Giuseppe Guarneri ‘del Gesù’ (1698-1744) - Violin Ferni (1732)

A remarkable player ... a remarkable violin
Silicon Valley Symphony is proud to announce that by special arrangement with Peter Prier violins of Salt Lake City and Robert Maltz Violins of Palo Alto, our soloist Stephen Waarts will be playing on one of the finest and most prized violins in the world, a Guarneri del Gesu. For these concerts, we will have a unique opportunity to hear this rarely played and fantastic instrument - the 1732 “Ferni” Guarneri - in the hands of a superb young player.

The mystery and mystique of Guarneri del Gesu (1698-1744)

Antonio Stradivari and Joseph Guarneri "del Gesù" are considered the two greatest violin makers of history. They worked within a stone's throw of one another in Cremona, Italy though Stradivari’s career was waning just as del Gesù’s was getting started. Between them they produced what today are regarded as the finest violins in the world with prices in auctions now regularly reaching many millions of dollars. del Gesù had a short life so his violins are much rarer than Stradivari's yet despite the famous reputation of the Strad, many of the world's greatest violinists from Heifetz to Perlman have expressed a preference for Guarneri violins.

Very little is known about del Gesù's life. In particular, there is an eightyear hiatus in which his whereabouts are unknown. Because of that, many wild stories circulated about him, such as that he went to prison, turned into an alcoholic or became mentally disturbed. There is actually no real evidence for any of these. His later violins are sometimes eccentric by Cremona standards which may indicate ill health, but architecturally and tonally they are superb. The name "del Gesù" derives from the acronym IHS (Iesu hominem salvator) and the cross on his labels, which was the logo of the Jesuit order, under whose patronage he worked.

The early history of the 1732 Guarneri del Gesù is unrecorded but the violin turned up during the 1830s in the collection of a certain Count Cessole. Cessole was an intimate friend of Paganini who is known to have often performed on this violin. Cessole gave or sold the violin to a collector named Ferni who in turn passed it along with another del Gesù to his two daughters, Carolina and Virginia, who toured Europe to great acclaim as a violinduet team. Virginia died early, but Carolina continued playing the 1732 del Gesù as a soloist and later had a simultaneous career as a famous opera singer. In 1874 she sold the violin to the French maker Eugene Gand, and from him it has passed from collector to collector, largely protected from the rigors of concert use. As a result this violin is one of the best-preserved Guarneris in existence as exemplified by the beautiful ruby-red Cremona varnish that remains largely intact.

Violin Notes by Robert Maltz

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