Kurt R.A. Giambastiani

The last time I walked into David T. Stone‘s luthier shop, I didn’t have much money. It was a quarter century ago, and I was going through tough financial times. My wife’s health prevented her from working outside the home, we were suffering through a long string of cheap but unreliable cars, and we were trying simultaneously to pay off our credit card debt and save the down payment on a house, all on a single salary. So, back then, when I brought my viola into David’s shop, I was just there for the bare minimum.

As a semi-professional musician (principal viola for the Bellevue Philharmonic and member of a couple working string quartets), the bare minimum meant two things: cat-gut and horse-hair.

Strings and bows.  

There were a lot of things I wanted for Natalia (my viola), but new strings and a rehaired bow would keep me going, keep me playing week by week, so that was all I got.

Last week, I returned to Stone’s shop with my viola and violin, and this time, it was for whatever they needed.

Stone’s shop is just a few blocks from Ravenna Park. It’s difficult to find–tucked away in a one-flight walk-up, the dark, recessed doorway isn’t visible until you’re standing right in front of it–but past the creaky door, you climb the shadowed stair, the walls papered with posters of operas and musicians, and emerge into a shop filled with warm light and the bright smells of rosin and new wood.

Presenting my charges, we opened their tired, battered cases and began the evaluation. David looked at my bows and immediately declared one of them (the violin’s) a total loss. He sent the viola to the workshop for a look-see, and spent some time with the violin.

Of the two, I figured the viola needed more work. True, the violin looked in worse shape, with its tailpiece off and its strings all loose, but the violin hadn’t seen the action that Natalia had. I had switched to viola fairly early in my education, and the viola had definitely been given the greater use, and abuse. As it turned out, a bowed instrument is much like the human body–use it or lose it–and thus it was the violin, left unused in its case for decades, that needed the most work.

The viola needed some attention, too, of course–new strings, new soundpost, new hair on the bow, a touch of glue along the joints and under the fingerboard–and we will be repairing the battle scars she received when a mic-boom fell on us during an outdoor performance at Dominican College. By far, though, most of the work will be done on the violin, which needs all of the above plus a new cord for the tailpiece, a new bridge, a new tuning peg, and a shave-down of the fingerboard.

I’ve also asked them to look for a new case for the viola. The cases I have–old, hard-shell, instrument-shaped cases that are more suitable to hiding tommy-guns than holding stringed instruments–have done good service. For fifty years, they’ve protected my girls from mistreatment by thieves and international baggage handlers alike (the latter being the worse, as the former merely tried to sell them at a flea market). Emblazoned with bumper stickers of my youthful idealism, they’ve both seen better days, but the case for Natalia is simply falling apart. The problem with Natalia is that, well, in today’s parlance, she’s what we’d call a plus-size model. Back in 1963, when Natalia was built, the trend was toward big violas to get that big viola sound. At over 17 inches long, her body is one of the largest, and she just doesn’t fit into standard voila-size cases.

But David and his staff whirled into action, and within a short span of time, I not only had detailed estimates of the work needed and a timeline for when the repair would be done, but texts had been sent around the Sound in search of a case that would fit Natalia’s ample proportions.

I’m excited about this project, and I’m excited that I can finally take care of my instruments the way I always wanted to. Simply as investments, it makes sense to keep them both in good nick, but they’re more than that. They’re like family members, in a way, sisters who have stuck by me and done their level best for me every time I’ve asked it of them. I’ve not done my best by them, and I’ve neglected them badly for years, but hopefully I shall be forgiven.

We’ll see in two weeks.

k