Lutherie. An elegant whisper of a word. Those of us who are string players (guitarists, violinists, cellists, harpists, etc.) will know who luthiers are and what the craft of lutherie is. Luthiers are the masterminds behind making and repairing stringed instruments.
It takes an aspiring luthier years to develop the skills to make stringed instruments.
The back and top pieces are at a precise curve, the tailpiece has to withstand the immense tension that comes from the strings, and the soundpost (a small wooden dowel inside the violin) has to be in the correct place to distribute the sound evenly. Any slight deficiency, a gap in the wood, or a misplaced tailpiece, could lead to the instrument’s lack of depth in sound quality or odd rattling sounds from misaligned pieces. A luthier ensures that everything is functioning correctly and that the instrument won’t collapse in on itself when the strings are applied.
Lutherie is an art of its own.
Since these instruments are so hard to make, this is why there are so few “good” violins on the market; for example, beginner violins tend to have a scratchy and whiny sound because the luthiers aren’t putting as much effort into making those violins.
The cheaper an instrument, the less time and effort a luthier puts into it (or they did put in a lot of time, but the outcome simply doesn’t sound right). The best violins come from luthiers that have plenty of experience and attention to detail. As a violinist myself, I remember my bridge snapped down because the angle was slightly less than 90 degrees, and it left a crack on the top piece that ran under the fingerboard. It took two weeks for the luthier to fix it because it was so difficult to align the pieces back together and seal it to prevent further damage. The vibrations that come from merely playing also alter the violin very slightly, so the luthier has to make sure that the crack won’t open when I play the violin again.
The old masters, primarily Guarneri and Stradivarius, were exceptional in their ability. Some say that it is impossible to play a Strad and sound bad, no matter what you are playing. Without lutherie, we would not have any other string instruments because they all descended from the lyre, a harp.
Luthiers are artists for artists, creating instruments for musicians who create music.
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