Il cannone

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The cannone in Palazzo Doria Tursi, Genoa

Il Cannone or short Cannone is the name of a violin , the 1743 by Giuseppe Guarneri (Guarneri del Gesu) in Cremona was built and a favorite instrument of the violin virtuoso Niccolo Paganini became famous. Paganini called it il mio cannone violino ("my cannon violin ") because of its powerful and rich sound . Today it is owned by the city of Genoa and is a national treasure.

Provenance

Paganini was given the cannon ; it is not entirely clear by whom and under what circumstances. Two possibilities arise from a quotation handed down by Julius Max Schottky . Paganini had reported to him:

“One of my excursions, which was not an art trip but only a pleasure trip, once took me back to Livorno, where I was required to attend a concert. The art-loving rich merchant, Herr Livron, lent me a guarneri, since I had no violin with me; after the game, however, he refused to take it back [...] I had a similar experience at Parma: Mr. Pasini, an excellent painter, heard of my ability to play everything a vista; He presented me with a very difficult concerto with the remark that if I solved the problem sufficiently, I would be given a valued violin as a present: the violin would become my property. "

The experts of the auction house Tarisio state that the French merchant Livron, first mentioned in this report, was the previous owner and date the change of ownership to 1799. Other sources indicate that the handover to Paganini probably took place in 1802. Without reliable evidence, the Napoleonic general Domenico Pino is also named as the giver in the literature .

Paganini had the violin reworked by violin maker Carl Nicolaus Sawicki in Vienna in 1828 . It received a tailpiece similar to a viola and a new fingerboard , which was slightly shorter and had a more pronounced curve. Especially after the renovation in Vienna, the cannone with its large, round tone was the ideal instrument to make up for Paganini's thin strings, which made the tone slender. The Cannone was an ideal partner for Paganini.

In 1833 the violin suffered damage in London, the repair of which the violin maker Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume did not complete until 1838. Vuillaume also made a copy that Paganini's pupil Camillo Sivori later acquired from his teacher and which is now called Sivori .

Paganini, who came from Genoa, died in 1840. In his will from 1837 he bequeathed this special violin to his hometown and added: “so that it may be preserved forever” (Italian: “onde sia perpetuamente conservato”). In fact, all essential parts of the instrument have been preserved to this day. This fact as well as the close connection with Paganini and the extraordinary sound contribute to the uniqueness of the instrument.

Storage, restoration and use

Since 1851 the cannone has been together with other Paganini memorabilia in the Palazzo Doria Tursi , the seat of the Genoese city administration. Vuillaume's copy, the Sivori , is also located there today . For about a hundred years the cannone was rarely played.

In 1937 the Cremonese violin maker Cesare Candi was commissioned to restore the Cannone . Restoration work in the 1960s aimed to adapt the instrument to the requirements of modern violin playing. In a further restoration in 2004, the cannone was largely restored to the state it was in during Paganini's lifetime by inserting copies of the parts Paganini used (fingerboard, pegs, bridge and tailpiece) and pulling gut strings. A conference was held on this restoration as part of the 2004 Paganiniana Festival .

Today, the Italian violinist Mario Trabucco , who has been the curator of Cannone since 1972 , and the violin maker Bruce Carlson, who has been responsible for its preservation since 2000 , are primarily concerned with preserving the violin . Mario Trabucco regularly plays on the Cannone .

Since the establishment of the international violin competition “ Premio Paganini ” in 1954, the winners of the competition have had the privilege of performing with the Cannone at a concert in Genoa. In addition, excellent violinists have given concerts with the Cannone in Italy and abroad or have been able to use it for recordings, including such famous artists as Bronisław Huberman , Isaac Stern , Leonid Kogan and Shlomo Mintz or, more recently, Vadim Repin and Joshua Bell and Julia Fischer . From the late 1970s to the early 2000s, the cannone was played relatively frequently. Since the last restoration in 2004, the focus has been on protecting the instrument as much as possible in order to keep it permanently in its excellent condition, as Paganini had wished for.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b Bartolomeo Giuseppe Guarneri 'del Gesù', Cremona, 1743, the 'Il Cannone, Paganini' tarisio.com
  2. ↑ a b c d Il "Guarneri del Gesù": Storia e Tradizioni premiopaganini.it (Italian)
  3. ^ Julius Max Schottky, Vaduz / Liechtenstein 1990, p. 257
  4. ↑ a b c d Violini a Genova Brochure in four languages ​​by the City of Genoa on the Cannone and the Sivori , 2003 (PDF)
  5. ^ A b Edward Neill, Munich, Leipzig 1990, p. 353 ff.
  6. ↑ Carl Guhr: About Paganini's art to play the violin. Mainz 1829
  7. ↑ The historical violins: The "Vuillaume" premiopaganini.it (archive page)
  8. ↑ a b c Alberto Giordano: The Paganini 'Cannon' violin tarisio.com, March 10, 2015.
  9. ↑ a b The Restoration of the 'Cannone' premiopaganini.it
  10. ↑ See the documentation of the conference contributions: Atti del Convegno Internazionale di Liuteria: Recupero e conservazione del violino Guarneri 'del Gesù' (1743) detto 'Cannone' Comune di Genova, April 2006, 121 pages, Italian / English (PDF).
  11. ^ Violini a Genova Brochure in four languages ​​from the City of Genoa, 2003 (PDF), see the double page with the list of artists.
  12. ↑ Comments from selected artists on their impressions of the Cannone premiopaganini.it (English)

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