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Scan 82
The Hawley Collection of violins, 1904
6 lines. Read by computer on 3 September 2026. No printed page number was found. See the scan on archive.org.
1Chapter IV
2Giovanni Paolo Maggini, 1581-1632
3The Hawley Maggini
5HE life of this celebrated violin-maker is one of great interest to the student of the early history of the violin. The position he occupied in the development of the art of violin-making is unique. Gasparo de Bertolotti, commonly known as Gasparo da Salò, was the originator of the violin, but Maggini, who was his favorite pupil, in the space of a few years so improved the model and construction that he left it at his death practically as it is to-day. Therefore, Maggini fairly divides with Gasparo da Salò the honor of being the father of the modern violin. One is apt to underestimate the value of Maggini's life work, after the lapse of so many years, overshadowed as it is by the glory of Cremona, a century later, unless he enters upon a careful survey of the conditions which then prevailed. Violin construction was practically in its infancy when he entered his career in the service of Gasparo da Salò, under whose name the first violins of which there is record had appeared only a few years before. Violin music was also in its infancy, but was making very rapid growth from the position of a mere voice accompaniment to that of the most important of orchestral writings. In consequence, the demand on the tonal capacity of the violin was rapidly increasing. In 1610, when Maggini was twenty-nine years of age, leading violin parts in an orchestral score appeared for the first time in Claudio Monteverde's opera, "Orfeo." In 1620, a violin composition in the form of a Romanza by Biagio Marini was produced, which was the first solo written for the violin. It was a feeble effort, however, and merely indicated what was to follow in the next few years. In 1627, only five years before Maggini's death, the first well defined solos for the violin were written by Carlo Farina, and, strange to say, were published in Dresden. It will be seen, therefore, that Maggini's career ended before any great progress in violin music had been attained. It was under these primitive conditions that his life was spent and his work accomplished. His mission in life was to improve the violin as it was left by Gasparo da Salò, so that it should become, to use an oft-heard expression, "the only perfect musical instrument." It is a life work that the most ambitious might envy, for directly and indirectly the world certainly owes him an enormous debt of gratitude. The influence he exerted on violin building was tremendous. From the monochord of Pythagoras to the violin perfected as it was by Maggini, its lineal descendant, more than two thousand two hundred years elapsed. Gasparo da Salò evolved the violin from the viol, but in respect to its construction left it incomplete. Maggini, his pupil, not only improved greatly on his model, enlarging the size, but in respect to thicknesses and measurements, the cutting of the wood and in the use of linings and corner block (features which to the layman may appear matters of small import,
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