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Michael Darnton
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Location: Chicago
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 Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 3:07 pm Post subject: |
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Behavior encompasses more than just sound out in the room. What the player experiences is a package of things that permits him to do his job better and easier. That may be difficult for the listener to understand because a really great player can work around a lesser violin and still have enough attention for the music to deliver a performance that reaches a reasonable percentage of his usual performance that's good enough to fool most people, but he's working harder to get there. He also has more tonal effects available with a better instrument, which he may or may not be using at any moment or in any piece.
The other aspect is what the listeners hear in the quality of the violin. Some of that is obvious, and some of it isn't unless there's a comparison available. I would put tonal variation near the top of the list of things that in my experience habitual concertgoers are able to recognize the loss of if a player is playing a violin that doesn't have it. I've called this shop vac tone--a sound that may be fundamentally good, but unidimensional and so unvarying that it eventually draws attention to itself as an unvarying and irritating drone. Several people have drawn my attention to one particular person on the world stage who has this problem with his instrument.
Not all of this good stuff is limited to Cremonese violins--it's just that a higher percentage of them have it. Some of the most special stuff is the hardest to hear, rarest to find, and most likely to be both unovserved and dismissed by people who don't hear it. As with any other tool that's an exceptionally fine example of its type, most people can't be expected to appreciate what the tool is doing, and most users won't be able to utilize it, either.
Some people seem to think that nothing is valid unless it's obvious to everyone, which is a ridiculous idea, of course. I don't know why some people seem to automatically have to diss things they don't understand--wine, cigars, violins, art, whatever, and say that differences aren't real and the aficionados are fooling themselves. To me, that's just a confession of a lack of understanding by the critic.
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ctviolin
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Joined: 07 May 2009
Posts: 961
Location: Roswell
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| Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 4:22 pm Post subject: |
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| Michael Darnton wrote: | You don't know how to be rude. Someday I will show you how it's done.  |
Cool.
If you ever want to make a few extra bucks, I believe I'd pay good cash to see that...
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Lemuel
Site Admin
Joined: 12 Aug 2010
Posts: 515
Location: Mt. Elgin, Ontario
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| Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 7:00 pm Post subject: |
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| Michael Darnton wrote: | | Behavior encompasses more than just sound out in the room. What the player experiences is a package of things that permits him to do his job better and easier. That may be difficult for the listener to understand because a really great player can work around a lesser violin and still have enough attention for the music to deliver a performance that reaches a reasonable percentage of his usual performance that's good enough to fool most people, but he's working harder to get there. He also has more tonal effects available with a better instrument, which he may or may not be using at any moment or in any piece... |
Are you implying that even if a violin had the Cremonese behavior, most players don't
have the skill level to even bring it out (let alone recognize it)? (Much like the example
you gave on the other thread on Ferraris, that it takes a qualified racer to bring out
the qualities of a Ferrari). |
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Michael Darnton
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Joined: 23 Mar 2007
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Location: Chicago
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| Posted: Thu Jan 03, 2013 9:10 pm Post subject: |
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I have had it explained to me like this.
You buy a Strad, and you play it for a few weeks. It's fine, but it doesn't seem to be particularly special. Then one day you notice some particular quality that you hadn't noticed before, and you explore that. Then a couple of days later something else pops up. Now you're paying attention. Pretty soon all sorts of musical possibilities that you never had before are presenting themselves.
"Initially, it was like walking in one door and going down a hall to a door at the other end. You rush down there every day, then one day you happen to look left, and you notice a door you hadn't seen before. Pretty soon you notice there are doors all down the length of the hall, and you'd never seen them before, and you're curious what's behind them."
Bob Bein owned a Stradivari cello for a while. He told me that before he bought it he had always understood that Strads were magical. When he bought it, he said for the first six months he was disillusioned; that ownership had shown him that it wasn't magical, it was just a pretty good instrument. He told me that it took him six months of ownership, and then at the end of those first six months he had become convinced that yes, Strads were really magical.
Those things are things that owners have told me. Six months seems to be the time it takes to "get it". Most players develop a method of playing their violin. When they get a new one, they treat it like the old one. Really understanding new possibilities takes time. Learning to draw them out takes time. It's not really the kind of thing you get in five minutes, which is why I'm famously cynical about instrument competitions.
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Lemuel
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Joined: 12 Aug 2010
Posts: 515
Location: Mt. Elgin, Ontario
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| Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 9:33 am Post subject: |
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| Michael Darnton wrote: | ...Bob Bein owned a Stradivari cello for a while. He told me that before he bought it he had always understood that Strads were magical. When he bought it, he said for the first six months he was disillusioned; that ownership had shown him that it wasn't magical, it was just a pretty good instrument. He told me that it took him six months of ownership, and then at the end of those first six months he had become convinced that yes, Strads were really magical.
Those things are things that owners have told me. Six months seems to be the time it takes to "get it". Most players develop a method of playing their violin. When they get a new one, they treat it like the old one. Really understanding new possibilities takes time. Learning to draw them out takes time. It's not really the kind of thing you get in five minutes, which is why I'm famously cynical about instrument competitions. |
This quote for sure is one of the most enlightening things I've heard in a long time. Thanks a lot for this! Great info. |
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Michael Darnton
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Location: Chicago
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| Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 9:33 am Post subject: |
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I want to make a pointer to a discussion over at That Other Forum, where discussing the story about me in the Trib they've gotten into whether a maker needs to play.
In view of what I've been saying above, one might understand that I feel strongly that the maker's own opinion about what he makes is most likely a bad opinion, unless he plays at the very highest level--and I'm not aware of a single maker with the necessary chops. I could once play cello decently, and it took me over 20 years to understand that what I liked was liked by a increasingly smaller proportion of players, the higher you moved up the playing ability scale, and that making to my taste was an impediment to my improvement.
What ultimately broke me of my misunderstanding was working in sales for five years where I had to interact daily with people who were really superb players.
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Lemuel
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Joined: 12 Aug 2010
Posts: 515
Location: Mt. Elgin, Ontario
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| Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 10:10 am Post subject: |
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| Michael Darnton wrote: | | ... I could once play cello decently, and it took me over 20 years to understand that what I liked was liked by a increasingly smaller proportion of players, the higher you moved up the playing ability scale, and that making to my taste was an impediment to my improvement... |
I'm not sure I understand this? Could you please elaborate?
By the way, what type of music do you like? Classical? Jazz? Rock?
I'm assuming that it is classical. If this is so, and you can appreciate the "tastes" of
classical recordings and concerts, I cannot understand why you would say that
as you moved up the scale in playing ability, what you liked was liked by a smaller
proportion of players. The "tastes" of classical players at concerts are your "tastes"
are they not?
I understand that superb players have abilities that far exceed those of
the average player. But doesn't moving up the playing ability scale bring you closer
and closer to similar tastes. (Unless your taste was different. You did say something
about your tastes on a another thread, but I cannot remember where.)
Maybe I'm missing the whole point. |
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mr_violin
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Joined: 15 Sep 2009
Posts: 52
Location: Chicago
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| Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 10:10 am Post subject: |
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And a good reason that the answer to this question ;
" Has Michael Darnton participated in VSA competitions?"
from the other forum is; as Jim Brown said; " I can say emphatically that the answer is no! "
Just think about it yourself and it is not hard to see why that is.
Larry Lewis |
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Lemuel
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Joined: 12 Aug 2010
Posts: 515
Location: Mt. Elgin, Ontario
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| Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 10:12 am Post subject: |
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| mr_violin wrote: | And a good reason that the answer to this question ;
" Has Michael Darnton participated in VSA competitions?"
from the other forum is; as Jim Brown said; " I can say emphatically that the answer is no! "
Just think about it yourself and it is not hard to see why that is.
Larry Lewis |
Could you please give me the link to this "Other Forum"? |
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Chet Bishop
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Location: Forest Grove, Oregon
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Chet Bishop
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Posts: 678
Location: Forest Grove, Oregon
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| Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 10:21 am Post subject: |
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Lemuel,
Unless I am completely misreading, I think he was saying that his taste in instruments was what was liked by a smaller percentage of players, as he neared the top of the "food chain."
Thus, the instruments I make might be loved by nearly 100% of amateur players, by 50% of semi-pro players, and by 10% of professionals...but 0% of virtuoso professionals.
Chet
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https://bluefiddles.com
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Michael Darnton
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Joined: 23 Mar 2007
Posts: 1347
Location: Chicago
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| Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 10:47 am Post subject: |
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| Lemuel wrote: | | Michael Darnton wrote: | | ... I could once play cello decently, and it took me over 20 years to understand that what I liked was liked by a increasingly smaller proportion of players, the higher you moved up the playing ability scale, and that making to my taste was an impediment to my improvement... |
I'm not sure I understand this? Could you please elaborate?
By the way, what type of music do you like? Classical? Jazz? Rock?
I'm assuming that it is classical. If this is so, and you can appreciate the "tastes" of
classical recordings and concerts, I cannot understand why you would say that
as you moved up the scale in playing ability, what you liked was liked by a smaller
proportion of players. The "tastes" of classical players at concerts are your "tastes"
are they not?
I understand that superb players have abilities that far exceed those of
the average player. But doesn't moving up the playing ability scale bring you closer
and closer to similar tastes. (Unless your taste was different. You did say something
about your tastes on a another thread, but I cannot remember where.)
Maybe I'm missing the whole point. |
I have about 10,000 cuts on my iPod, and you'd be hard-pressed to figure out which type of music was most represented. The one thing that isn't there is opera. There's no rap, either.
Yes, Chet's got it: it's not about types of music but the instruments and the player's interactions with them.
About personal preference, take just one example from a number of possible examples that's a particularly common one: I personally like an instrument that's lively in my hands. I'm not in the minority among players, most of whom by number, let's face reality, are students, amateurs and players in second and third rate situations. A poster on TOF referred, I think, to something like buzz under the chin.
Moving upwards from a piece of soggy, dead lumber VSO (violin shaped object), as many buyers of new violins from modern makers are doing, this is a definite sign of improvement. However, the higher up you move, you learn that it's the sign of a defect in the instrument: that it is made by lost, soundless vibration stolen from a very localized tonal area that could otherwise be turned into music. There are a lot of ways to create that pseudo-resonant effect. One of them is by "tuning" the fingerboard, which is a popular, and also increasingly controversial, subject among violin makers. Someone came up with it as a strategy at one point, makers liked the buzz, but as it became more widely spread, other makers started reporting that its appeal among players wasn't universal.
When the fingerboard and neck are flapping around in resonance with the violin it makes the player feel like something resonant is happening. To a better player, though, that represents lost sound, because a flapping neck isn't radiating anything. By stealing from and thinning out the core of the sound, it gives an appealing crispness and immediacy in the player's perception. Both of these things happen at the loss of tonal density and complexity in the projected sound of the instrument that a better player needs to make his music. Ultimately it comes down to satisfying the person looking for the buzzy feel against the skin vs more tonal complexity and core. There are a number of ways to turn this vibration loss back into sound, not just messing with fingerboard tuning, if that's where you decide you need to go.
Some at TOF have commented on the supposed value of a maker being a player, but the real question is "what quality of player?" An amateur player, a second-rate player, or a folk fiddler who relates to instruments as an one of those specific types of players does? Maybe this isn't all that great of an idea? At this point I might mention that one of my ex-coworkers is widely acknowledged as being one of the best restorers and adjusters in the world, and he can barely tune a violin using a pitch pipe. What he can do, however, is listen, and what he does know is what players want. His inability to play isn't a liability, since his own personal prejudices about how a violin should feel don't enter into the equation in even the smallest degree--he's completely responsive to the player's response. Really, what could be better than that? That lack of personal opinion is part of what puts him at the top, along with a good set of ears, a good tonal memory, and a practical understanding of cause and effect in violin mechanics.
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Lemuel
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Joined: 12 Aug 2010
Posts: 515
Location: Mt. Elgin, Ontario
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| Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 11:25 am Post subject: |
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Yes, truly, I was missing the whole point, but now I got the whole point.
Again, really appreciate the clarification.
You know, in reading the "Other Forum", the thought of a maker having to also be
a player never crossed my mind. If this were so, then one could also say in other areas,
of life, race car makers need to be racers, farmers need to be food connoisseurs,
camera makers need to be good photographers, and list goes on.... |
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Michael Darnton
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Joined: 23 Mar 2007
Posts: 1347
Location: Chicago
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| Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 11:42 am Post subject: |
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I'll lay a tip on you, something that works really well for me: when you're adjusting for a player, don't just listen (which of course you should always be doing), watch. I almost never ask players to tell me or talk about what the problem is. Most players know (on some level that may not be able to be verbalized) when their instrument is going to do something they don't like. You will be able to see them stiffen up, or hesitate, or throw on a bit more concentration. They might glance at the contact point to put it carefully where they want it. There will be some visual clue that something bad is anticipated. When you see that, notice what note comes next and what happens to it. Often you won't hear anything, because the player will know how to cover the problem, but you will see the problem you can't hear. That's what you go after and fix.
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Lemuel
Site Admin
Joined: 12 Aug 2010
Posts: 515
Location: Mt. Elgin, Ontario
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| Posted: Fri Jan 04, 2013 11:09 pm Post subject: |
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| Very interesting. Thanks for the tip. I'll experiment with it. |
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