"Art Matters" produced and hosted by Quin Mathews
WRR 101.1 FM Dallas
This was interview broadcast on Sunday, November 19 and Thursday, November 23, 2000
Quin Mathews: Michael Selman grew up playing the violin in Texas, then as a professional, performed across the country and overseas, where he lived for several years. Now he is back and has brought with him the distinguished English violin dealer, John &Arthur Beare Ltd. He became one of the firm's principals and opened Beare's first US operation. The location they picked was Dallas.
Michael Selman: There have been so many inquiries and so many customers in the United States that have traditionally had to travel to England to take advantage of what we offer, so we looked throughout the United States for a location that we thought might be suitable. And in the end, we felt that Dallas provided the best opportunity that we could find anywhere, and there were several reasons for that. Obviously location, it's very central to the rest of the United States, and Asia's accessible. We didn't want to be on either coast because we thought we might be somewhat isolated, and the East Coast is more or less halfway between London and Dallas, so we wanted to spread our wings a little farther from London. And we saw a great opportunity in Dallas because it's such a rapidly growing city and its culture is thriving and growing and just really in its infancy, I believe. Our business has changed dramatically, as I'm sure many businesses have changed in the last twenty, thirty years. The traditional violin shop consisted of a building that housed instruments, and restorers, an expert…usually an expert in the field, and traditionally the customer traveled to that location. And so there are many more regional businesses, very few international businesses because travel was restricted, and I'd say, oh, about thirty years ago, with the possibility to send instruments via air express, or UPS, or Federal Express, that became a new factor in how we do business, and a new way of carrying out our business, and now with the possibility of traveling just about anywhere in the country or the world by airplane, very quickly and very efficiently, now much more, our business is to go to the customer. So, I feel like any violin business that's going to exist in a major way must be international in nature, and must be prepared for a lot of travel, and taking instruments around the world to be shown.
Mr. Mathews: Who can afford to buy these instruments now? And I know that there are, shall I say, patrons who are purchasing instruments and then putting them in the hands of artists.
Mr. Selman: Yes, that's true. There are foundations, learning institutions have purchased with the idea that they students who can no longer afford instruments, that are very qualified and in need of a fine instrument, so they purchased. I think the future will bring more of a difference between what we might call museum-type instruments, instruments in unusually fine condition, and other instruments that will become more tools of the trade, to be used on a daily basis, and so collectors and foundations are gradually buying up the finest instruments, museums, you know, collections. And those instruments, many of them will possibly never be on the market again, at least within our lifetime.
Mr. Mathews: Inside the dealership off Turtle Creek in Dallas is a shop, neat as a fiddle, where luthiers repair, or even in some cases make violins. One of these craftsmen is Georg Eittinger.
Georg Eittinger: Well, I am trained as a violin maker, but we are specialized now in restoration of violins, violas, and cellos. We do also new-making, but we are specialized here in restoration of antique instruments, of old instruments.
Mr. Mathews: Which do you enjoy more, making a violin or repairing one?
Georg Eittinger: Both parts of the job are very challenging, and you can actually enhance your new-making by getting the experience of doing restorations because you learn a lot from the old instruments and from the old makers. You learn a lot of the construction of old instruments, which you can then put into the work of making new instruments, and this is very valuable. So, from time to time I really love and like to do new-making because I want to put the things I have learned over the last few restorations into my new new-making, and this is very, very valuable, really.
Mr. Mathews: Do you play the violin?
Georg Eittinger: I do, yeah, I do.
Mr. Mathews: Can you tell just by handling a violin, what it may sound like?
Georg Eittinger: Yes, you can, you can to a certain extent. I mean, if an instrument has the right patterns, the right thicknesses, the right material, you can pretty much tell even without playing the instrument, if this is going to be a good-sounding instrument or a not-so-well-sounding instrument. It's possible, yes.
Mr. Mathews: Aren't the violins by Stradivari, are they the peak?
Mr. Selman: They really are. The lifetime of Stradivari and his workshop and his sons who were helping him, a good part of his time making violins, really represent the deepest, I'd say collection, or deepest work, body of work that we have in our field, and what it illustrates and shows us is a continual striving for quality and never sitting still with what one is doing, I mean, he changed his model, he changed his pattern.
Mr. Mathews: Well, I know people keep looking for the secret of Stradivari. Is there a secret?
Mr. Selman: I don't believe there is a secret. And I think that's why we can't find the (laughs) secret because I have to believe that Stradivari was a genius of some sort, and, you know, today we can copy what Stradivari did with an instrument, absolute proportion, absolute thicknessing, everything's correct, but the wood and the fiber of the wood would not be the same. And my feeling is that along the road of making a violin, Stradivari must have made turns in the road to get to the end result. Although I'm sure he had a very clear image and picture, as we know that other artists such as Michelangelo had before they began a work of art, I'm sure there must have been small changes that took place as he got to know the material working with it and the piece of wood that he chose for a particular instrument. Although the concept was very strong in his mind, I'm sure, he probably had to modify some things to get the end result. And so we can't look at varnish, or how the wood was treated before it was made, or the age of the wood. There are just too many factors, I think, to figure anything out. The other important item, I think, is that these were families of makers, from a very early age, for example Guarneri del Gésu, had begun to make instruments, to work in a workshop, to see violins being made, although even at an early age he may not have been participating, I'm sure he was observing and learning to a certain extent, and by the time they were teenagers they were more or less constructing violins. And so, it's a little bit like learning an instrument. We were talking about learning the violin or the piano, starting at age eighteen or twenty, or age six or seven. There's a big difference usually, and I think that's a very important factor.
Mr. Mathews: Do people bring violins to you and say, "Tell me what this is, is this a Stradivari violin?" or "Can you tell me what this is?"
Mr. Selman: Yes, on a weekly basis, we get several calls. Usually I can handle them over the phone, because with a great work of art there is generally a history to it, generally people know it's been under a bed, nobody really knows about it. It's usually a Stradivari. (Laughs). So, I'm more interested if someone calls and the label is from another maker, other than Stradivari, because so often those labels were used, not really to copy or to forge Stradivari, but, you know, if you say, "Oh, this is a Stradivari model," it would probably be pretty good if you're using that label, so it was kind of the designer label of choice throughout our history.
Mr. Mathews: So there are basically no lost Stradivaris out there.
Mr. Selman: I would say, oh, I'm sure there are still a few that are lost or misplaced, or that people have owned, but they're happy with them at home and nobody really knows, and at some point, they will present them for sale or to be put into the hands of another artist, but I would say it's very, very rare, and we're talking about Dallas, Texas, you know, the Metroplex area. If I'm getting five or six inquiries a week, you know, just in this one area, you can imagine how many there must be worldwide every week. (Laughs).
Mr. Mathews: You must have made hundreds of thousands, (laughs) or perhaps they're not Stradivaris.
Mr. Selman: Right! (Laughs).
Mr. Mathews: Michael Selman, thank you very much.
Mr. Selman: Thank you, it was a pleasure.
