From: thom newlin <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Date: Fri Dec 5, 2003 10:29:53 AM US/Pacific Subject: the next stradivarius may be hungarian
"Nguyen, Dieu {PPD~Florence}" wrote:
Violins duel at Texas A&M
A violin duel was staged this past Sept. 15 at Texas A&M University, College
Station. One contestant was a Leonardo da Vinci Stradivarius, 300 years old
and valued at up to $5 million; the other was made in six weeks by biochemist
Joseph Nagyvary and completed in August. The comparison concert was organized
by MiraMedia, a German company that is doing a documentary film on Antonio
Stradivari. The audience numbered 600.
Nagyvary, recently retired from Texas A&M, has long studied Stradivarius
violins to the molecular level. At the comparison concert, his instrument and
the Strad were both played by world-class violinist Dalibor Karvay, who played
behind a screen so the audience members couldn't see which instrument they
were hearing. Each violin was rated for tone quality (beauty) and projection
(power) on a 10-point scale.
Karvay played the same four selections on each instrument. The order of
playing was determined randomly. For those selections, the 160 trained
musicians in the audience rated the Strad at an average of 8.03 in tone
quality and 8.0 for power; they rated the Nagyvary violin at 8.1 for tone
quality and 8.33 for power. The 303 average concertgoers put the Strad at 7.83
for tone quality and 7.8 for power; they put the Nagyvary at 8.03 for tone
quality and 8.23 for power. Says Nagyvary, "I consider the results a draw for
both the untrained and trained audience."
Karvay also played Prokofiev's "Sonata in D" on the Strad and Waxman's "Carmen
Fantasy" on the Nagyvary. He played both in full view of the audience, which
got to guess which piece was played by the Strad. Most people picked
incorrectly.
The Hungarian-born Nagyvary began in the 1980s to use his knowledge of
biochemistry to study the intricacies of the violins made in the 18th century
by Stradivari. He plans to go on making his violins. He says: "Antonio
Stradivari was at his best in his 70s and 80s. I'm 69, so perhaps I'm entering
the same stage of life."
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