Scan 75
Joseph Guarnerius, his work and his master [Andreas Gisalberti], 1906
10 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. Printed page 39. See the scan on archive.org.
1the peculiarity in the main consist, wherein Joseph did not manifest any "characteristic sign of originality?"
3Most of the books in which Joseph Guarnerius's career is touched upon, repeat one after another the same kind of thoughtless assertions, taken perhaps from the same original sources, putting them forward as accepted facts in connection with tradition. Forty-two years of age is a rather advanced stage in the lifetime of ordinary men at which to commence an entirely novel career, and it is very remarkable, if not quite unknown, for one during the last twenty years of his life to become an acknowledged master of a difficult art, and, at the end, leave behind him a growing and imperishable fame.
5No writer that I am aware of has pecked at this seeming great inconsistency, and it may not have occurred to any one to search into the matter with the object of finding out how, or in what direction, Joseph Guarnerius was engaged during his early manhood, up to the very late time in life at which he has been credited with having first constructed his violins.
7An answer might be hazarded by those who would be anxious to have their creed still upheld, that there was a possibility of his having worked as an assistant to one of the important makers of Cremona, and that circumstances unknown and only indirectly connected with business, may have been in the way; or, as being somewhat in harmony with this, the instance might be cited of old Andreas Amati while in Brescia assisting a much younger man who had brought out a new form of musical instrument—to wit, the violin.
9This would be reasonable so far as it went, but on the other hand, there is an unanswerable rejoinder that would naturally come to mind in the discussion, that the pupil or even assistant of long standing always reproduces, more or less, in his manner of work, the prominent features of style belonging to his master, and the instance of old Andreas Amati would actually go very strongly to help this, his work showing distinctly his natural tendency to refinement and delicacy, while acting upon
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