Books › Old violins and violin lore. Famous makers of Cremona and Brescia, and of England, France, and Germany (with biographical dictionary); famous players; and chapters on varnish, strings and bows, 1893 › scan 30
Scan 30
Old violins and violin lore. Famous makers of Cremona and Brescia, and of England, France, and Germany (with biographical dictionary); famous players; and chapters on varnish, strings and bows, 1893
12 lines. Read by computer on 14 September 2026. Printed page 22. See the scan on archive.org.
1CHAPTER II.
3VIOLIN CONSTITUTION
5One of the subtle charms of the violin is that it may be called bisexual.
7It unites in itself and welds together the masculine and feminine qualities.
9Its very fabric is bisexual. The soft, easily moved vibrations of the swelling front are controlled, checked, and yet excited by the slower and harder pulsations of the maple back. The porous deal and the close-grained maple or sycamore thus thrill together, and each supplies the deficiency of the other, both blending in harmonious and sympathetic union, the ribs welding the back and the belly into an organic whole, whilst the sound-post, poetically called by the French the soul of the violin (l'âme du violon), collects the quick and slow vibrations, and fusing them, produces the subtle resultant of violin tone.
11That tone is the offspring of neither back nor front, nor ribs alone, but of all these differently vibrating surfaces, collected and made musical in the "soul," and poured forth as the breath of life from the \( f f \) holes as out of the very mouth and nostrils of the violin. Surely the children of the violin are nothing
The computer misreads some letters and numbers. Where a name matters to you, read the scan.