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Contemporary Instruments on Display You can’t have too much of a good thing. At least, that’s the hope of the organizers of two separate exhibitions scheduled for this autumn. Cremona Exhibition ’99 marks the second annual U.S. tour of several dozen violins, violas, and cellos from Cremona, Italy. At the same time, contemporary American violin and bow makers will be displaying their wares—in person—in Los Angeles at the 1999 Exhibition of Contemporary American Violin and Bow Makers at the auction house Butterfield & Butterfield, which is also holding a sale of musical instruments. For players who live in or travel to the right places, this fall brings unique opportunities to play and assess a rich variety of new instruments. Exhibition ’99 will travel to four sites over a three-month period, spending a minimum of ten days at each location. It starts October 15 at the Thomas Metzler Violin Shop in Glendale, California, outside of Los Angeles. By October 28, the instruments will be at the David Kerr Violin Shop, Inc., in Portland, Oregon; the next host, Rolland Huthmaker Bowed Stringed Instruments in Duluth, Georgia, outside of Atlanta, takes over on November 17; and the show’s last day will be December 15 at the Baroque Violin Shop, owned by Paul J. Bartel, in Cincinnati, Ohio. Details about the tour are available on-line at cremonaexhibition.com. The ambitious event is being coordinated by Dominik Musafia of Musafia North America, Inc. The instruments themselves represent the work of some 30 individual violin makers in Cremona. As Musafia points out, the Italian makers benefit greatly from this chance to send their wares to this country. They have suffered during Japan’s economic downturn because contemporary Cremonese instruments had particular cachet in the Japanese market. The makers’ involvement in this U.S. exhibit, Musafia explains, "is for the purpose of publicity, for the purpose of sales, and for the purpose of raising the image of Cremona in the United States." The American dealers involved all regularly sell contemporary Cremonese instruments in their shops, but with this event they can pitch an event to their customers that is unique. "We have, at the moment, maybe 125 violins ready for sale," David Kerr says of his shop, "but we don’t have 40 from one city. That’s what’s really exciting. Yes, normally you can come in and play a lot of violins, a mixture of old and new from every part of the world—but to have 40 instruments from one city is truly amazing." Kerr is planning to have several tryout rooms open at his shop so that customers can easily get their hands on the instruments and assess them. He’s advertising and sending the word out via his mailing list, which covers much of the northwest region. He’s not alone; in southern California, repeat hosts Tom Metzler and Barbara Don (a husband-and-wife team) are letting all their customers know about the wine-and-cheese reception they’ll hold, along with demonstrations and hands-on opportunities. Paul Bartel, in Ohio, is also doing this for the second time, and he will again have Italian makers Edgar Russ and Giorgio Grisales in his shop as resident luthiers for several days, as well as host a reception and make the instruments available to play. And in Georgia, where Rolland and Dixie Huthmaker have sent mailings to some 1,500 professional and student players throughout the South, there will be luthier visits, coverage from local newspapers and television, and a reception hosted by the mayor and town council. All the shopowners report that they have already received calls from interested players in their area and even out of state. In Georgia, according to Dixie Huthmaker, "People are just thrilled. This has never happened in the South before. For people [here] to see so many instruments of this quality [in one setting] is very unusual." The attention being lavished on these events does raise the question, why Cremonese instruments? One of the reasons is simply that someone has taken the trouble to bring them all over—no easy task. Musafia North America, Inc., is a distribution business, and violins by contemporary Italian makers are part of the company’s product line. The second reason is that people want to see them. "I think, first of all, that contemporary instruments are important," says Paul Bartel. "The people I deal with can’t afford $200,000 violins. But the [contemporary] Cremonese ones are a very good deal. I consider them professional instruments, and I consider them investments—and I don’t throw those words around." Bartel believes that new instruments coming from Cremona, the home of the Amati, Stradivari, and Guarneri families, are blessed with an allure that their contemporary counterparts from, say, Cincinnati do not have. But, he adds, it’s also easier to get them. "Making a living as a violin maker is difficult to do if you’re going to work out of your own shop," he points out. "You’ve got to stop and wait on customers. There are fantastic contemporary American makers that I can’t get enough of, I can’t get them to meet the demand—they don’t have time. These guys [in Cremona] don’t do that. They just make violins. It’s a phenomenon in Cremona—there’s a world market for them, and they’re competing with each other, which is good for us. I can go and pick what I think are great instruments at a good price. Of course there’s junk everywhere too, but out of 250 makers there might be 50 that I’d consider of a professional player’s quality, and another 50 that I would buy from for advanced-student instruments." Meanwhile Todd French, the musical-instrument specialist at Butterfield & Butterfield, is ready to pose a friendly challenge to the Cremonese mystique with his second annual exhibit of American-made wares. Butterfields’ has a regular auction scheduled for October 18 at its Hollywood gallery, but on October 15–17 the gallery will be open all day to show the works of up to 35 American bow and instrument makers. Last year’s event (see Market Report, July/August 1998) drew a good crowd and gave players a chance to try a variety of instruments and talk to the makers. This year, French hopes the attendance will be higher. When he realized that Metzler’s and Butterfields’ events were scheduled for the same weekend, he contacted Metzler, and the two agreed to advertise each other’s exhibitions to their attendees. "After all," French says, "this is such a great opportunity. Tom Metzler will be showing some 30 to 40 Cremonese instruments. Then people can come to our exhibit and see the American school—which, in my mind, is becoming the leader in all schools of violin making—and they’ll see maybe 75 instruments there. Then there are another 100 next door at the auction, ranging from some really modern violas—made a couple of years ago—to some Joseph Gagliano violins. "As a cellist myself, I’m excited about it, because normally this only happens in London, where you may have four auctions at a time. In America, you just don’t get a chance to see so much, to go and play with no charge. It’s fun, and it’s all spread out in front of you. It’s like a musician’s toy chest." Outreach to players is the main theme for both exhibitions. Like French, all the dealers hosting the Cremonese tour are, or have been, players, and they’re putting a significant amount of time and money into planning events and alerting their customers. "We’ve always been the kind of shop that holds local events, and we enjoy that," says Barbara Don. "What do we have to offer that’s different than at any other shop? It’s a certain kind of spirit. We’re not just here to sell instruments, collect people’s money, and say ‘thank you very much.’" The Metzler shop has held other events for the community, including jazz workshops, demonstrations of new models of Zeta electric violins, and even teacher-appreciation nights for the local public-school music faculty. "We want to be a violin shop that provides everything, to be the kind of shop I would have wanted to go to when I was growing up," says Don. "Definitely not stuffy—the opposite of stuffy!" The Cremonese instruments will be for sale; the violins range from $7,000 to $15,000. The items in the American exhibition are not for sale at the Butterfields’ gallery but may be bought later from the individual makers. The violins will range in price from $3,500 to $20,000. —Mary VanClay
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