Strad Finder to the Stars
The Daily Telegraph -October 1 1994
In a classic 1967 BBC film about the cellist Jacqueline du Pré, a well-groomed young man is seen advising her about her Stradivari cello. Du Pré bubbles with delight over her prized possession. Next to her, the young man, Charles Beare, is polite, patrician, and clearly knows every square inch of the instrument.
A mere footnote in that film, Beare has today become the world's top violin dealer. Big names in the business from across the globe acknowledge his pre-eminence. In New York, the great violinist Isaac Stern is a fervent admirer. "It's gratifying to see how Charles has grown in stature over the years," he says. "He is one of two or three people in the world I can turn to for three things: his knowledge, his memory-he can remember a violin like most of us remember a face-and his untouchable integrity: the latter invaluable in a field not always known for it."
Since Beare's fleeting television appearance, the best stringed instruments have risen from the genteel antique status to objets d'art that often fetch millions of dollars; in a market crowded with sharp dealers and forgers, Beare commands an extraordinary unsullied reputation.
Now, he has sealed that reputation with a book, Antonio Stradivari: The Cremona Exhibition of 1987 has just appeared under the imprint of his firm, J&A Beare Ltd., and has been snapped up by players such as Stern and lovers of violins all round the world. It is an exquisitely produced volume, describing and illustrating 44 instruments made by Stradivari and exhibited in the master's home town of Cremona, in Italy, in 1987. It is as if John Paul Getty had put together a sumptuous volume of 44 of his favorite art works and described each in intricate detail. The catch is that Beare's book costs £260.
"I admit it's not the sort of book you'll find in W H Smith," Beare says. "But there are a lot of violin fanatics around the world."
Beare, now 57, runs his firm from fusty premises in Broadwick Street, in a five-story building that used to be a pub. In the early sixties, the Rolling Stones are supposed to have rehearsed in what is now J&A Beare's showroom. It is in this room that you can see the hardware of the business: antique violins and violas hang in a cupboard like meat in a butcher's shop. In a glass case lies a Stradivari mandolin, unique and impossible to value. Upstairs are two workshops, where makers of instruments and bows, and 10 restorers-half recruited from the prestigious Newark School of Violin Making-carry out some of the most delicate and sought-after work in European stringed instrument making.
Beare has the sharpest eye in the business for an instrument's worth and provenance-"Sometimes I only know who I'm talking to by looking at their violin or case"-on top of which the quality of craftsmanship on offer has drawn almost all the world's top players.
A personal favorite of Beare's was the American virtuoso Nathan Milstein. "He used to ring up at 9:45 and ask if he could come and buy some strings. At 10:15 he'd roll in and-because he had nothing else to do that morning-he'd find a fiddle and reminisce. Then he'd pick on some poor person in the shop, and want to give them a lesson."
Beare's standing among dealers is also helped by a lack of competition. W.E. Hill, a famous firm to whom Beare admits he used to have to "play second fiddle", left London 20 years ago, and had now gone out of business. Edward Withers, an important name from the past, has been bought by Adam Whone and relocated in Windmill Street.
Stock having been built up in the Thirties, before prices soared, Beare knew that when Hill's decamped to Great Missenden in 1975, Beare's would become more convenient for visiting soloists if it stayed in central London; the firm has been in Soho since it was founded by the grandfather of Beare's stepfather in 1892.
Recently, J&A Beare has turned its full attention to making. The firm's bows are selling like hot cakes; out of London, meanwhile, Beare has built a workshop where he employs a number of highly talented restorers and makers who have worked for many years in the London shop. In London, the daily business of restoring and cleaning continues: repairing cracks, planing finger boards, touching in worn varnish on all manner of fiddles and cellos, as well as adjusting instruments for players before concerts. Out in the country, Beare is keen to offer a new kind of service.
He says: "All the instruments have to be hand-made. One person could probably produce eight instruments a years. The usual rationale is that one half-decent violin could go for £10,000; many go for more like £20,000 or £30,000. My feeling is that, if we can make an instrument sounds like £30,000 and sell it for £8-10,000, we're doing something really worthwhile."
Such conscientiousness about price is central to Beare's thinking. He has long been integral to the nurturing of home-grown musical talent by enabling great violins, whether Strads or instruments by other old masters, to fall into the hands of soloists who seek them.
One method increasingly adopted to match fine players with great but prohibitively expensive instruments is for wealthy patrons of music to buy one for a soloist's use. With Beare's help, the young violinists Tasmin Little, Mayumi Seiler, and Nigel Kennedy have benefitted from such schemes.
Cellist Yo-Yo Ma, a great friend of Beare's, was united in a similar way with his cello in 1987. In 1983, Ma had fallen in love with Jacqueline du Pré's Stradivari cello but would never be able to afford to buy it. Du Pré's playing career was already over; she had suffered since the early Seventies from multiple sclerosis, which caused her death aged 42 in 1987. The Davidoff was then sold for a rumoured £1.5 million to friends of Ma's for his use as long as he lives.
"Unfortunately," Beare says, "it would be worth far more that that now." Unfortunately? And here Beare, altruistic though he is, points to one of the profoundest anomalies of his trade.
"This is symptomatic of what dealers have done. For 25 years, these kinds of instruments kept level with house prices. Then the housing market collapsed. Violins did not. This has resulted in such an acceleration of prices that the best instruments have gone away from the people who should be playing them. Often, these are talented young musicians who are trying to start a career.
by James Woodall
