Archive

More detailed information about stringed instruments and the history of violin making.

Rembert Wurlitzer and the travels of antique violins

Mirecourt’s new masters: contemporary violin making in Mirecourt

Nicolas Lupot, the second great name in French violin making

Eric Blot, the expert of Cremona and Italian violin making

Noteworthy families of Markneukirchen violin makers

Electric violins: a guide to technical standards and quality characteristics

Roland Baumgartner, Basel: an expert dedicated to antique violins

NEW SOUND SAMPLE: Jean-Joseph Honoré Derazey: fine French master violin (certificate Hieronymus Köstler)

The fine French violin presented here is a mature late-period piece by Jean-Joseph Honoré Derazey, whose workshop worked under the name H. Derazey, he constructed this violin around 1870 based on a large format model by Antonio Stradivari. The young master Jean-Joseph Honoré Derazey was one of the great Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume's most valuable employees. Nine years of this intense and demanding task at JB Vuillaume honed Honoré Derazey’s skills and left him with a steady hand, even at an advanced age, as this exquisitely crafted violin demonstrates with its natural elegance. Its unmistakably nature can be seen in the delicate blackened scroll and in the rich coat of luminously transparent and radiant orange-brown oil varnish with subtle antiquing and typical traces of age. The tone woods are of the highest quality: very even-grained spruce was selected for the top, whilst the two-piece back highlights the interesting flaming of the premium maple. The purfling and the meticulously crafted sound holes are flawless in their beauty. A single minor repair to the upper part of the right sound hole has no impact on the sound, value or stability. This very fine French violin is now ready to play after having been carefully set up at our atelier for restoration. This outstanding H. Derazey violin has a radiant appearance and a large, resonant, mature sound which is sophisticated, radiant and mature in character. A certificate by the Stuttgart expert Hieronymus Köstler is included in the price.

Order a certificate of appraisal with this violin, the certificate option is available in the shopping cart.