Macon beacon. [volume] (Macon, Miss.) 1859-1995, 1896-05-09
A v,olIN MACHINE.

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ny Means OF His Invention q Semitic Man
Says Ho Makes Them All Perfect.
There is a violin maker in this city
who has an altogether new theory IN re-
gard TO this instIument and one 70 new
that II Is totally at variance with the
general impression. II Is that there is
no accident or luck in the superior tone
of violin, but that they can be made
OF a given tone one after the other with
perfect assurance. II has been asserted
that good, honest violin maker may
turn out so specimens of his best work,
and yet only few of these prove to be
first-class instruments. The history Of
famous masters in the art would aeenl
to bear out this assertion.
II. w. Cakes, who has been making
yiolins in this city for IS months, and
elsewhere for nearly twice MS many
years, brushes all this away like moldy
cobweb, and says he can insure first
class instrument every time. and that
there is no secret aboutit.
"The trouble about all the makers Is
that they do all their work by rule OF
thumb and by the eye. ! make mine by
mathematical rules. Once having at.
TUNED certain perfection can dupli-
cate that result with mathematical ac-
curacy."
sand the tone?"
'grhe tone follows as matter Of
course. 1t must. Now, there used to be
secrets in the art, of course. II was long
before anyone could turn out an instru-
inent that could compete with the old
Cremonas. First. they thought the Sc
cret of the latter's superiority lay in the
varnish, and many years were spentin
attempts to find out that secret. They
found 1t out at last, or rather, that twas
no secret. They discovered that the
cabinet makers of Cremona used the
same varnish as Stradivari used. Then
they thought the secret must be in the
wood, and for some time they pinned
their confidence to that. They took ex-
traordinary pains to get just such re-
sonance and letter tone, and even took
the wood from fine violin and put il
with other wood, but with all their eff
forts they made as many failures as sue
cesses.
"Now, Stradivari used the same ma
terial for the whole of the 800 yiolins he
made, and yet the good violins were the
accident. Only so of all he made turned
out to be good instruments, and yet
you call him master"
"Are there any violins comparable
with these SOP"
Certainly. Within the last so years
just as good violins have been made as
have ever been made"
"But age has something to do with
| tone?"
Undoubtedly, provided the violin is
played on. 1t might lie century, and
if not used would not improve at all
Violins are like everything else in the
world; they have their birth, their
growth, maturity and decline. would
say that at about rs violin would be at
its best. / know that after 100 years
they begin to lose their power, and
finally become comparatively worth
less so far as tone is concerned"
And how, in making an instrument,
are you so confident what its tone will
De, MT. OakeS B
''By this little machine here" he re-
piled, pointing to machine that had
the appearance of a little turning lathe.
'If you take one of my violins and mark
it into small squares, you will find the
thickness corresponds in each cor
responding square. This machine will
show the difference, if it is only the
thickness of piece of gold leaf
spent 20 years studying the defects Of
yiolins and how to remedy them before
l made one. Then | got down to mathe.
NAUTICAL nicely and made this machine
| to insure it.
"Why, here is a shop violin, costing
s1.50, that have worked on for expert
ment. Because of its correction of tone
1t is now worth from $50 to $780,
"How many violins could you make in
a sear?"
II could make about one first-class
one month; say ten in the course of
year, and if disposed of that number
in Seattle l should be contented and
happy"
"If they should all prove to be good?"
was hazarded.
There is If. They would be Smathe-
matically perfect, and the tone would
speak for itself, straight to the heart OF
those who know music."-Seattle Post
Intelligencer.