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Seth Borenstein reports at AP that ten world-class soloists put prized Stradivarius violins and new, cheaper instruments to a blind scientific test to determine which has the better sound and the new violins won hands down. "I was surprised that my top choice was new," says American violinist Giora Schmidt. "Studying music and violin in particular, it's almost ingrained in your thinking that the most successful violinists on the concert stage have always played old Italian instruments." Joseph Curtin, a Michigan violin maker and Claudia Fritz, a music acoustics researcher at the Pierre and Marie Curie University in France had the ten violinists put a dozen instruments through their paces in a rehearsal room and concert hall just outside Paris. They even played with an orchestra. The lights were dimmed and the musicians donned dark welder's glasses. The dozen violins together were worth about $50 million and the older, more expensive ones required special security. The 10 violinists were asked to rate the instruments for sound, playability, and other criteria, and pick one that they would want to use on a concert tour.
The finding shocks music aficionados, because of the mythologies built up around the Italian violin makers of the 17th and 18th centuries, particularly the Stradivari and Guarneri families. Along with violins made by other Italian masters in this era, Stradivarius and Guarneri instruments have gained almost mythical status, with musicians insisting these instruments have a quality that cannot be reproduced.
Canadian soloist Susanne Hou has been playing a rare $6 million 269-year-old violin made by Guarneri del Gesu called by some the greatest violinmaker of all time. Like other participants, Hou was drawn to a certain unidentified violin that ranked No. 1 for four testers and No. 2 for four more. "Whatever this is I would like to buy it." Hou, whose four-year loan of the classic Italian violin has expired, is shopping for a new one this week. She wishes the researchers could tell her which one she picked in the experiment, but Curtin said the researchers won't ever reveal which instruments were used to prevent conflict of interests or appear like a marketing campaign. For Hou finding the right instrument is so personal: "There are certain things you can't explain when you fall in love."
(Score: 3, Insightful) by dvorak on Wednesday April 09 2014, @07:08AM
Strands are great violins, and I don't think we'll ever quite be able to replicate them and their sound qualities perfectly, but I haven seen compelling proof that we can't make something that sounds different, but just as good.
Still, I don't think you can deny the uniqueness of the experience of playing an old Italian instrument. I one played my violin teacher's Guarneri, and it was a pretty thrilling experience, not just because the instrument sounded good, but because I was playing a violin that had been made hundreds of years ago. It made me feel like a better violinist, and when you're on a stage in front of thousands of people, that can help.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 09 2014, @03:24PM
Would be a stressful experience for me- I wouldn't want to become famous as the idiot who tripped and destroyed it...
Here's another angle on the same story: http://phenomena.nationalgeographic.com/2014/04/07 /stradivarius-violins-arent-better-than-new-ones-r ound-two/ [nationalgeographic.com]
Unfortunately that's what a lot of science nowadays seem to be about - attracting attention and possibly $$$$. Not saying this study and the previous one was bad, but I see too many "troll" studies that seem solely for attracting attention and $$$, not really for finding out anything concrete.
By the way it shouldn't be shocking. It's a follow up study. There have been other experiments before where cheaper violins beat the famous ones. Or where people can't figure out which violins are which (or better).
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/09/09091 4111418.htm [sciencedaily.com]e /2012/01/02/violinists-cant-tell-the-difference-be tween-stradivarius-violins-and-new-ones/ [discovermagazine.com]
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/notrocketscienc
(Score: 2) by naubol on Wednesday April 09 2014, @08:28PM
Science has always had steps where initial, simpler, cheaper studies were done to decide whether it would be worth staging a more rigorous, expensive study. You can take the words about attracting attention and use it to say that the existence of this motivation means that the first study wasn't good enough to even infer that further study is warranted, but that would be fallacious.
The strength of a conclusion from a study should mostly, if not completely, rely on the methodological quality of the study, the rigor with which it was performed, the scrutiny brought to bear on it by subject matter experts, and the repeatability of the results in subsequent or previous studies by other scientists.
I also think that complaining that money and attention is just now a factor in which studies are done is naive.
(Score: 2) by Maow on Thursday April 10 2014, @02:18AM
<Sarcasm>
But, but, then how do you explain all those "scientists" pocketing all those Stradivarius violins at the end of the test, huh? And then they reported the violins stolen and, and, pocketed the insurance money too, uh-huh!
And all those Porche-driving climate scientists with their yachts and private planes - what about them?!?
</Sarcasm>
I weep for humanity when I read about the science "scepticism" on tech web sites.
Of course, other than the Creationists, this sentiment seems to have arrived fully-formed with the climate science deniers.
One has to shake one's head...