Stories | Quincy Whitney

Yo-Yo Ma

In 1983, and again in 1992, in separate radio interviews, celebrated cellist Yo-Yo Ma mentioned that he was enamored of the viola repertoire but was not able to access it via the cello. In 1983, Tom Knatt, student of Hutchins, offered to Ma the Alto Violin—or the “vertical viola”—he had made after the patterns developed by Hutchins. At the time, Ma tried out the vertical viola and later after a few months, wrote a postcard to Knatt saying he “wanted to play it at Carnegie Hall but couldn’t muster the courage.” A decade later, the idea appealed to him in ...

The Met

At Home at the Metropolitan Museum of Art—a Hutchins Violin Octet and One Lucky Research Fellow In late 1988, Carleen Hutchins donated a Violin Octet to the Metropolitan Museum of Art to honor the 100th Anniversary of the Crosby Brown Musical Instruments Collection. The first exhibition of the Hutchins Violin Octet went on display in the spring of 1989, running March through July of that year. A decade later, a change in administration of the galleries brought the Hutchins Violin Octet out from the catacombs once again—when museum curators asked Hutchins to examine the octet violins for analysis of repairs ...

The Cover: American Luthier

“Violin” was painted by Walter Tandy Murch (1907-1967), a Canadian-born painter specializing in still life paintings of objects. In it, Murch painted an actual scientific experiment set up by Hutchins in her basement laboratory in Montclair, NJ. The image was first published on the November 1962 cover of Scientific American highlighting the article entitled “The Physics of Violins” by Carleen Maley Hutchins (1911-2009). Murch wrote in an undated notebook: “I think a painter paints best what he thinks about most. For me this is about objects, objects from my childhood, present surroundings, or a chance object that stimulates my interest.” ...

Serpentine “S”

The serpentine “S” that graces the pages of American Luthier epitomizes the paradoxical nature of the violin-as it echoes the shape of the sound holes carved in the first known violin by 16th century Italian luthier Andreas Amati, celebrated inventor and “father” of the violin. Erroneously known today as “f” holes, the “f” is actually a long, descending, “S,” found in print or cursive writing in old manuscripts. One luthier suggests that these holes took on the shape of an “S” because they were sound holes. In Latin, sound is sonas; Italian, suono; French, son; Spanish, sonido. The sound holes ...

Octet

The Treble Violin, tuned G-D-A-E, an octave above the violin, is the smallest and highest member of the OCTET. In England it is called the Sopranino following the nomen datum of the recorder family. Its dimensions are approximately those of a quarter-size violin, but in construction it is quite different. In order to achieve the transposed violin sound, the Treble not only has extremely thick top and black plates, but extra large f-holes and strategically placed small holes in the shallow ribs so that its main resonances occur at the desired frequencies. Michael Praetorius projected an instrument in this tone ...

Luthiers

Who makes Octet Violins? The following luthiers have either studied with Carleen Hutchins, use her methods or both—and have made octet violins. Each and every luthier listed below is professionally trained and willing to make octet violins of various sizes: Alan Carruth: Location: Newport, New Hampshire, USA Website: www.alcarruthluthier.com Email: alcarruth@aol.com PHONE: 603-863-7064 Anne Cole: Location: Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA Website: www.annecoleviolinmaker.com Email: anne@annecoleviolinmaker.com PHONE: 505-294-3709 Andrea Ortona: Location: Oxford, UK Website: www.ortonaviolins.com Email: andrea@ortonaviolins.com PHONE: 44 (0) 789-4077-322 Joris Wouters: Location: Westerlo, BELGIUM Website: www.violin.be Email: joris@violin.be PHONE: 32 (0) 14 54 01 08 Pio Montanari: Location: Genova, ITALY ...

Ernst Chladni

In 1782, German physicist Ernst Chladni began studying vibrations in rods and later in plates, an unknown field at the time as, up until this time, musical acoustical studies had focused almost exclusively on the vibrations of strings and the vibrations of air inside wind instruments. This drawing depicts the exploration of sound figures in plates from 1785. With his experiments with vibrating plates, Chladni opened up a new field. Chladni systematically studied the sound patterns of circular, square, and rectangular plates, by fixing them with his fingers at different points, thus enforcing at these points the occurrence of nodal ...

APGAR Quartet: Fiddles in the Hospital

“A doctor and a violinmaker walk into a hospital……” How does a violinmaker find herself stealing a shelf from a hospital telephone booth? This was hardly the scenario Hutchins envisioned when she entered Columbia Presbyterian hospital in December, 1956—with a diagnosis of breast cancer. Carleen recalled that as her mother had a sister who had died of breast cancer, “my family thought that was the end of me!” While most patients might be holding their breath, instead Carleen held fast to viola SUS #23, the prized possession she had brought with her to the hospital, spurred by the news that ...

A Pig’s Bargain

Sometimes pivotal moments in our lives are forever recorded—in an object, or an inscription, or a symbol. Every Hutchins instrument carries within it the symbol of a life-changing moment and a lifetime friendship—between Carleen Hutchins and Helen Rice, the “Great Lady of Chamber Music.” Hutchins and Rice met over the lunch table at the Brearley School, the day before school started in the fall of 1945. Hutchins taught primary school science and Helen taught music. While Helen puzzled over the challenge of starting a string program with just one player—she ended up catching Hutchins at her own game—inspiring someone else ...

A Feast of Fiddles – Join a Virtual Violin Community!

Join a Virtual Violin Community! Do you own a piglet in the drove? Is there a SUS fiddle in your house? Do you own a Hutchins violin? Viola? Cello? Bass? Do you play a Hutchins treble-soprano-mezzo-alto-tenor-baritone-bass or contrabass violin? If so, please join the Hutchins/American Luthier virtual violin community!!! There is strength in numbers! FREE MEMBERSHIP!!!!! Please pay your dues with a kind FAVOR—PHOTOGRAPH the SUS label inside your fiddle and send it to me via your phone—————————– We will make a montage of all your photographs—and create a piglet fiddle poster with all the SUS labels we collect. CREATING ...