Contemporary violin, Museo del Violino

At the Museo del Violino, following a balanced trace of art and craftsmanship, creativity and tradition that from the late Renaissance shops reaches up to today. The violin making knowledge and innovation support and raise the cultural level of Cremonese violin making, a system that is unique in the world and open to the international community.

Room 5 – The treasure chest

The room contains the most important instruments of the great Cremonese classical masters belonging to the collection of the Municipality of Cremona and of the “Walter Stauffer” Foundation. Famous instruments by Antonio Stradivari are part of it, including the Il Cremonese violin (1715), by various exponents of the Amati and Guarneri family.

Andrea Amati (1505c.-1577) – violin “Carlo IX”, 1566c.
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Girolamo Amati (1548c.-1630) – violet “Stauffer”, 1615
(Cremona, Walter Stauffer Foundation)

Nicolò Amati (1596-1684) – violin “Hammerle”, 1658c.
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Antonio Stradivari (1644c.-1737) – “Clisbee” violin, 1669
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Giuseppe Guarneri fiulius Andreæ (1666-1740) – “Quarestani” violin, 1689
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Antonio Stradivari (1644c.-1737) – cello “Stauffer – ex Cristiani”, 1700
(Cremona, Walter Stauffer Foundation)

Antonio Stradivari (1644c.-1737) – violin “Il Cremonese”, 1715
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Antonio Stradivari (1644c.-1737) – violin “Vesuvius”, 1727
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Giuseppe Guarneri “del Gesù” (1698-1744) – violin “Stauffer”, 1734
(Cremona, Walter Stauffer Foundation)

Room 7 – Sunset and rebirth of violin making
Here are exhibited instruments belonging to the collection of the Stradivarius Museum, representative of the Cremona violin-making from the late eighteenth century to the early twentieth century. Two different video stations illustrate the main Cremonese violin makers of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the celebrations in Cremona of the two-century Stradivarius and the history of the local School of violin making, where the violinmakers of tomorrow are still being formed.

exposed instruments

Nicola Bergonzi (1754-1832)
three-string double bass, 1777
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Giovanni Battista Ceruti (1756-1817)
small violin, 1802
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Enrico Ceruti (1806-1883)
violin “Stauffer”, 1868
(Cremona, Walter Stauffer Foundation)

Giuseppe Beltrami (1830c.-1881)
violin, sd
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Pietro Grulli (1831 -1898)
“pochette”, 1892
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Giuseppe Bernardo Lecchi (1895-1967)
violin, sd
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Giuseppe Fiorini (1861-1934)
viola, 1924
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Cesare Candi (1869-1947)
violin, 1931
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Igino Sderci (1884-1983)
violin, 1934
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Biagio Caruana (1885-1957)
violin, 1931
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Simone Fernando Sacconi (1895-1973)
violin, 1941
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Gaetano Antoniazzi (1825-1897)
viola, 1886
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Pietro Messori (1870-1952)
cello, sd
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Luigi Digiuni (1878-1937)
cello, 1927
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Giuseppe Ornati (1887-1965)
cello, 1928
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Gaetano Sgarabotto (1878-1959)
violin, 1933
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Luigi Galimberti (1888-1957)
violin, 1934
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Piero Parravicini (1889-1957)
violin, 1923
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Marino Capicchioni (1895-1977)
cello, sd
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Vincenzo Cavani (1889-1973)
cello, sd
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Ferdinando Garimberti (1894-1982)
violin, sd
(Cremona, Municipality of Cremona)

Room 8 – The Triennial Contemporary Violin Making Competition
The Permanent Collection of Contemporary Violin Making brings together the instruments awarded with the gold medal at the “Antonio Stradivari” International Triennial Competition for Bow Instruments, a veritable Olympiad of violin making.
The work of the best Master Luthiers of today expresses an inexhaustible search for stylistic values and technical solutions, demonstrates the relevance of the Cremona school and the eclectic vivacity of an increasingly global art, enriches the cultural meaning of violin making with new stimuli and content and affirming its modernity.
On the wall on the left you will find the names of the famous members of the respective juries, while later on the opposite side a planisphere shows the places of origin of the various participants. At the end of the room, after the table dedicated to the winners of the competitions, a suggestive installation recalls the many operators active in Italy, while the central ones are dedicated to the professionals.

Exposed instruments

I Triennale 1976
violin – Giorgio Ce ‘(Italy)
viola – Piero Badalassi (Italy)
cello – Erminio Malagutti (Italy)

II Triennale 1979
violin – Augustin Andreas (Germany)
viola – Alexander Muradov – USSR
cello – Roger Graham Hargrave (Great Britain)

1982 Triennial 1982
violin – Sonoda Nobuhiro (Japan / Germany)
viola – David Burgess (United States)

IV Triennale 1985
violin – David Gusset (USA)
viola – Nicola Lazzari (Italy)
cello – Primo Pistoni (Italy)

V Triennale 1988 violin – Marcello Ive (Italy)
viola – Dante Fulvio Lazzari (Italy)
cello – Pierangelo Balzarini (Italy)
double bass – Marco Nolli (Italy)

VI Triennale 1991
violin – Luca Sbernini (Italy)
cello – Luca Sbernini (Italy)

VII Triennale 1994
violin – Helmut Muller (Germany)
cello – Alessandro Voltini (Italy)

VIII Triennale 1997
violin – Primo Pistoni (Italy)
viola – Christopher Rowe (Great Britain)

IX Triennale 2000
violin – Kolja Jens Lochmann (Germany)
viola – Marcus Klimke (Germany)
cello – Kolja Jens Lochmann (Germany)

X Triennale 2003
violin – Jan Baptista Špidlen (Czech Republic)
cello – Raymond Schryer (Canada)

XI Triennale 2006 cello
Francesco Toto (Italy)

XII Triennale 2009
violin – Marko Pennanen (Finland)
viola – Antoine Cauche (France)
cello – Silvio Levaggi (Italy)

XIII Triennale 2012
violin – Ulrich Hinsberger (Germany)
viola – Ulrike Dederer (Germany / Switzerland)
double bass – Marco Nolli (Italy)

XIV Triennale 2015
Viola – Charles Coquet (France)

Room 9 – friends of Stradivari
Since 2009, the Stradivari Foundation has promoted the friends of Stradivari network, a worldwide network of those who play, collect, study or simply love the ancient Cremonese string instruments. Within this cultural project, violins by Stradivari, Amati, Guarneri and Storioni, belonging to public and private collections, are temporarily exhibited in Cremona, where they can be admired and listened to in exciting and unique concerts.

Exposed instruments

Andrea Amati – violin “Carlo IX”, 1566 c.
(private collection)

Antonio Stradivari – guitar “Sabionari”, 1679
(Domenichini family collection) (temporarily not exhibited)

Antonio Stradivari – “The Hellier” violin, 1679
(Evelyn & Herbert Axelrod Fine Instruments Collection)

Antonio Stradivari – “Chigiano” cello, 1682
(Chigi-Saracini collection)

Antonio Stradivari – Coristo mandolin, 1700/1710
with original case
(Beare Violins LTD collection)

Antonio Stradivari – violin “Lam- ex Scotland University”, 1734
(The Sau-Wing Lam Collection)

Giuseppe Guarneri “del Gesù” – violin “Principe Doria”, 1734
(private collection)

Lorenzo Storioni – violin, 1770-1780 c.
(private collection)

Room 10 – The violin in the cinema
A podium tells the biographies of Italian professional violin makers, while on the walls there is a special tribute to those active in the city. Take a seat now on the chairs and enjoy the video proposed here, with clips of films in which the violin is still the protagonist. This same room, at various times of the year, hosts public meetings and exhibitions with the tools of the collection.

Museo del Violino
Museo del Violino Antonio Stradivari based in Cremona, is dedicated to cremonese luthery of all time. At the same time it is a Museum, an Auditorium and a Research Centre about antique and modern luthery.

At the Museo del Violino it is possible to discover five centuries of Cremonese violin making through the direct encounter with the great Masters – Amati, Stradivari, Guarneri – and their masterpieces, following a balanced trace of art and craftsmanship, creativity and tradition that from the late Renaissance shops reaches up to today.

Concerts and auditions with original instruments, multimedia installations and a rich set of documents allow everyone to create a fascinating and engaging journey where instruments, sounds, scents and images combine to shape history, dreams and emotions.