-tune its playing characteristics by adjusting a kevlar cord inside the stick. He also makes the less expensive Arpège. (In the U.S., call Spiccato French American Bows, Inc., in Salt Lake City, Utah, at (801) 537-7856, or e-mail pprier@prierviolins.com for information.) Another manufacturer is Coda, which also makes three models, the deluxe Classic, the less-expensive Conservatory, and the new Colours (see page 112). (CodaBow International, Ltd., is based in Winona, Minnesota, and can be reached at [507] 454-1509 or at codabow@luminet.net.) There are a number of other makers as well. These bows are an excellent choice for musicians who perform in less-than-ideal conditions, and at the lower price range they may be a good choice for the student who is a bit careless of a fragile bow. While I don’t think carbon-fiber bows will ever replace fine master-made pernambuco bows, they are worth comparing if you are looking for a good bow at a reasonable price. My best advice is to decide on a budget, and then try all of the bows within that budget. It really depends on your needs and playing style. —Richard Ward A I noticed in the May/June Q & A column that reader Elaine Sprague asked about John Juzek, the maker of her violin. In addition to the information given in that issue, I can add that I knew a Juzek store in New York very well many years ago, before it moved to Vermont. It sold very reasonable student instruments, mostly to schools, but also to private people. It used to be located in a big loft downtown and I went there with my students quite often. As I understood the situation, the owners imported instruments in parts from Czechoslovakia and then put them together here; one of the nicest workers was a Czech, and I think the owners were originally Czech too. In contrast to other shops, they did not allow you to take a fiddle home to try but made you pay for it outright, then allowed you to return it if you didn’t like it—the way you can return clothes to a department store. The owner, at the time, was an old gentleman named, indeed, Juzek. I think it was his son who moved the store to the country (the reason given was that he liked to ski). The fact is that they did lots of successful business for a great many years and were sorely missed when they left town. —Edith Eisler
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