Scan 5
Musical Courier 1926-02-04: Vol 92 Iss 5, 1926
98 lines. Read by computer on 29 September 2026. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1GASPARO DA SALO, INVENTOR OF THE VIOLIN
3Today we take the violin for granted—it has been with us always. But such is far from being the real case. It is not so very old. Only in the sixteenth century (1560) did Gasparo Bertolotti, a young lute maker of the town of Salo, in northern Italy, construct, with his long thin fingers, a small, new instrument and called it the violino, meaning the little viol, and this became the missing soprano to previous existing, bass, tenor, and contrafio viols. Until a comparatively recent date, the history of this genius and originator in instrument design was practically unknown and might still be, were it not for Cavaliere Giovanni Livi, former keeper of the State Archives in the city of Brescia, not far from Salo, who has made it his life work to contribute to musical history an authentic story of Gasparo.
5To the old income tax reports of Salo and Brescia, this earnest investigator owes his first success in tracing the origin and life of the humble violin maker, and these archives of the two towns, together with other data, declare that in 1568, Gasparo was twenty-six years old. It was in 1870 that Livi set out to dig out of the mass of all but unreadable ancient records some facts concerning this little known native of Salo and resident of Brescia, in which mediaeval city Gasparo took up his residence, and where, in 1609 he died, at the age of sixty-seven years.
7The record of the humble life was hidden in obscurity until Livi, by his labor of love and patience, unearthed the story through patient researches in the great masses of official records and pieced it together by elimination, by comparisons, by the relative bearing of one date upon another, until now the facts concerning the birth, life work, and death of the genius are reasonably established and Gasparo rescued from the obscurity of centuries! Although the name of Gasparo had been, in his later days, famous throughout the then musical world, and his signature, ever the same, was on all of his violins, "Gasparo da Salo: in Brescia," with no dates, his life has been until then a sealed book.
9I saw in Salo and in Brescia some of the ancient parchments from which, only thirty-four years ago, Livi, earnest researcher, evolved his conclusions, and, of all these indescribably yellow, worn, and cracked documents, written in impossible old Latin, only one, the baptismal certificate, preserved in a glass case in the cathedral at Salo, had to my stranger eyes any significance. The certificate was fairly legible:
11Gasparo Bertolotti was baptized in SALO in the year 1542. Son of Francesco Bertolotti.
13A VISIT TO SALO
15The fascinating glamor which hung about the boy violin maker of mediaeval days prompted me to visit the little city of his birth, Salo, in the north of Italy, on the beautiful Lake of Garda, which lies flat like a blue sheet in the midst of surrounding majestic mountains. The lake, largest in Italy, is thirty-four miles in length, and varies in width from three to eleven miles. Its northern end was formerly in Austria but since the war it is solely Italian.
17I boarded a little white steamer which plies daily up and down the lake, and zig-zags across from one charming lakeside village to another, embarking and disembarking its passengers, passing between ranges of high mountains on either side, past modern vine-hung and flower-covered white villas; past a lonely turreted tower standing like a walled prison on a mountain top; past the villa of Gabriele d'Annunzio, perched high on an all but inaccessible hill and remains to bake in the hot sun, and its inhabitants, undisturbed by foreign visitors, go sleepily on as in centuries past, for Salo dates back in history to Roman days.
19Leaving the little steamer, I was at once in the midst of the life of Salo, for all its activity centers about the Lake front. Here, most of the small hotels, the cafes, the cab stands, and the more pretentious shops of the town are situated. Here indeed is the very town itself, for all of the little straggling streets which lead upward from the shore road are lined only with the small stone homes of the people, and the plainer shops.
21The Lungo Largo Giovanni Zanardelli is the life of modern Salo, but not the Salo of Gasparo's day. To find the ancient haunts of the Master, I must climb into the toy village perched on the hill above and behind the lake shore, almost out of sight of the visitor. Along a steep street leading upward, I trudged. Half way up its rough, cobbled length, I came upon a round green park set in the midst of the street. In this small enclosure, Piazza Napoleon, amidst green trees, facing the lake, stands an impressive shaft of black and white marble, surmounted by a white figure of Gasparo with head bent, hands busily at work fitting delicately together the two halves of the body of a violin. This exquisite memorial is the work of an Italian sculptor, a native of Salo, Angelo Zanelli, and has but this year been erected. Beyond the green park I passed the modest City Hall, the ancient stone hostelry, The Hotel of the Hat, and, turning to the left, found myself, without preliminaries, projected into the tiniest of enchanted medieval towns. Here was no suggestion of elegant shore drive, no broad piazza, but only narrow
23MUSICAL COURIER
25February 4, 1926
27By Adelina O'Connor Thomason
28(Copyrighted, 1926, by the Musical Courier Company)
30Gasparo da Salo gave to the violin its actual form;
31Giovanni Paolo Maggini amplified its sound;
32Nicolo Amati gave it graciousness;
33Guarnieri and Stradivari, its perfection.
35—Percio Berenzi.
37Gasparo da Salo gave to the violin its actual form;
38Giovanni Paolo Maggini amplified its sound;
39Nicolo Amati gave it graciousness;
40Guarnieri and Stradivari, its perfection.
42—Percio Berenzi.
44(Left to right) The Quay along the shore of the Lago di Garda at Salo, the commercial and social center of the town; Salo, seen from the lovely Isola Bella; Market Day in the Piazza Vecchia (Old Square) at Brescia, where Gasparo had his workshop.
46(Left to right) A public fountain in the old part of Brescia; Doorway of a present-day one-room violin shop in Brescia, with cellos and guitars out to dry in the noonday sun and a group of apprentices; Commemorative tablet to Gasparo, high up on the wall of the old church of St. Joseph, Brescia, where Gasparo is buried.
48REPUTED BIRTHPLACE OF GASPARO at Salo (third door from left).
50FORECAST OF EUROPEAN MUSIC FESTIVALS FOR 1926
51(Subject to Change)
53Date
54Place
55Event
57MARCH
58March 17, 19, 20………….London (Kingsway Hall)………….Elizabethon Music Festival
60APRIL
61April 16-19………….Bournemouth, Eng………………….British Music Festival
63MAY
64May 2-8………………Oxford……………………………Oxford Music Festival (Heather Tercentennial)
65Uncertain…………….Trier (Treves), Ger…………………Rhenish Music Festival
66May 25-June 1………….Baden-Baden…………………Metropolitan Opera Week (Bodansky)
67May 29-June 2………….Heidelberg…………………….Sixth German Brahms Festival
69JUNE
70June 14-19(?)………….Probably Mannheim………………53rd German Tonkünstlerfest
71(General German Music Society)
72June 16-22…………….Zürich……………………………Fourth International Music Festival (I.S.C.M.)
73To be announced………….Colombier (Neuchâtel)………….Swiss Tonkünstlerfest
74June 26-28…………….Aberystwyth, Wales………………Seventh Aberystwyth Festival.
75June 26………………..(Preceded by Harlech Festival, June 24, and 3rd Cardiganshire Festival, June 25).
77JULY
78To be announced………….Bonn……………………………Beethoven Festival
79To be announced………….Uncertain…………………….Second German Handel Festival
80To be announced………….Berlin………………………….Fourteenth German Bach Festival
81July 25-26(?)………….Donaueschingen…………………Sixth Modern Chamber Music Festival
83AUGUST
84To be announced………….Glastonbury, Eng………………Glastonbury Festival Plays (Rutland Boughton)
85Aug. 2-7………………..Swansea, So. Wales………………Welsh National Eisteddfod
86Aug. 5-29……………….Salzburg………………………….Salzburg Festival (Mozart, etc.)
87Aug. 1-Sept. 5………….Munich……………………………Opera Festival (Mozart-Wagner)
89SEPTEMBER
90To be announced………….Haslemere, Eng………………Second Haslemere Festival of Old Music (Dolmetsch)
91Sept. 5-10……………….Worcester, Eng………………..Three Choirs Festival.
92Sept. 12-16…………….Margate, Eng…………………..Margate Musical Festival
94OCTOBER
95Oct. 19-24(?)………….Blackpool, Eng…………………Blackpool Competition Festival
97N. B.—The Musical Courier has compiled this preliminary list for the convenience of readers who desire to make their European arrangements early. It is, of course, subject to additions and changes, as at this time complete data is not yet available. A definitive list will be published in the early spring.
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