Baroque violin?

[garyrich]

I've been thinking of picking up a fiddle, since I've decided it's very hard to play most trad tunes on my viola d'amore. For my own aesthetic sense I like the sound of baroque set up instruments and was wondering if anyone has opinions. Seems almost certain that's how most violins in Ireland would have been set up 200 years ago. Nowadays? Not so much.

http://cgi.ebay.com/Copy-Sebastian-Klot ... 097wt_1502

In the unlikely event I were to actually get it at the current $0.99 it's a no brainer, but it's more likely to end up in the ~$100-$150 range.

[MTGuru]

What sound are you after, Gary? As I'm sure you know, and unless I'm misreading it, this is probably just a cheap Stainer copy, like umpteen other Mittenwald style fiddles. Not sure what's baroque about it. Or rather, aren't all Stainer copies baroque? You'd want to set it up once you got it anyway. Certainly, some of those Chinese copies can sound pretty decent.

As for 200 years ago ... trad is a living tradition, not ars antiqua.

Since you're local, PM me if you're interested, and I can point you to some local resources for ITM / fiddle, including a fellow Berklee grad.

[garyrich]

What's baroque about it? They were (Stainer, Guarnerius, Strad, Amati) all setup that way when new, but virtually all have been modified by now. Very likely a cheap Stainer copy, or even a cheap Klotz copy, for whatever difference that makes at this level. But with a lower neck angle, a lighter sound post. bass bar and a flatter bridge. Getting one of those nasty orange Palatino instruments and having a luthier set it up that way would be adding >$200 in labor to a $100 violin. Studio City (nice people, I got my Ramirez 1a from them eons ago) would probably have a better starter fiddle than a Palatino, but I don't think they'd have one in baroque form for under $2000. There's just no demand for them among starter instrument buyers. Violin buyers are very very very conservative, I'm not so much.

I'm after a basic playable fiddle. I've got a house full of instruments (family not always thrilled, Mom's 7 ft Grand eats a room) and most of them can't be >$1000 each. It's just not possible. I've got a Rogue (Chinese) resonator guitar that cost about $100 that's really very nice, an Epiphone (probably Malaysian) LP Jr that I got new for $75 that's nice enough that I'll probably put a $100 P90 pickup on it. I'm looking for something like that in a fiddle. I see junky kid violins that a good retailer will give you full trade-in credit when your kid outgrows it (this is good), but that's not what I want (I pretty much never sell instruments or books). I also see these Chinese ebay violins. "Charming Song" in Shanghai and "old-violin-house" in Singapore have things that at least "look" better than the orange Palatinos and have good reviews from people that are not me. Hard to say, they are prettier (the purfling on the neck of that Klotz copy is a bad example), look like decent craftsmanship and are not obvious firewood like most ebay factory violins. I know little of violins, but I've had enough fretted instruments through my hands to know firewood at a glance.

Difficult. I like the look of this for instance:
http://cgi.ebay.com/GASPARO-DA-SALO-CON ... 809wt_1558

but when the most actually useful info you can find on it is this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=79QjPe586Xc

what can you really say? I can't play any better than that guy. How would it sound in the hands of a better player? My viola d'amore was made by Song Tieji. It's not a $2500 instrument, it's a basic starter instrument. It's also not firewood and the only viola 'amore you will find for < $1000.

[garyrich]

As for the sound I'm looking for? Warm, dark, open? I have zero interest in those ultra high notes - I think the hypnotoad was invested by someone listening to those notes play by someone less than a real expert.

I'm much more interested in Ars Subtilior than Ars Antigua. But my interest in a good vielle is a different subject

[MTGuru]

All interesting, yes. I guess what I was suggesting is that if you're specifically interested in playing Irish trad fiddle, a historical baroque setup is probably not the direction experienced Irish fiddlers will point you in, for either sound or feel. Cheers.

[garyrich]

That's the rub. I'm interested in ITM, but it's not the only thing I'm interested in.

When I started listening to a lot of Celtic traditional music (not just Irish) I just sort of assumed they were playing on older baroque type instruments. If you are playing jigs and reels in 1st and 2nd position, often off the shoulder - why play an instrument that was designed to play that way but modified 100 years later to play Paganini on high tension strings? I still don't really get that, but it's what I see people playing. Often they take the modern instruments and put on lower tension strings and a flatter bridge to take it half way back to the way it was made in the first place. Is there an ars antigua type tradition in ITM that is interested in sounds that would have seemed "normal" to O'Carolan like there is in early classical music? If not maybe I'll start one.

I guess my real question is more how out of place would a baroque violin be if I get one and learn to play it well enough not to be embarrassing at the local Slow Session? More or less of a hairy eyeball look than my piano accordion? I'm perfectly happy playing a hornpipe on a crumhorn for my own amusement, but I don't see much point in inflicting it on others.

[brewerpaul]

They call it a crumhorn for a reason...
You'd probably do best finding a violin shop and checking out used instruments. Dollar for dollar, I think you'll get better sound, and hopefully a properly set up instrument.

[s1m0n]

If you are playing jigs and reels in 1st and 2nd position, often off the shoulder - why play an instrument that was designed to play that way but modified 100 years later to play Paganini on high tension strings? I still don't really get that, but it's what I see people playing.

..Because you're the only musician, and you have to be heard over two sets' worth of hobnailed boots battering a quadrille into a flagstone floor.

~~

But more seriously, remember that ITM was the music of a very poor, largely rural population: tenant farmers and itinerant labourers. If you asked Joe Heaney why his home village had such a strong tradition of unaccompanied singing, he'd have said it's because no one living there could afford to buy an instrument. They played what they had, could make, or could find. The latter was often used instruments originally made for classical music. Until the revival, this was the principle source of flutes and violins used in ITM. Pipes - which had to be custom made - represented a much greater cost, and were so were more likely to be restricted to the middle classes who could afford such a musical luxury, or to professional musicians/dancing masters, for whom it was an investment in the tool of a trade.

[garyrich]

Excellent points all. It seems that most instrument changes from 1700-1950 have been about making them louder and LOUDER. I've heard plenty of baroque violins played in concerts and the modern ones are not that much louder until you get into that super high pitch range and really dig into it. I don't think I've heard any traditional music that uses those notes (OK, gypsy/romani does). Old violins styles are plenty loud, that's a big part of why they eventually killed off the gamba family of bowed strings. ITM does still appreciate the quieter more voluptuous sound of cylindrical bore unkeyed flutes.

The idea of poor folk playing what they can get their hands on makes prefect sense too. You'd expect folk instrument to trail "professional" use by maybe 100 years. By that logic I'd expect them to be the last people to commonly use things like baroque violins, since those would be the old cheap instruments that nobody else wanted. The really nice ones would have had new necks put on them and otherwise modernized. I've never heard of people taking old flutes, reginding the bore and retrofitting a Boehm key system to them, so good ones were still around. Maybe this all just got frozen in place and codified sometime in the twentieth century when people would have been playing cast off violins from ~1890 and locally made un keyed flutes. If that tradition had continued, it's certainly cheaper/easier to get your hands on a modern metal flute these days than a playable Irish flute.

[benhall.1]

That's the rub. I'm interested in ITM, but it's not the only thing I'm interested in.

When I started listening to a lot of Celtic traditional music (not just Irish) I just sort of assumed they were playing on older baroque type instruments. If you are playing jigs and reels in 1st and 2nd position, often off the shoulder - why play an instrument that was designed to play that way but modified 100 years later to play Paganini on high tension strings? I still don't really get that, but it's what I see people playing. Often they take the modern instruments and put on lower tension strings and a flatter bridge to take it half way back to the way it was made in the first place. Is there an ars antigua type tradition in ITM that is interested in sounds that would have seemed "normal" to O'Carolan like there is in early classical music? If not maybe I'll start one.

I guess my real question is more how out of place would a baroque violin be if I get one and learn to play it well enough not to be embarrassing at the local Slow Session? More or less of a hairy eyeball look than my piano accordion? I'm perfectly happy playing a hornpipe on a crumhorn for my own amusement, but I don't see much point in inflicting it on others.

You do know that Baroque strings (unless you count the French, and who counts them? ) were higher tension than on modern violins, yes?

Similarly, I guess you know that, by 200 years ago, so-called baroque violins were pretty much obsolete. Anomalies and blips abound, of course, but Ireland in the 18c was up there with the rest of Europe in terms of modernity. At least, it was like that in Dublin.

[benhall.1]

And another one (although I admit, this one may be just me). I don't buy this 'folk music was [always past tense, for some reason] played by poor people, and they would have used cast-off instruments'. Why? Whenever music of any kind gets mentioned in old books (like, say, Catriona - Sctoland, admittedly, but I reckon the principle's the same) it's played by all sorts, and often the higher up echelons. Hmmm ... I mean, I think poor people played it and play it, and other people played it and play it too.

[MTGuru]

The idea of poor folk playing what they can get their hands on makes prefect sense too.

Gary, check out the concept of "gesunkenes Kulturgut" for a standard folkloristic treatment of this idea. But also see my comments to Ben below.

Maybe this all just got frozen in place and codified sometime in the twentieth century when people would have been playing cast off violins from ~1890 and locally made un keyed flutes. If that tradition had continued, it's certainly cheaper/easier to get your hands on a modern metal flute these days than a playable Irish flute.

I think that's part of it, though the freezing point may be later than you think. But adoption is never uncritical, free of aesthetics. That is, just because something is available to be adopted doesn't mean it will be. And one can guess criteria by looking at what's been adopted and what hasn't. Cheap and cast-off band instruments - Boehm flutes, clarinets, trumpets - have been around long enough, but still don't (and won't) turn up in the post-revival ITM core.*

* Now I just know Mr. Gumby's going to post a photo of guys playing ITM trumpets, etc. But that's not what I mean ...

lower tension strings and a flatter bridge

Actually, flat bridges are not typical of ITM fiddle - unlike, say, Old Time fiddle with its droning double stops. Irish players tend to prefer a rounder "standard" bridge for cleaner, faster execution, and medium tension strings like Helicores or Dominants for the well-defined lift that the dance music calls for, as Simon described.

Again, I'd reiterate that there are some truly fine Irish trad fiddlers and ethnomusicologists in the local area to talk with, if you're serious.

I don't buy this 'folk music was [always past tense, for some reason] played by poor people, and they would have used cast-off instruments'.

I do consider gesunkenes Kulturgut a useful concept, and the history of the ITM instrumentarium approximates it, with a few important caveats: 1. The flow is not necessarily one-way. Folk culture and "high" culture don't exist in isolation, but as parts of a complex interdependent system that influence each other constantly. 2. I agree it's a mistake to categorically equate "poor" with "folk". Cultural affiliation, social status, and economic status don't necessarily coincide, and can recombine in myriad ways. That doesn't exclude that folk communities may be poor.

[s1m0n]

And another one (although I admit, this one may be just me). I don't buy this 'folk music was [always past tense, for some reason] played by poor people, and they would have used cast-off instruments'. Why? Whenever music of any kind gets mentioned in old books (like, say, Catriona - Sctoland, admittedly, but I reckon the principle's the same) it's played by all sorts, and often the higher up echelons. Hmmm ... I mean, I think poor people played it and play it, and other people played it and play it too.

What became ITM - or at least all the parts relating to set dancing - began much farther up the social ladder in a pan-european quadille craze sparked at the Congress of Vienna in during which the victorious powers remade Europe at the end of the Napoleonic wars. The party lasted for nine months and ended in June, 1815. In the aftermath, haughty statesmen and lowly privates alike carried the new dance craze home to all the corners of Europe.

One such corner was Ireland. The significance of Ireland to ITM isn't that the Irish played this music first, it is that (largely) rural |Ireland went on dancing these dances and playing the music long after everyone else had stopped. Relative poverty, rural isolation, and exclusion from the higher reaches of the social order loom large among the conventional explanations for the social conservatism of rural Ireland,and this is what preserved the music as a living tradition long enough for the folk boom to happen.

[garyrich]

I had never heard of gesunkenes Kulturgut as such. Seems half right, 25% silly and 25% German fatalism. Doesn't exactly explain things like narco-corridas.

you can probably tell that I'm coming to ITM via my long term interest in medieval and renaissance muisc and not from an Irish or celtic background (I guess I'm Ulster in name only via my 2nd gen scots-irish stepfather). I only recently realized that while good live early music is very rare around here, there is good ITM. Heck I'm going down to Ireland's 32 for their Sunday session in a while. I'll bring a few whistles and may even try playing them.

PS: That Klotz copy violin closed at $255 which is more than I'm willing to gamble. Looking at the bids, most of that seller's stuff seems to be being bought by repeat customers that look like violin teachers or small music stores. Probably a good sign. I have a suspicion that their "Veccio" work shop instruments are the same one that Eastman buys in the white and ends up selling as their "Veccio" in the $2500 range.

[Flavius]

If I may drop a question (hopefully on-topic enough), I wondered if any of you have played any of the various pochettes/travel fiddles available on the market and would like to comment on them (general playability and how -or whether- the concept fits with trad/baroque/other styles).

Thanks