H.C. TAI  LAB

As a music lover, audiophile, and occassional fiddler, I am fascinated by the beautiful sound of antique violins made in Cremona, Italy. Cremona had three illustrious families of violin makers: Amati, Guarneri, and Stradivari. Top concert violinists have almost universally agreed that Antonio Stradivari (1644-1737) and his neighbor Giuseppe Guarneri "del Gesù" (DG, 1698-1744) made the best sounding violins known to exist.

 

For more than two centuries, many people have tried to unlock the "Secrets of Stradivari." Even today, violin researchers are faced with two major mysteries:

(1) The tone. The best sounding violins in the world, according the consensus of top soloists and collectors, are exclusively made by Stradivari and DG. How do we characterize their unqiue tone by objective methods? 

2) The craftsmanship. Stradivari and DG violins must have sounded very unique even when they were just made, because many equally old violins from other Italian cities sound less fine today. What could possibly prevent old makers in other Italian cities, or thousands of later makers of 19th and 20th century--who tried their best to copy Cremonese instruments, from making equally amazing violins? How do we tell if Stradivari and DG had special working knowledge or techniques?

For the first question, we think it is gradually becoming possible to measure and demonstrate the unique acoustic properties of Strad violins. In collaboration with Chi Mei Museum in Taiwan, the world's leading collector of antique violins, we have been able to record many top instruments. Through speech analysis software, we found that Stradivari violins produced formants (resonance peaks) similar to those of female voices, but other good violins produce more male-like formants. We hope that more extensive recording databases and more sophisticated analytical methods will eventually uncover the psychoacoustic appeel of Stradivarius.  

For the second question, the answer probably lies in the material technology behind the wood or the varnish. Many aspects of Stradivari's work, including wood selection, instrument geometry, and construction methods have been extensively copied and tweaked. However, Cremonese material technologies with respect to varnishing and wood treatment have remained elusive until modern analytical chemistry has been gradually applied to old instruments. As a PhD student, I have written a comprehensive review about the chemical analysis of Stradivari's varnish, which has been widely read and appreciated by many of the leading violin makers in the world. Now we are investigating wood samples from Cremonese insturments to determine if chemical treatment was applied to the wood.

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Special thanks to Chimei Museum in Tainan, Taiwan--the world's leading institution for collection antique string instruments--for long-term collaboration and support of our violin research.  We have now further extended our research to Chinese guqin (seven-string zither), which are no less valuable than Old Italian Violins and even much older. 

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Our violin-related publications are listed below:

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I. Articles about Stradivari's wood properties:

 

[1] Tai, H. C.*; Li, G. C.; Huang, S. J.; Jhu, C. R.; Chung, J. H.; Wang, B. Y.; Hsu, C. S.; Brandmair, B.; Chung, D. T.; Chen, H. M.; Chan, J. C. C. Chemical distinctions between Stradivari’s maple and modern tonewood. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 2017, 114, 27-32.  PDF  (reported by The New York Times, The Washington Post and over 100 international media outlets)

 

[2] Tai, H. C.* “Secrets in the Wood” The Strad, 2017, 128 (1528), 48-53. PDF

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II. Articles about the acoustics of Stradivari violins: 

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[1] Tai, H. C.* (2014). Role of timbre memory in evaluating Stradivari violins. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci. USA, 111, E2778. PDF 

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[2] Tai, H. C. & Chung, D. T. (2012). Stradivari Violins Exhibit Formant Frequencies Resembling Vowels Produced by Females. Savart Journal, 1 (2), online article. PDF

 

[3]  Tai, H. C.*; Shen Y. P.; Lin, J. H.; Chung, D. T. Acoustic Evolution of Old Italian Violins from Amati to Stradivari. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci., U.S.A. 2018, 115, 5926-5931. (Reported by The Times, The Guardian, BBC Radio, and dozens of international media outlets)  PDF

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III. Articles about Stradivari's varnish:

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[1] Tai, H. C. (2007). Stradivari's Varnish: A Review of Scientific Findings, Part 1. Journal of the Violin Society of America: VSA Papers, 21 (1), 119-144. PDF

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[2] Tai, H. C. (2009). Stradivari's Varnish: A Review of Scientific Findings, Part 2. Journal of the Violin Society of America: VSA Papers, 22 (1) 60-90. PDF

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[3] 戴桓青 (2010). 追尋琴絃間的夢幻音色--一個化學家的小提琴之路. Scientific Monthly, Vol. 41, No. 8. 580-603. Cover story: PDF (Chinese)

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IV. Articles about Chinese guqin: 

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[1] Cai, W.; Tai, H. C.*. Three millennia of tonewood knowledge in Chinese guqin tradition: science, culture, value, and relevance for Western lutherie. Savart J., 2018, 1 (7), 1-24. PDF

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[2] 戴桓青 (2017). Scientific Monthly, Vol. 48, No. 9, 670-673, 音色的祕密--小提琴與古琴的材料科學; No. 10, 746-749, 從古籍中的材料知識探究琴中科學.  PDF (Chinese)

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[3] 蔡文潔; 戴桓青 (2019). 唐圓宋扁--從木材科學定年看古代樂器的傳承與收藏. Scientific Monthly, Vol. 50, No. 5, 28-31. PDF (Chinese) 

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