Could you tell a new violin from a 300-year-old Italian Stradivarius? If not, you鈥檙e in good company: neither can the very best violin soloists.
Many musicians regard vintage violins as superior, especially those by the master builder Antonio Stradivari. His instruments are considered to have exquisite tone, perhaps a result of the wood preservation techniques used in 17th- and early 18th-century Italy.
and colleagues at the Jean Le Rond d鈥橝lembert Institute in Paris wanted to test whether Stradivariuses really are superior.
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Video: Blind tests compare new violins with Stradivariuses
They presented 10 musicians with six new and six old violins, including five by Stradivari. While wearing modified welder鈥檚 goggles and under dim light, the musicians played each violin in a rehearsal room and a 300-seat concert hall. The new violins were also given antique touches to disguise them. Each test lasted 1 hour and 15 minutes.
More playable
Asked to choose a violin to replace their own for a hypothetical concert tour, six of the musicians selected new ones. The whole group did no better than chance in picking out which violins were old and which new, but tended to rate newer ones as more playable.
鈥淓ven though soloists readily separated violins they liked from those they did not, they couldn鈥檛 reliably tell old from new,鈥� says , a modern-day violin maker based in Ann Arbor, Michigan. 鈥淭his implies whatever tonal qualities top players happen to be looking for, they don鈥檛 seem to be related to an instrument鈥檚 age or country of origin.鈥�
The results build on a that took place in a hotel room in Indianapolis, Indiana. This time around the musicians were top-level soloists and had more time to test a wider selection of violins, in more relevant settings.
Fritz is cheered by the findings as she says it vindicates the skill of present-day violin-makers. 鈥淚t also allows young soloists to be recognised by how they play, rather than what they play,鈥� she adds.
Final word?
It鈥檚 unlikely to be the final word. Joseph Nagyvary, a professor emeritus at Texas A&M University in College Station who studies the chemistry of violins, isn鈥檛 convinced. He says that players need to play a violin for weeks to evaluate it fully, and that the study did not take into account that Stradivariuses vary in tone. 鈥淓xperts know well that the 600 or so extant Strads vary vastly in their tone quality due to their playing and preservation history,鈥� says Nagyvary, who is also a maker of modern-day recreations of Stradivarius and Guarnerius violins.
However, , one of the musicians who took part in the study, says he doesn鈥檛 believe it was biased. 鈥淥ne can argue that the old instruments selected were intentionally 鈥榳eaker鈥� than the new ones chosen, or that the new instruments were set up optimally versus the old, which were 鈥榯ired鈥�,鈥� he says. 鈥淏ut I think these are elements that players face each time they walk into a violin shop.鈥�
Fritz says some soloists were frustrated that they did not get to see the violins at the end of the study, and were surprised to learn that their favourite violins were new ones.
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