I can't believe I'm first to start a "new year" thread this year, are you becoming lazy? It's been a particularly rewarding year to follow MN, I'd say! There's been quite a few interesting things coming up, and some very good posters, has joined in! Huzzah!

Haven't had so much time to participate myself as I would have wanted to, but most often I must admit I have very little of value to add to the discussion, rather there is a lot for me to be learnt... Something that J. Curtin wrote in an article in the Strad earlier this year comes to mind; can't remember the exact words, it was something about violin makers as people who traditionally kept secrets... then at a certain point one started to understand that whilst keeping a secret you are most probably just fencing in your own ignorance - well he said it a lot better, but you get the idea.

This is a great place for being contradicted, and things that might sound like clever ideas are given some resistance.

I am sure there quite a few secrets out there still and I sincerely hope some of them will be unmercifully killed off here in the course of 2010, happy new year!

Huzzah!
(Hurrah!)

"might sound like clever ideas"... yes, so many clever sounding ideas - if we had a newly made violin for every clever sounding idea we got, we'd be WAAAAAAAY ahead of the game, wouldn't we?

Magnus, I will try to be more like you this upcoming year. More work, and less chatter - now, I finally have figured out a useful New Years resolution!

Also, this New Year; no more serial posts...

Well, it is still December...

Nothing wrong with serial posts, just means you think twice (or thrice) about things, which is very good, huzzah for them too!

........................

Hi Magnus.
I like your sentiment but I don't agree that hard earned itellectual capital should be given away for free.

Sharing?????

Well, it's one thing to pay lip service to sharing, and share some basic stuff; or things already widely known in the violin making pro community; or inconsequential stuff. Quite another to share all the details in a way which would allow any maker with good woodworking skills to reliably place instruments in the pro player community.

Has any maker done that?

I don't mean to cast a pallor on an upbeat thread, but secrecy in violin making is still very much alive. I run into it when I try to recruit teachers for Oberlin. I don't give those who reject "dumping everything" a hard time, because I can't think of any high-level pro maker who doesn't do the same, tacitly or overtly.

Doing it tacitly, with stated professions against secrecy, seems to win the most approval though.

Well, I can't complain that luthiers want to keep certain knowledge a secret. After all, they learned it and therefore own it.

It's all a matter of job protection. I respect that.

Those college professors are suckers.

Stay tuned.
Mike

PS: I was a college professor, so cool your jets.

.................................

You can't really compare the employment experience of professors in institutions and self employed violin makers. ( professor is best career choice)

David,
A touchy topic to be sure. From my narrow perspective...
A few "top shelf" makers are quite open with the how and what of their varnishing.
A few "top shelf" makers just do not share at all.
Either of these is fine as long as everybody knows the score.
A few "top shelf" makers are very good a picking your brain, but giving very little.
That's not too bad...and can be fun if you have been warned....

Then there is what I call "creative disinformation". This is something I witness more often than I care to think about...A maker will willingly share methods and materials in great detail as long as these are not the current procedures one sees on the instrument. Though this information given is generally excellent the maker will lead you to believe that this is their current best effort...

This never sits well with me.

I will share a lot about what I do. And there are some things I just won't tell. And if you ask me a question I don't want to answer, I'll tell you that too.

But. Years ago Ben said to me,,,You know, it doesn't really matter. If we both use exactly the same materials in exactly the same way, what you do will look like you and what I do will look like me.
I guess that's what keeps this interesting.
On we go,
Joe

Agree with much of this Joe. I don't know about the "creative disinformation" but then again most of what I learn is from outside this forum so I only read a select group of posters who I know may provoke new thoughts about my making. Another one is that many of us give or are given a gift of a "secret" with the awareness that it is not to be shared. I see no issue with this.

I don't share some of my secrets for the same reason I suspect many others don't. I don't know if the things I do that are unique actually make a difference yet. Two that I need to share (not really secrets) are my approach to soundpost placement and the use of a new knife shape for the sound holes (still refining this).

Good post though Joe-

To all- I wish you a Happy New Year and success with your current instrument.

Happy New Year to all, I think those of us in Sidders will get there first (make sure you watch the fireworks on TV, there seems to be an interesting thing on the Harbour Bridge), barring Pegboxers from the Pacific islands.

I look forward to the day that I have secrets

Again, Happy New Year.

Tim

while i don't thing its exactly wrong to keep secrets from the general public i also don't see why people do it. I know the reasons stated but that never really held much sway with me. If violin making was easy and learning was fast, then everyone would be in the top 1%. Giving information to everybody might and i stress might bring 1 or 2 new professional luthiers into the world. I personally don't think it hurts to have more really good makers out there. It just means i have to be better

Jesse

Wishing you all a happy, healthy and prosperous new year, secrets or not. Besides, if you do a really good job of keeping them, how would I know you were?

Yes, but that's not quite what I am saying either. It is obviously not the case with you Melvin, but I tend to think there is a lot of "intellectual capital" out there, that might not be half as valuable as the capitalist tends to think himself. When openly discussed, often its real value emerges on the marketplace, and it might be close to worthless or even useless, when taken out of the often rather narcissistic and self-congratulatory context of many a violin makers' atelier.

Some things have been traded down for a long time in violin making communities, and have thereby been adjusted and corrected as time went by, whilst still kept relatively "secret". But some ideas, especially very "personal" ones, no matter how hard earned, they are more likely to be wrong, I think. Actually, some fatal errors are committed by people who sit in secrecy with a genial method for fitting bass bars or whatever, and some of the oddest new instruments I've seen are made by people with jealously guarded "secrets".

This is not always the case of course, and some things are not discussed openly, and some things that we consider "our own" we'd might not share, and especially not on an internet forum, which is right and fine. If everyone did the same things, it would not be a nightmare, one might argue that there's way too much of that already, and some more secrecy might make violin making more exciting and geographically varied.

Obviously, keeping things to yourself has a value, and discussing things openly has a value too, but since this forum is mostly about the latter, I found it a more appropriate subject, that's all! Since there is no forum for secret-keeping that I know of, I could not post my "Shh, keep quiet guys! Happy you know-what!" on it, and if I did, I could not tell you about it.

This is a personal thing. Fortunately my food, clothing, shelter and basic violin making needs are covered. I would starve if I had to make violins for a living. I would enjoy making a contribution to knowledge in the field. Folksinger Pete Seeger (90) recently said "I just want to be useful." I agree with that. My grandchildren will better remember me if I teach them how to be useful.

I wasn't griping at you Magnus, or the concept of sharing. A lot of it goes on here.
I was griping about makers who imply that they're in support of openness, and open themselves, but really aren't; and I might also gripe about those who gripe about those who don't share everything.

The only person who I think is entitled to gripe about withholding information is one who freely shares all their own assets, including information, money, their house, car, etc. Sure, I know it's frustrating. You want some violinmakers secrets, the product of years of work. Well, he might want your house, also the product of years of work. Hey, maybe y'all can work something out.

Did I use the word "gripe" enough times?

Magnus writes:



This is such a good point. We all have our self interests and one of those should be a 'reality check'.

Wishing everyone a Happy, Healthy and most Peaceful New Year!

Oded Kishony

Discussion can be developing. However I do think that discussions and opinions alone cannot be trusted upon alone. To be able to pinpoint what is really important and not, I think we need measurements and experiments to back that up. I do believe in experiences, and if they are sound, they will show up in well planned measurements as well. :-)

One might expect that kind of view from a maker with a engineering background. "Not everything that can be counted counts and not everything that counts can be counted", said Einstein. Probably true for violin making as well. So there will be some areas that are difficult to cover experimentally, although the process of playing and listening basically consist of the elements involved in experiments, at least qualitatively. Making and evaluating violins is sort of a mixture of experiments and practice. That is one of the facinating aspects of instrument making.

We are working on a very complex matter. And being several working on the same "problem" we will reach further than what we could alone. I see Davids point on sharing and not, many here are also competitors. But sharing on a certain level is also what is done in the scientific and induistrial world. We give something and get something back. That is sharing. A sort of trading information. I am very grateful for new insights that I have learnt the past year from this site. And it has been great to share ideas, results, some playful fun and discuss things in a developing environment. There are a lot of gifted and knowledgeable persons active here, and I have great respect for their (your) work and abilities.

Thanks for a fine 2009 and wish everybody a Happy New Year!

Speaking from one looking up, there is quite a bit of information freely given here. I guess if I get to the point where I sort of know what I am doing the more "secret" info would be appreciated more. At this point I probably wouldn't know how to use it.

So thanks for the all the help, and have a prosperous new decade. kevin

Yes that is a good point. It is easy enough to walk around like a saint and praise the value of sharing, and most likely nobody notices you actually share very little I was thinking about discussion, rather than sharing, though. You don't necessarily have to share every detail of you approach to get a meaningful discussion going!



Oh, I really think so. The meaning of "griping" is the same as "groping" isn't it?

I would like to make the best instruments I can and would gladly give them away without charge. The only reason I would consider placing a price on them is to calibrate their 'value to others'.

As a result...
1. I am a leech, but of the more socially acceptable type, so if you would all PM me your best kept secrets - mum's the word.
2. I would not consider myself serious competition for anyone.

Best for 2010.

No.
Joe

Here's wishing you all a very happy & productive 2010!

Secrets? ... Stradivari's and Guarneri's best-kept secrets appear to be those put right
under our noses [eyes?, ears??] ... vhat secrets??

In the spirit of openness, may 2010 be thee year old acoustic "benchmarks" are put to their greatest challenge.
Can you hear it?

A plateau is a high form of flattery.

Jim

Janito,
Since you are flying high on violin making again!....
These are the questions I don't answer:
How do you prepare your linseed oil?
How do you prepare your resins?
How DO you get the color into the varnish and keep it transparent?
How come you are so interested in violin varnish since you don't make violins?

I know the answer to the first three...
Happy new year.
Joe

Cake decoration...

---------------
A little later...

The product of yesterday's efforts by my 5 year old niece and two 18 year old helpers.

That's what we need in the New Year. Less griping and more groping.

Sheep dreams...

Hi,
Happy New Year to all.
Spare a thought for poor Heron Allen! He was made to belive he could make violins!

Hi
Happy New Year to all of you!
It´s been a good one- off to the next

does it count if I share tonights dessert with you?

here we say "guten Rutsch" meaning sth. like have a smooth slide into the next year (maybe because it´s usually quite icy here in winter)

best wishes

Martina

Ha ha.

Fleece Navidad.


Martina;
"Good Slide" ????
Over here, that's a brand of intimacy lubricant.

Happy new year to all!!! We are going to the house of an Italian friend, we prepared abbachio (lamb), peperonata, basil pate, and some other things...


Yes, this is quite a good year here, many many good threads. In Italy even the most silly "secrets" are still jealously kept, it`s a pity, there is an interisting Italian Forum but very few professional makers participate, it`s a pity indeed.

Happy new year to all!!!

Click to view attachment
And a flappy gnu ear!

Ha ha ha!

Yes, this is perfect.

Opinion time;
Often, I will hear a specific type of beginning maker post (here and elsewhere) with conviction that there is a mysterious cabal of experienced makers out there, who are "in the know" regarding certain aspects of violin making, a situation where the "real" and "important" aspects of violin making are being held back from them, and where they are being "kept out of the loop", or "in the dark" - so to speak by virtue of their inexperience. Some people are so prone to thinking this way they come upon violin making angry, and with a sort-of chip on their shoulder.
This type of thinking is in error.
This is the type of secret that I believe does not exist.
Other types of "secrets" do exist, but so what?
Of course, the only real remedy for this is to simply start building, making violins, and before long, one discovers that ALL of us are in the same boat with regard to making violins that rise above the other violins that are being made today. Practical Experience , or the act of making rather than talking, thinking, arguing and/or theorizing about it, IS the one great secret that still exists in violin making today.
Other secrets - as they do exist, (I have discovered), have mostly to do with the varnishing process, and will be found to constitute pragmatic or even idiosyncratic (proprietary) methods which allow a specific maker to have a specific look associated with their own product. In such a case, it is better for the newer maker to stumble upon or evolve his or her own "secret" aesthetic method, and to impart their own imprint in the violin making world.
That, along with individual skill and talent in making, will take you about as far as it is possible to go in this craft.

Secrets - Bah, Humbug! People keeping them ought to be boiled in their own varnish (sorry, I watched Dickens' "A Christmas Carol", one too many times this year!)

If you have them, please just keep them - most likely you are entitled to them

Happy 2010 to all!

It is very instructive to be in a largish class of learners each progressing at their own pace. This means that there is a regular supply of instruments that have reached the 'finished' stage.

You gasp "My word, it looks like a gargoyle, but it sounds like an angel" and "Surely they could not have had Secrets" and "There is hope for me yet".

And no PMs, so this proves that there are no Secrets.

Yes, very instructive.

For about three consecutive years I taught a high school level class on making violins (as part of the Mentorship program, where the students chose from a list of active local businesses) here in the shop. Observing the differences between students - their individual strengths and weaknesses, talents and drives, was the absolutely most interesting part of the process from my perspective.

Janito -

What do you think you're doing...?

Serial posts are MY shtick.
I know I promised to cut them out this year, but it's been 2010 for long enough now, and it pains me to think that someone else may try to take over and surpass my finely honed serial posting skills.

Besides, aren't New Years resolutions made to be broken?

Absolutely.

Don't back down on this point ct!

I bow to the Master.

I agree.

Too true.

Do I detect a little more cranial hair this early in 2010?

We were poing to the store on Saturday and as I backed the car out of the garage I noticed a plump white and reddish bird in the pear tree on the other side of the house. Here, with the temperature around 0 degrees F. and a stiff breeze was a bluebird. His feathers all spread out to keep him warm in the cold, but not a little bug in sight to feed him. But there he was, the bluebird of happiness, spreading a little smile, and astonishment, to our day. If the rest of the year comes through with that much promise it will be a good one.
Ken