GOLD

Years ago I was visiting with the Parisian luthier and bow connoisseur, Bernard Sabatier. An American violinist who had recently started buying and selling bows was there and he had just talked Sabatier into selling a cello bow from his collection. It was a gold mounted Victor Fetique exhibition bow in perfect condition. It had what looked like an original gold winding but the neophyte dealer remembered being advised that one should always check to see if a bow had been grafted by removing the winding.

Grafting is done when the bow at the frog area is completely worn out from years of handling. Then a new piece of wood is joined to the original stick under the grip and the original frog fitted to it. The properly grafted bow is just as strong and useful as the original but loses value because some original wood is lost and with it the maker's stamp. With modern repair techniques grafting has become rare. Of course a gold winding is expensive and this adage only applied to a bow in an advanced state of wear, but the young dealer insisted on removing the grip.

Sabatier shrugged and started unwinding the gold, but soon all of our eyes registered a look of incredulity. The bow had been grafted and each of the eight facets of the stick at the graft was stamped 'Vtor. Fetique à Paris'. With his typical fatalistic manner, Sabatier shrugged again, put the bow back in the box and with a certain uneasyness the young dealer left the shop. He had been right but at incredible odds.

Sabatier's Fetique was revealing and being absolutely original was even more interesting as a collector's piece. If Fetique had been obliged to graft a extra piece on a too-short Pernambuco stick it could only mean one thing. He lacked enough really beautiful pernambuco for his gold mounted production and it may have pained him to set aside the too-short piece of wood.

Stephane Thomachot and Bernard Sabatier

This story obliquely illustrates an important point. The quality of the pernambuco wood in a bow is what sets it apart and truly this wood is the rarest and most precious thing in the bow. The gold may be expensive but it is not rare in the same sense, you can go to a dealer in precious metals and buy it at any time. All makers starting with the Tourte family made a limited number of bows with gold mountings for their clients who wanted the highest quality. Gold conferred more value but the bow's real quality always rested on the pernambuco stick. The great majority of the finest bows of all time are silver mounted.

Today when buying a contemporary bow it is important to know the practice of the maker. With some makers, gold mountings indicate their highest grade and commissioning a gold mounted bow ensures that you will get the best wood the maker has. In this case it could be well worth the extra cost of the gold mountings. In my case I select the best possible stick for the player regardless of the mounting and so gold is only an aesthetic consideration. I have enjoyed making the occasional gold mounted bow for those who truly love the look. For instance, Francois Hetsch, a french violist received some money when his mother passed away and he wanted to reinvest it in a gold mounted bow to remember her by; this made perfect sense.

Charles Espey violin bow 1983, Bellamy 'or rose'.

Another thing to think about when considering gold mountings is the gold itself. Gold is available in a variety of alloys and their corresponding color. In Paris we would always use 18 carat 'or rose' from Bellamy, a little dealer by the rue de Gravilliers in the jeweler's quarter. This had a beautiful warm pinkish tone against the ebony or the tortoiseshell that was still available at the time. Gold must be alloyed with other metals because if made of soft pure gold the 'passant' or ferrule would bend when the hair was wedged into place. 18 carat gold is ideal for this and consists of 75% gold alloyed with silver and copper to give it stiffness and the required color. But sometimes bows from production shops are offered in gold and this metal is often 14 carats or less. Fourteen carat gold is only 58.5% gold.

I appreciate the simple and elegant look of silver and beautiful ebony. In addition, gold is a significantly heavier metal than silver so gold increases the weight of frog and button by about a gram. This can be compensated for but it depends on the bow. Another thing to bear in mind is the fact that a maker may feel obliged to use dense, strikingly beautiful wood with a gold mounted bow. This wood may or may not be an ideal match for the musician or their instrument. Sometimes a less dense or simpler looking wood will give the best tonal return. One has only to look at the plain brown color of some of Francois Tourte's best bows to recognize this. So gold is an option but not a prime consideration in selecting a fine bow.

Today there is another more sombre consideration regarding gold mounted bows. The staggering rise in the price of gold has come with an exponential increase in exploitative and environmentally devastating mining practices in some of the world's poorest and most unstable countries. 70% of the world's gold is coming from developing countries but even in technologically advanced countries, gold mining has a significant environmental impact. In the Eastern Congo gold is being mined by forced labor under the control of militias who use their proceeds to buy arms. The use of cyanide and mercury to process gold has environmental consequences from the Amazon to the Eastern Congo. See this article for further information: http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/the-real-price-of-gold-512591.html. These issues have prompted Hoover and Strong, a dealer used by many American makers, to market a gold certified as entirely recycled. This is a very good thing but any use of the metal effects the demand.

AN ELUSIVE STICK

For a bow maker, the selection of the Pernambuco stick is the most important element in matching a bow to a player. Some time ago, the violinist Jan Mark Sloman and I started a dialogue and at the end of each telephone call or email I went to my store of sticks held in racks. Promising sticks were examined and in the end half a dozen sticks had his name penciled on them. When the time came to start work on his bow the first task was to decide on the right one. Sloman wanted a rich and dark underpinning to his Vuillaume's sound and I decided to use a wood of a somewhat lower density than the wood I usually use. He also wanted a bow that could respond to his entire repertoire and so finding these qualities through increased flexibility was not a good option. This stick had to be very strong so it could be taken down to fine diameters but I also wanted some complexities in the grain especially down near the frog. I found a great stick and began planing it out, fitting the tip plate, and mounting the frog. I pictured the process on this same bow in an earlier post called "ebouchage' or roughing out.

Unfortunately, at this point I began to question my original choice. The stick's response was slower than I had hoped for and I also wondered if the sound was going to be right. So the stick was put back in the rack and I selected another. But this stick did not reach expectations either. So I found a third stick that filled the original requirements of lower density, excellent strength and a complex grain structure. It also had a nice little pin knot just beyond the winding and came from my first trip to Brazil in 1984. In one of our conversations Jan had mentioned that his friend, the late Sergio Lucca, believed that most great bows had a pin knot. So this seemed like a good omen and I also agree that a tiny knot adds a certain nobility to a stick. As the stick took shape it felt good but it was even lighter than I expected and to give it the right level of resistance I made it about one tenth of a millimeter larger than I expected in some areas. My experimentations with light frogs that have no under-slide appear to create conditions for brilliance in the sound. Since this was not the direction we wanted to go I made a normal weight frog with silver under-slide.

In making a bow there is a period of polishing and varnishing when one has to control their impatience to know what a bow will really be like, especially in terms of sound. When the bow was finally completed and the hair received it's first rosin I played it for the first time and compared it to another bow with unlined frog I had in my shop. I knew the first bow had a rich and focused sound so I hoped the new one would exceed it in these qualities. Instead the new bow's sound seemed very broad but with a razor sharp definition or zing and a tooth to the sound not unlike a reed instrument. With my violin it was not possible to hear its full potential at the lower end but I began to doubt my original intuition for the stick. But the stick's playing qualities felt good and I was very curious to find out what Jan would think. To give him the same frame of reference I had experienced, I sent him both bows without indicating which bow was the new one. On the first day he wrote back saying "the unlined frog bow is fabulous for me...'. So I had to resign myself to the fact that I had failed in my stick selection after all, although not for lack of effort. At the end of a week however, Sloman came to the conclusion that the bow I had made for him really did bring out what he was looking for, a full, dark lower end combined with a 'sizzle' that gave the sound definition. And so goes a lifelong process of discovery; making a bow in response to an individual player and their instrument.

WILL’S BOW Part 10. Varnishing.

When the stick is completed it needs to be sealed with a varnish. The varnish on a violin is relatively substantial and plays a role in the instrument’s tone. The varnish on a bow, however, can be quite thin since it is only there to seal and protect the wood and prevent the bow from being effected by rapid changes in humidity. Some makers like to apply enough varnish to fill the wood’s pores completely while others prefer the minimum.

The varnish’s main ingredient is lac, the resinous secretion of an order of insects of the Coccoidea family. The insects deposit the lac on the twigs of certain trees in Thailand, India and other parts of Asia. The twigs are collected and thoroughly cleaned to form a deep red granular product called seed lac or the lighter, more refined shellack in flakes. The varnish itself is made by dissolving lac in alcohol and optionally adding small amounts of other resins. The varnish is not applied with a brush but rather with the technique called French polishing where the varnish is applied to a clean cloth with a little oil and rubbed on the bow. A number of coats are applied to bring the bow’s surface to the maker’s satisfaction.

WILL’S BOW Part 8. The head.

With the stick round, the final carving of the head takes place and the mortise for the hair is cut. As we mentioned earlier, we have chosen a particular height for this head to compliment our concept for the bow’s relative flexibility and the actual transition where the head meets stick has an effect on the bow’s sensitivity. In addition the overall mass of the head effects the bow’s distribution of weight.

The head is also the most sculptural element of the bow and here the bowmaker’s personal style manifests itself strongly. While the throat of the frog is also a sculptural element it is bounded on three sides by the frog itself. The head is a three dimensional form that could manifest itself in many ways and still function to hold the hair. The sketch illustrates some of the variables the bowmaker works with in developing a style. Is the ‘dessous cou’ or back of the head turning sharply or roundly from the stick. How is it angled, forward or back? How does the base or line of the tip plate relate to the curve of the stick? Is it relatively flat or strongly curved? How delicate is the ‘bec’ and how far does it extend from the rest of the head? How does the ‘arete’ or ridge along the front of the head relate to the curve at the back of the head. Does the head appear wide above or bell shaped? Finally how sharp or rounded is the curve from the arête to the top of the stick? And how does that curve relate to the curve between the back of the head and the underpart of the stick? A sharp curve in front and back gives the head a hatchet-like appearance. However Eury very effectively used a very rounded front contrasting with a very angular ‘dessous cou’. These are things bowmakers and connoisseurs notice but any player will appreciate the overall elegance of a beautifully conceived head.

Another strong stylistic element is the ‘chanfrein’ or chamfer, a bevel cut at the angle between the sides and back of the head. It can be cut in many shapes and nowhere else is the signature of the bowmaker more evident. On earlier 19^th century bows the chamfer is a pure unpolished stroke of the maker’s knife that brings to mind the calligraphic nature of Sumi painting. Later in the 19^th century the knife marks were usually cleaned up with a file but the chamfer still had the stamp of the bow’s maker.

WILL’S BOW Part 7. Rounding stick and carving head.

When the bow feels good, whiplike in the hand, it can be rounded. In the French tradition, bows in the very early 19^th century were often octagonal; Tourte and Eury are good examples although they also made round bows. Then starting with Persois and Peccatte the general preference was for round bows. But whether or not the maker plans for a bow to be round or octagonal, the bows are planed down to size as octagons. Then if a round bow is planned, the corners are taken off making it sixteen sided and then 32 sided at which point it is practically round with a few more strokes of the plane.

Here we are rounding the bow and concurrently the head is getting carved down as well so the curves of the head flow into the stick.

WILL’S BOW Part 5. Tip plate and head.

Now the head is brought down to its anticipated height and the tip-plate with its ebony liner is glued in place. The height of the head strongly influences the way the stick articulates because it acts like a tiny lever that facilitates pulling up the hair away from the stick. Even a difference in height of one tenth of a millimeter will make a difference. In a sense the head depowers the stick and allows the hair to be at playing height without being under too much tension. The stick itself is just as strong but that strength is kept in reserve. We will go into this in more detail when the stick is being adjusted. Historically, earlier bows had a higher head and this was reduced by Voirin and his school in the latter 19^th century by about one millimeter.

Bowmakers typically work directly with raw materials, working with logs or boards of wood and sheets of silver or rough slices of mother of pearl. But traditionally the tip plate was prepared in its simple rectangular form by another artisan or a bowmaker who specialized and could purchase a special saw and cut large numbers. In France in the 1980’s, virtually all tip plates were prepared by Roger Gerome, a genial old Mirecourt bowmaker. The photo on the left shows him when he was younger. I remember visiting him and seeing his fine jigsaw for cutting ivory. He joked that ever since he gave his chickens ivory dust they laid white eggs.

Until the 1980’s all fine bows had an ivory tip-plate with the exception of a few with gold or silver tip-plates. But then bow-makers became aware of the plight of Africa’s elephants and the export of ivory was controlled strictly by CITES, the international organization regulating the trade in endangered species. After experimenting with bone, which is less than ideal, bowmakers discovered the availability of Mammoth ivory. In the permafrost of Siberia and Alaska, the local peoples keep an eye on the constantly changing riverbanks as they travel by boat. From time to time the tusks and other remains of a Mammoth will be exposed after lying frozen for over 10,000 years. These tusks are legally collected and sold, offering bowmakers an alternative. I have used Mammoth ivory for about 25 years. Sometimes while filing the material I smell its toasty odor and I’m astounded to be working with a natural material that is so old. The tips are cut out for me by an ivory carver who makes use of his scraps. They come oversized so I cut them down to size and bend them.

The tip plate includes a layer of ebony that varies in thickness according to the head’s style or period. The tip-plate is glued on with a mixture of two kinds of hot glue in equal proportions, ‘colle de nerf’ and ‘colle de os’. One is made from sinews and the other from bones. This glue has been used in woodworking since the time of the ancient Egyptians and has always been used in violinmaking. In my opinion it will last longer than any synthetic glues.

At this point the head will stay in its roughed out state while we plane the stick down further.

WILL’S BOW Part 4. Mortise and screw.

With the frog fit we now cut the mortise the screw will ride in, using a little chisel called aptly the ‘mortaise de pannes’. This is done by bracing a knee against the bench and holding the stick firmly on the knee. The stick is very stable in this position and the mortise can be cut securely. Years ago I had just finished making a new chisel and took a small piece of ebony to test it on. The ebony flipped to the side and I drove the chisel to the bone. This made it hard to climb the 6 flights of stairs to my little apartment/workshop on rue Joseph Dijon in the 18ieme arrondisement.

With the mortise cut, the eyelet can be screwed into the frog.

Then the screw hole is drilled using a traditional tool called a ‘foret’. It is operated using a bow made of an old fencing epée and a cello string. The stick is held freehand as the drill bit is directed by eye. The foret is used for all drilling on the bow and like the plane and other tools, they were made by specialized blacksmiths in Mirecourt. They are very hard to find, the violinmaker Vincent Lainé let me have one he had. But the American bowmaker Michael Hattala had the castings made and turned out some excellent forets for some colleagues.

Will's Bow part 2. Cambering.

When the stick is planed out to an oversized taper the cambering or imparting of the bow’s curve begins. Apart from the quality of the wood, the camber is probably the single most important element of the bow’s playing quality. You could compare it to a violin’s arching. Each bow-maker has a personal idea of what constitutes an ideal camber. Camber gives the bow its feel, contact, flexibility and level of power and it works hand in hand with the bow’s graduations or taper. The camber is also where the maker relies on his intuition or sense of what will feel right because these things are so hard to quantify. Sometimes after many years a stick can warp a little or lose a little camber. This can be restored but if the restorer does not respect the maker’s original intent, the bow’s original camber may be lost forever.

If heated to a certain point, Pernambuco wood can be bent and maintain that curve indefinitely. We heat up a few inches at a time and slowly put in the curve we have in mind. Every bow I make has the camber traced on a strip of mat board and this gives me a reference to refer to as I camber. But each bow ends up a little different depending on the wood and the requirements of the player. Will and I have discussed his bow in depth and he has tried several bows belonging to a colleague so I now have sense of what should work.

Here Charles Bazin is cambering a stick. In Mirecourt the bowmakers would go to the bakery when they swept the coals out of the oven. They would fill an old ‘Marmite’ or Dutch oven with coals and use them for cambering. I use an old fashioned hotplate with an exposed element to give the same even heat but in other traditions an alcohol lamp is used as well.

Will's Bow

I have already made the frog although it isn't polished yet. The frog is without silver under-slide at the intersection of frog and stick. This was the norm for makers like Tourte and Eury working the late 17 hundreds and very early 19th century. The polishing will come later after it is mounted on the stick.

This bow is for Will Fedkenheuer of the Fry Street Quartet. The bow will have to perform well on his Gagliano as well as a new Moes & Moes violin he will be getting shortly. He has been using a nice old Pfretzschner that is quite light. Here we are going to a bow weighing about 59.5 grams but the frog and winding will be relatively light so the stick will fairly dense and quite powerful. The stick is wonderful pernambuco wood I found in Espirito Santo, Brazil in 1987.

Here the stick is roughed out and ready for cambering tomorrow.