Area Tuning

Area Tuning the Violin

Originally published as Guild of American Luthiers Data Sheet #283, 1984 by Keith Hill Announcements of discoveries'' of the secrets'' of Stradivarius usually are not worth the ink used to print them. When they appear, everyone reads them with the customary curiosity. Then away they are filed along with the hundreds of other such claims. They get dredged up again when someone writes yet another book on the violin. Mindful of this possible fate, I would like to offer an explanation of a discovery that I have made. It is not of the secrets'' of Stradivarius; rather it is, I believe, the acoustical system used by the ancient Italian violin makers to construct the sound of their instruments. The system is simplicity itself. It is possible for anyone who understands it and has normal hearing to use it. Moreover, it requires no measuring equipment save the ears and possibly a monochord. Furthermore, the thicknesses and their inexplicable variants, which so annoy our modern sense of decency when we observe them in the finest violins by Stradivari and Guarneri, occur naturally as a result of this system. Because it is so simple, it is, of course, the last place one would think to look for the answer. I expect that once you are equipped with the following information, you will go to your nearest antique Italian fiddle and look to see if what I am saying is actually there. The heart of the acoustical system is this: Each discrete area of vibrating surface on the plates is tuned to an overtone in the harmonic series. In Figs. 1a and 1b you can see how I have observed the areas to be. Not every maker would have used exactly the same distribution. Camilli, for instance, creates many more than the normal areas which I have shown. But for the greater number of makers, what is indicated is what you can notice.

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What does this mean? Take as your fundamental, or first partial, the basis pitch which you have preselected and tune the largest area to it. On the top of the violin, this would be the lower bout on the treble side. On the back of the violin, it would be the lower two-thirds of the lower bout area. All other areas on the plates are tuned to these pitches respectively. The idea the ancients must have understood is: the larger the surface area on the plate you give to an overtone the more prominent that overtone will be to the ear when the violin is finally sounding. The overall pitch of the plate is indicative more of the inherent properties of the wood and is not really relevant. Figs. 2a and 2b and 3a and 3b show typical tuning schemes.

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It is important to remember that each maker would have had his or her own personal scheme or pattern of ratios. Some might have more than one. Stradivari changed his scheme twice (but with a few variants now and again), his first system being the same as that of Nicolo Amati, his teacher, and the second system being that of his Golden period (see figures 6 and 4). Other makers changed the scheme from instrument to instrument, depending on other factors such as wood quality and the modeling. I have seen only a few Guarneri violins and each has a different scheme and pitch. He clearly understood the relationship between specific wood qualities and things like modeling, pitch selection, and tuning scheme. As for the question of what pitch to select, that appears to be a matter of personal preference. The usable pitches range from C# to F#. When lower than C# the plates get too thin, and when higher than F# the plates become too thick to resonate freely. Some makers made the top plate higher in pitch than the back and others made the back plate higher than the top. There is no obvious rule, therefore it is probably hidden within the woods used. Stradivari, in the instruments which I have personally inspected, used D for the top and E for the back. Guarneri was inconsistent, for I have seen instruments by him which range from C# for the back and D for the top to F# for the back and F for the top.

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After having used this area tuning principle for almost twenty instruments, it is clear to me that some schemes work better for particular pitches while others work best with altogether different pitches. Although the subject is too complicated to discuss in detail here, there is a definite relationship between the fundamental pitch used for the tuning scheme, the scheme itself, and the modeling. While the tuning scheme and the pitch on which it is based are important, unless you strive to make the actual tuning as flawless as is humanly possible, they seem irrelevant. Choose one and make it a pure as possible. The most important aspect of the use of this area tuning principle is achieving an extremely accurate tuning. Accurate tuning ability seems to be the factor which separates the best violin makers of the period from the mediocre ones. Stradivari and Guarneri were the best tuners. Their ability to tune the wood accurately was unexcelled. This was the heart of their craft. If there is a catch to using this principle, this is it. It took me about twenty-five instruments to refine my own level of control over the tuning process. I hope that it will require far fewer for those of you who are willing to look into this principle and try it out for yourselves. Because you need not look for the principle, I expect that you can be successful in only five or six tries. I hope that I am not wrong about this. I feel confident that those who are persistent in their pursuit of control over this principle will be successful in producing violins equal to the ones made long ago by the Italian masters.

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Any success in acquiring control regarding the use of this principle can be heard. When you get the overtones right, the violin will produce a sound of greater strength of tone, more beauty of sound, better carrying power, and more flexibility. No attempt to tune means leaving everything up to chance. When the attempt has been made and is less than accurate, the result is less open, less free, and less brilliant. When no attempt has been made, the result ranges in sound from muffled to raw and harsh. The violin sound that results from tuning the plates as I have suggested is at first in need of playing-in. At once the sound is radiant, alive, and feels very healthy. What is lacking is the richness and depth that comes from being played-in. It seems that when a tuned fiddle is played-in it becomes more resonant, brilliant, flexible, easier to play than at first, and deeper sounding. What happens to the wood with playing-in is that the tuning gets clearer and more obvious. The principal effect appears to be like the effect which exercise has on the human body. A noticeable difference in the sound can be observed after only three months of playing-in. I have observed radical differences after a years worth of playing-in. What is sure is that when the instruments have had the tuning principle applied to them, they start life sounding wonderful and proceed to become better and better with age and playing-in.

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Curiously, there are many people in the violin world who reject a new good-sounding fiddle because of the preconceived notion that it will somehow deteriorate in quality. Where this may be true for instruments which have not been tuned according to the area tuning principle, it is quite the contrary for instruments which have been well tuned. After all, Stradivaris instruments were much sought after when they were new because of their gorgeous tone quality and their flexible playing properties. I feel that it will be helpful to include some specific tuning schemes which I have observed in some antique Italian instruments. You can notice the similarities and differences between them at once. As I stated previously, there is a relationship between the modeling on a violin and its specific tuning scheme. Because I can not present in this article the information regarding the modeling, I caution you not to take these schemes at face value. Think of them only as specific schemes for given instruments. That is, they are just a point of departure for thinking about the principle (Figs. 4, 5, 6, 7). Each maker possessed a different understanding of the variables involved in the execution of his craft and created a tuning scheme to compensate for acoustical inadequacies. In this way, each maker was able to make a sound which felt complete for him. The great makers who extended the acoustical range of the violin felt more compelled to use other methods to reach those same goals as did early makers or makers of less importance to us today. What I like about the area tuning principle is that it allows every maker to construct a sound which most pleases him. (I dont really believe that today violin makers everywhere will go and do this, but the spirit of the early Italian masters requires that the idea be suggested.) A maker can do this by designating the largest areas to the overtone he or she most prefers to hear in a sound. For me, there is one instrument that I have heard which feels the most complete. That instrument is the 1734 Guarneri del Jesu, known and the Gibson, owned by Ruggerio Ricci. It has been a challenge to understand that particular instrument. I hope that each one of you will find the one fiddle that challenges you. And, in the same way, I hope that you will try to understand it and aspire to make instruments of a quality equal to it. To do this you need to be able to hear the tuning scheme used by the maker.
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Testing a Violin to Notice its Tuning Scheme For the novice, getting someone who owns a great violin to let you handle their prize for ten minutes may be difficult. I appeal to those of you who are players, who own a great fiddle, to encourage your local maker to listen for the tuning on your fiddle. But for the novice, it may prove advisable to do the listening test with a player or the owner. It is actually easier to hear the overtones that are on the violin plates when someone else is doing the work. I have always found players with such instruments to be very obliging when they understand that no harm can come to their instrument from doing the test. The actual job of testing the fiddle is easy. But care must be exercised when handling something as valuable as a Stradivari or Guarneri violin. Remove rings, watches, and bracelets from your hands and wrists. The purpose of the test is to discover the tuning scheme by rapping very lightly on the plates. To do this effectively, you will need to damp off any extraneous vibrations or resonances which might complicate the act of listening. I usually begin with the top. I spread a soft cloth over my lap and lay the violin back side down in my lap. This damps off the back while I listen to the top. I grasp the neck of the fiddle to secure it and to damp off the sound that the strings might make. Using the knuckle on my right hand middle finger (this gives me the clearest sound) I rap lightly at points central to the discrete area I am testing. The most important part of the test is to establish the interval relationships between the overtones on the various areas. From this you can readily determine the pitch on which the scheme is based. I start with the area in the lower treble-side bout. Progressing to the upper bass-side bout, then to the lower bass-side bout I end up on the upper treble-side bout. This way I establish the basic framework to the tuning scheme and move on to the smaller areas once this framework is established. I find it hard to determine anything about the tuning on a plate when I knock the areas in an isolated way. I zero in on the scheme by checking the relationships between the areas. I will knock here twice, then there twice, then over here and so on. By moving around quickly from area to area you avoid listening too carefully. In the best instruments the scheme will become clear with just a few rappings. In the poorest instruments there will be nothing but out-of-tune areas and no clear relationship.
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Many of you will experience the same problems hearing the tuning that I had. Trying too hard is a big one. If you assume an almost casual attitude when listening you should be able to hear what is there. Because so much is available to the ear for hearing, it is possible to hear almost anything you want in the rap sound of a great fiddle. So you must want nothing. Another problem is autosuggestion. This is what occurs when you tell yourself that you are hearing the third or the fifth when what you are actually hearing is the octave. There can be an effective counter to this. Make a suggestion that what is present is a non harmonic pitch. That is, an overtone'' not in the harmonic series, like a minor third or a fourth. When you find that the sound cannot be interpreted as what you are counter suggesting then you can be more sure that what you are hearing is so. You know that the overtone for that area is the one, when you cannot make it disappear or reorient itself. What I do is to think the pitch first. By anticipating the pitch and comparing the rap sound with it, you can tell quickly what the pitch is. My guess or pitch anticipation is sometimes in agreement, sometimes in disagreement, either way I learn to know what the scheme is. I always double check my findings by thinking a semitone higher or lower than the pitch that I have already observed. Doing this weakens the potency of autosuggestion. Another vexing problem is not having a knuckle on your hand which is capable of producing a sound of sufficient clarity. If so, do some experimenting to get the clearest sound audible. When others are present ask them to do the honors by lending a hand and lightly rapping on the fiddle for you. When this is not possible, you can use the eraser end of a new pencil. Be careful not to drop the pencil eraser end down on the surface from too great a height. I recommend dropping it from a height above the surface of a quarter inch or so. When you have to do this, practice a few times on a table top before using it on the fiddle in order to avoid marring the varnish. Once you have thoroughly examined the tuning on the top, turn the violin over and do the test on the back. Take care to completely damp off the extraneous vibration from the top. Because hands are the most effective dampers for this, when others are present ask them to assist in damping off the top. But, take care. The varnish on the great antique violins is sensitive to warm moist touch from the hands, so protect the varnish from direct contact using a handkerchief or clean dish towel. When the top is neatly damped off check out the tuning on the back. When you have repeated this test on five to ten antique Italian violins you should, I trust, be able to confirm my findings. Because the area tuning principle is so exquisitely simple, it may prove hard for many people in the making and playing professions to accept it. As the determining principle which accounts for the extraordinary tone quality that the typical great Italian fiddle emits, it stands alone. Neither the varnish nor the wood nor the modeling nor the workmanship can by themselves make a violin built today sound like the best of the 17th- and 18th-century violins. This is already something that everyone knows. History has shown us that aging does not improve the quality of the famous 19th-century violin makers products. Likewise, it will not improve todays output unless the varnish covers wood which has been well wrought and finely tuned. I have learned that any finely-tuned scheme carries with it very important playing qualities. These playing qualities are ease and immediacy of tone production, fullness of tone, freedom of tone, a glowing brilliancy, great purity of tone, strength of tone, great carrying power, flexibility of tone, superior tonal balance, evenness between the strings, seemingly unlimited tonal reserve, richness in the bass and fullness in the treble, and more secure in-tune playing. I have also found that each tuning scheme tends to favor one or more of these playing qualities. Depending on the choice of wood, an 18th century maker would alter the scheme to fill out the spectrum of
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overtones he or she most preferred. Harder woods tend to emphasize highest overtones so a more concordant scheme (one having fewer dissonant overtones) would be used, while softer woods which dampen the higher overtones might have a more dissonant scheme, thus bringing out the overtones which the wood might leave out. The best instruments by Stradivari and Guarneri are those which marry the tuning scheme which is most favorable for enhancing all these playing qualities to the appropriate pitch, which was determined after considering the wood and peculiarities of the modeling used. A natural question to ask is, "How does the varnish fit into the picture?'' We know that varnish has the effect of changing the pitch. We know also that the harder the varnish, the stiffer and more resistant it is. Conversely, the softer the varnish is, the more pliable and flexible it is. The ideal varnish is hard, tough, flexible, and pliable. There is still no varnish that measures up. (The statement in this last sentence was true when I originally wrote this article. Now, it is no longer true. Read my article on violin varnish. That varnish measures up when properly made.) When a varnish does not measure up, it has the unpleasant effect of determining in a major way how the violin is going to sound. The role of varnish on an instrument made according to the area tuning principles is one of strict neutrality. It must encourage everything yet dampen nothing. It must contain the energy and integrate the vibration of the plates as they respond partially'' and fundamentally.'' Once I became aware that I had discovered something of substance with this area tuning principle, I felt that it was important to find from what source in nature the early Italian violin makers might have derived their inspiration. I discovered what I believe to be that source quite by accident in the shower one day. I noticed that the high pressure water as it struck my body produced distinct pitches. Wondering if there was any relationship between the pitches, I let the flow strike against my body at first in the chest, then on my throat, and so on up my face and head. I found that the various areas in my body corresponded to the changes in mass, density, plane (of surface), and materials. Each area had a different pitch. Moreover, each pitch was an overtone of the pitch of my chest. For me, this was natures confirmation of the principle. In imitating the human voice, they imitated natures mode of acoustical construction by following the principle which nature employs in creating the sound of the human voice. The timbre of every voice is the result of these overtones, and the prominence of each overtone is governed by the amount of area allowed to it in the body. (Nature being what it is, infinitely variable, voices will yield different results even when the observations suggest that two voices should be similar. So far, evidence has not been gathered to confirm or deny the hypothesis that the more area that an overtone has allotted to it in ones body, the more prominent that overtone is in the sound of ones voice. But reason dictates that this is what is happening.) While there are other acoustical principles at work in the great Italian violins, not just the area tuning principle, they do not stand to make their effect unless the tuning principle is first observed (applied). It was the knowledge of these principles which constituted the science of the art of violin making as Stradivari knew it. It was a copyists'' attitude which caused this science to be overlooked. Worshipping varnish and expert craftsmanship has created the blindness to these principles. Recognizing golden calves'' for what they are is the best hope for music in the future. It has not been my intention to give out formulas or state dogmatic rules. The area tuning principle is neither. It is a wholly different way of looking at violin making. It suggests that the violin makers in Italy viewed themselves not as mere fancy box makers but as builders of sound in a violin format, in imitation of God and His nature. It also suggests that when viewed this way, the process of making a violin of excellence is simple, straightforward, and
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really unmysterious. The truth of this can only be measured by those of you who become skilled in executing the principles and by the players who use the results capably, moving the listeners with stirring performances of music. Soli Deo Gloria

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