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Scan 572
Grove's Dictionary of music and musicians, 1927
8 lines. Read by computer on 5 September 2026. Printed page 520. See the scan on archive.org.
1he apparently left Brescia in 1614, and nothing further is known of him after that date.
3Gasparo da Salò was one of the earliest makers of stringed instruments who employed the pattern of the violin as distinguished from that of the viol. His works are of a primitive pattern, more advanced than that of Zanetto and other old Brescian makers, but totally different from that of the contemporary Amati family. The model varies, being sometimes high, sometimes flat; the middle curves are shallow, and the sound-holes straight and angular. The wood is generally well chosen, and the thicknesses are correct; and the tone of the instrument, when of the flat model and in good preservation, peculiarly deep and penetrating. He made many instruments, especially basses, of pear wood as well as sycamore wood. His selection of timber was most careful; indeed, the remarkable regularity of the grain in the tables of his instruments bears evidence to this particular trait of the Brescian master. His varnish is principally deep yellow, and rich in tone, though some of his instruments are much darker in colour; in fact some are almost black, an effect doubtless due to age. The sound-holes are long, parallel and pointed in form, and in the gambas and viols still retain the more simple C shape; yet in spite of their length they are in perfect harmony with the form of the instrument. The purfling is usually single, and the general appearance of his work is bold, but not highly finished. His tickets run as follows: 'Gasparo da Salò: In Brescia,' and are undated.
5The pattern of Gasparo da Salò was partially revived in the 18th century, owing no doubt to its great tone-producing capacity, by the celebrated Joseph GUARNERIUS (q.v.), and to a less extent by some of the French makers. As a maker of tenors and double-basses Gasparo da Salò has never had an equal, and his instruments of these classes are eagerly sought after. The objection to his tenors is their great size, but their effect in a quartet is unrivalled. Two remarkably fine specimens, formerly in the possession successively of Dr. Stewart of Wolverhampton, and of John Adam of Blackheath, came subsequently into the possession of J. A. Torrens Johnson. The most perfect specimen of a da Salò viola ever seen by the writer was the one which belonged to Edward Withers in 1884. This was a fine primitive instrument, and another perfect specimen was the property of Tyssen Amherst, an English amateur of celebrity. At the Special Loan Exhibition of Musical Instruments at the Fishmongers' Hall in 1904 there were three of da Salò's masterpieces. One was a viola of 1570, the property of E. A. Sandermann; another a viola da gamba of the same date, lent by W. E. Hill & Sons; and a third was a viol of 1565, belonging to F. Pengrie. (The dates quoted are according to the catalogue.) At the Victoria and Albert Museum there are two Gasparo da Salò viole da gamba. One is mounted with seven strings, an innovation attributed to Marais in the 17th century. The sound-holes are in the C form, the ribs curve into the neck in the true viol fashion, the wood of the belly is even in grain, and the varnish is brownish yellow. Its complete length is 4 feet, and it was bought at the sale of the Engel collection for £8. The other gamba by this maker is mounted for six strings. The neck terminates in a well-carved grotesque head of an old woman; the wood of the table is even in grain; the sound-holes are in the C form; the varnish is slightly darker than the instrument mentioned above. The finger-board is ornamented with ivory and tortoise-shell, and bound with catgut frets. The purfling is in one single broad line. It is labelled within 'Gasparo da Salò: In Brescia.' The length measures 3 feet 9 inches, and it was bought at the sale of the Engel collection for £10. The well-known violin-maker, August Reichers of Berlin, possessed a small-sized violoncello by this maker in 1894 (probably a cut-down bass), and Dragonetti possessed three or four double-basses by da Salò. The most celebrated of these instruments was presented to him by the monks of the monastery of St. Marco, Venice, about the year 1776, and was returned to the donors after his death. It would appear that this bass has disappeared. Another of Dragonetti's basses was bequeathed by him to the Duke of Leinster, and a third was in the possession of the Rev. G. Leigh Blake in 1875. In the same year John Hart owned a Gasparo da Salò bass (small size) in an exceptional state of preservation.
7The most renowned instrument of this maker is the violin which was made by him to the order of the Cardinal Aldobrandini, a noble patron of the fine arts in Rome, who paid da Salò 3000 Neapolitan ducats for his work, and presented it to the treasury of Innspruck, where it was preserved as a curiosity. The head of this curious violin is said to have been carved by Benvenuto Cellini; it represents an angel's face carved and coloured, surrounded by flowing locks of hair. Behind this there leans a little mermaid, the human form of which terminates in scales of green and gold. The tail-piece is another mermaid, in bronze colour, and the finger-board is ornamented with arabesques in blue and gold; while the bridge is delicately carved in the form of two intertwining fish, similar to the zodiacal sign of the month of February. The belly is made of an exceedingly rare species of Swiss pine, which grows on the Italian side of the Swiss Alps, and is even-grained. When Innspruck was taken by the French in 1809, this violin
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