Leandro Bisiach - Quotes

Quotes

"The baron Andrea Paganini, grandson of the famous Niccolo, wrote a letter of thanks to Bisiach in 1839 for the repair in admirable style of his Stradivarius. Other clients included Sarasate, Joachim, and violincellist Alfredo Piatti, who trusted his violoncello (a Stradivarius, from which Bisiach made a reproduction) to no-one else. This patriarch of violin making must have had a rather striking personality, if his own maestro, Riccardo Antoniazzi, to say nothing of Antoniazzi's father Gaetano and brother Romeo, joined the company that Bisiach had created in his own name." - Pardo Fornaciari, Arte Liuteri

"Leandro Bisiach began in his native town of Casale Monferrato, in 1886, and immediately transferred himself to Milan where, as student of Riccardo Antoniazzi, thanks to Antoniazzi's maestro Enrico Ceruti (1803-1883) and of his teacher, Claudio Storioni, he could claim more than just an imaginary affiliation with the great Cremonese school. In fact Storioni had been a student of Carlo Bergonzi, the only true custodian of the secrets of Stradivarius. We must say that Leandro Bisiach honoured his significant inheritance, which in actuality was not only symbolic. By one of those tricks of fortune that make one suspect the hand of destiny, Leandro senior had come into possession of tools and models that had belonged to the various old Cremonese masters. This seems strange enough in itself, a curious coincidence. In reality, he had much greater luck; among the documents and papers obtained by Fanny Rossi, the widow of Giacomo Stradivari (1822-1901), Bisiach found the most precious and extraordinary item imaginable, that is, the formula for the varnish of the great Antonio Stradivarius from 1704. In truth, it was not the only varnish of the eighteenth century that Bisiach could use. He had at hand another formula used first by Giovan Battista Ceruti (1755-1817) and later by two other generations of the same family. In addition, in 1929 he gained possession of a collection of documents attributed to Stradivarius, among which he found another formula that dated back to the great Cremonese." - Pardo Fornaciari, Arte Liuteria

"Leandro Bisiach did a great deal of research and found some old recipes. The varnish on the instruments from his best period is very beautiful; of transparent and flexible quality. He primarily used a light red-orange color although it varied greatly from one instrument to another. He had a special talent for creating "antiqued" varnishes for the numerous "copies" he made. To give it the old look he very often shaded off the varnish only at the base of the back plate. He used a large number of diverse models but principally those of Stradivari, Amatise and other models of Guarneri, Balestrieri, Guadagnini, Gagliano, Ceruti or other violin makers from Veneto (Venice) in the 18th century. He also utilized many others as chance would have it." - Eric Blot

"Leandro was one of the most influential violin makers and dealers of the late 19th and early 20th centuries. He won important recognition and prizes in International exhibitions in London (1895), Atlanta (1895-96), Turin (1898), Paris (1900), Milan (1906), and Brussels (1910), and in 1905 opened and successfully ran a workshop that can be compared to the great workshops of J.B. Vuillaume and W.E. Hill and Sons." - Stefan Hersh

""One can easily say that Leandro was as influential in 20th century as J.B. Vuillaume was in the 19th century. Auction Record:Leandro Bisiach, Violin Milan 1895 Brompton's (London, England) Nov.3, 2008 $93,893 / £59,220" - Gennady Filimonov

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