Posted on 02/14/2004 6:45:06 AM PST by em2vn
BEAUTY LOST, BEAUTY FOUND: Violin maker nears end of `impossible' Stradivarian quest By BOOYEON LEE:Special to The Asahi Shimbun --------------------------------------------------------------------------------
A young man was soothed by the sound of violins drifting on the night air. He went on to become one of the world's greatest craftsmen.
To look at Jin Chang Heryern as the soft afternoon light streamed into his Tokyo workshop, one could easily picture Antonio Stradivari bent over his workbench in Cremona, Italy. Jin wiped a speck of dust from his newest creation, much as Stradivari must have done many times before he died in 1737, taking, some say, the secret of the acoustically perfect violin with him.
Not so, says the 74-year-old violin maker in Chofu. After 45 years of mastering the art, he says he's found the secret.
That would be an audacious claim if not for his client list and the many medals that show how the self-taught master quietly rose to the top of his profession from his modest workshop.
After winning gold medals in five of six categories in 1976 at the Violin Society of America's international competition in Philadelphia, Jin was named Hors Concours Master Maker-an honor given to violin makers who have captured more than three gold medals in the competition.
Only five people in the world hold this title, and Jin, also known as Chin Shou Gen in Japan, is the only one in Asia.
His lifelong struggle to revive the sound of original Stradivarius violins is so compelling that his biography, ``Kaikyo o Wataru Baiolin'' (Violins that cross the ocean), published in 2002 by Kawadeshobo Shinsha, has been adapted into a comic strip, a CD and a television drama. The book has been published in South Korea and Taiwan.
In 1943, Jin, 14, came to Japan from what is now South Korea with his older brother. He chose not to go home with him at the end of Japan's occupation of the Korean peninsula, but stayed behind, working construction sites by day and studying English literature by night at Meiji University in Tokyo.
Returning to his cramped flat at the end of the day, his only solace was the occasional sound of violin playing drifting through the neighborhood.
``When you're lonely, the sound of a violin is like medicine for your soul,'' Jin said.
Moved by the sounds he heard, he took up the instrument when he was 20. At first he dreamed of a professional career, but his hands, calloused and bruised by hard labor, would not allow it.
A few years later, Jin found his calling after hearing a professor at the University of Tokyo, Hideo Itokawa, declare the craft of violin-making dead.
It is no small irony that while beauty escaped him-Itokawa later failed at violin-making-he was the lead designer of the Hayabusa fighter plane that saw action in World War II.
Itokawa was also a pioneer in Japanese rocket science and at a seminar at Meiji University he said that while man could build a rocket to go to the moon, reproducing the acoustic perfection of a Stradivarius was impossible.
``The word `impossible' piqued my interest,'' Jin said with a grin. ``I'm a very curious man.''
Disillusioned with a job market unforgiving of his Korean nationality, he had given up finding work related to his college degree.
``I figured I could take a shot at it, since I had nothing better to do with my time.''
After a few years as an apprentice in Nagano, he had made 50 violins but hadn't sold any. At last, a well-known violin instructor in Tokyo, impressed by the sound, if not the appearance, offered to buy one.
``He asked me how much and I told him 3,000 yen. I was just excited that someone would buy it,'' he said. At the time, imported handcrafted violins cost about 1.5 million yen and factory produced ones sold for no less than about 5,000 yen.
The teacher, Hirotsugu Shinozaki, bought the rest of Jin's stock in Nagano and wanted more. This success served as an incentive for the now-married Jin and his wife to move to Tokyo.
Over the years, he experimented with the thickness of the front and back and learned to select the best types of wood and varnish-all of which affects the tone of the violin. Along the way, Jin took every opportunity to examine the work of master violin makers.
``Every time a world-class musician came to Tokyo, I'd line up backstage after the concert to show him my violin,'' he said.
Photographs of young Jin posing with Yehudi Menuhin and other violin virtuosos line his workshop wall. Though Jin was but one of many fans waiting outside Menuhin's dressing room, the American was delighted to talk to him.
Such meetings gave him a chance to look at violins crafted in the days of Stradivari.
Violin teacher Shinozaki recommended he enter the international competition in 1976. Jin had never been abroad nor had he studied under a master violin maker, but his triumph at the event was of historic proportions.
Forty-two years ago, in the early 1960s, one of Shinozaki's students, violinist Eiji Hirai, passed the entrance examination to Tokyo National University of Fine Arts and Music with one of Jin's 3,000-yen violins.
On Feb. 23, Hirai is scheduled to pay tribute to the violin maker with several other musicians. All will be playing Jin violins at Nikkei Hall in Tokyo's Chiyoda Ward.
Today, Jin's client list is a long one and includes Tsugio Tokunaga, one of the nation's leading violinists. Jin has come a long way from the 3,000-yen days. A new Jin costs between 1.5 million yen and 3.5 million yen-the most expensive violins made in Japan.
Unlike Stradivari, Jin's secrets will not die with him. His sons are violin artisans in their own right-his oldest apprenticed under him and is already carrying on the trade in Chofu. His other son makes bows.
Jin explained what drew him to the craft. ``My friends who made it big in business used to ask me why I would spend my entire life bent over an instrument. I would just tell them that I wanted to do something other people couldn't.''
As cameras roll and printing presses churn out stories of his life, Jin hasn't changed. He returns daily to the same wooden workbench in the same workshop. ``I find the greatest happiness in life right here,'' he says.
``I just didn't know that sticking to one thing and growing old with your dream could be so inspiring for people.''
On Feb. 23, a chamber orchestra will give a concert ``Tenjo no Gen'' with old and new Jin violins as part of the Nikkei Muse Salon concert series. The repertoire includes music from the CD, ``Tenjo no Gen, Hibiku'' (Strings of heaven, sound) by Dreamusic Co., inspired by a comic series adapted from Jin's biography.
The series ``Tenjo no Gen'' is currently running in Biggu Komikku comic magazine. A three-hour television drama about Jin is also in the works and is scheduled to air in South Korea and Japan at the same time in December.(IHT/Asahi: February 14,2004) (02/14)
I had always heard the true secret of a Stradivarius violin's incredible tone was the varnish: what he chose to use, how he applied it, how my layers, etc. Apparently, this "secret" died with him and has stumped violin makers ever since. Maybe this man has figured it out after all. Very cool.
I notice the difference humidity has on my fiddle. They're pretty touchy, must be combination of many factors.
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