"This is a monograph which all students of the violin will be happy to possess. The author is a connoisseur and expert, and his account of the great Cremonese master and his life-work, is singularly well and clearly told, whilst the technical descriptions and diagrams cannot fail to interest everyone who has fallen under the spell of the violin.... Mr. Petherick traces the career of Stradivari from his earliest insight into the mysteries of the craft to his highest achievements. Numerous illustrations lend attraction to the volume, not the least being a view of Stradivari's atelier, from a painting by Rinaldi, the sketch of which was made on the premises."--_Music_.
"Mr. Petherick is well known in the musical world as a violin expert with a special knowledge of the instruments made by the Cremonese master, whose biography he has here given us. He tells us how the master worked, what his pupils did, and where their work differs from that of their preceptor. In fact, the volume is as much a dissertation on the violins of Stradivari as a biography of the master, and is full of deeply interesting matter."--_Lloyds_.
_Crown 8vo., Cloth, 5/-, Post Free, 5/4._
VIOLIN MAKING BY WALTER H. MAYSON, With Thirty-one Full-page PHOTO ETCHINGS, Illustrating the process of Violin-making in every stage--from the rough slab of wood to the finished Instrument.
The text is written by an Actual Violin Maker, in a very clear and lucid style.
"'Popular lecture' style, with photographic illustrations."--_The Times_.
"A feature of the book is the clearness of the illustrations."--_Morning Post_.
"Describes a very fascinating art from start to finish."--_Morning Leader_.
"This new booklet, on how to make a violin, is an admirable exposition of methods. Mr. Mayson avoids learned terminology. He uses the simplest English, and goes straight to the point. He begins by showing the young learner how to choose the best wood for the violin that is to be. Throughout a whole chatty, perfectly simple chapter, he discourses on the back. A separate chapter is devoted to the modelling of the back, and a third to its 'working out.' The art of sound-holes, ribs, neck, fingerboard, the scroll, the belly. Among the illustrations is one showing the tools which the author himself uses in the making of his instruments. To learners of the well-known Manchester maker's delicate art we commend this little volume."--_Daily News_.