CONTRA BASS BOW; COLLABORATION BETWEEN LAPIERRE AND PETRACCHI

“Every bow is an unfinished work, which only reaches its fulfilment in the hands of its performer”.  This statement has never been so true as in the case of the legendary Lapierre of Mº Franco Petracchi.

Contra bass bow Marcel Charles Lapierre 1956

The opening sentence is mine, and is among other things what fascinates me about this work, as well as being the reason why I prefer the production of the bows to pure commercial.

Many of my violin maker colleagues don't understand why I do not take advantage of my knowledge of the history of bow making when commercialising and selling bows.

I have mainly two reasons to this. First of all, I do not like to sell ugly bow. If you decide to sell bows it is unlikely you will sell bows made only by Tourte, Persoit and a few other illuminated craftsmen, because there isn't that many around any longer. You are therefore forced to turn to the production of low quality bows made in the end of the 19th century, and the beginning of the 20th century – I frankly find them uninteresting.

You will find the second reason within the opening sentence.

When you have an antique bow of any kind of beauty in your hands it is a completed and definitive product which has reached its maturation. The bow sure undergo continuous modifications during time because it is a living object in constant change, but as any other living object it can only be born ones.

You could think that the bow is completed – that is born – when the craftsman has finished his work. When a bow or a violin is born it doesn't know why and what it was made for; it only knows the hands it was made by. It is the musician that finish the work; making it understand why it was born.

It is so beautiful to see a material that inanimate, note after note it comes to life and literally lights up. Although Master Petracchi has used something more to shape the bow.

In the article I dedicated to Marcel Lapierre , you might recall that I was not enthusiastic about his work. He was a craftsman of second level with media manual skills and exactly for these characteristics he was suitable in the production of contra bass bows.

Despite the roughness in the cut of the stick – maybe caused by the rapidity of the execution – Lapierre had one skill that distinguished him from the mass of workers of Mirecourt; he was able to recognise excellent wood.

It is my experience that Mº Petracchi has the same sensibility as Lapierre had, when dealing with wood, to the point of making this bow a companion in life.

In fifty years of use this bow has had a reparation done in the last third of the stick, it has had an enormous filling done of the tail and two frogs have been destroyed. The bow still has a speed of sound by 5650 m/s, which means that when it was made the speed was above 6000 m/s – quite incredible.

This must have been the reason why Mº Petracchi, bought the bow. He just hadn't calculated the roughness of Lapierre, which would have been tolerable with a more tame wood, but with this wild beast he needed a craftsman like my colleague to make useable again.

Besides the fact that the bow hasn't been cut well, furthermore the mechanic chosen to the bow stiffens excessively the structure. The bow head was very high and the curve quite forward, and with the power of the wood you lost every contact to the string halfway on the bow.

Probably because of terrible muscle pain Mº Petracchi, had to decide whereas to through away the bow or make it work.

He searched for a solution to improve the bow without renouncing on the power of the wood. Since the bow lost adherence towards the bow head he lowered it to make the horse hair come closer to the the string. Doing so the horse hair came to close to the curve, therefore he made the frog higher and obtained a playable bow, and a bow more similar to a German model.

As an expert in bow mechanic I admit that I would have had “almost” the same consideration, it is surprising “how” a non technician has achieved a correct solution.

There isn't much to say about the bow. The style is leaning onto the fashion at the time, which is a mix of Louis Bazin, some Emile Auguste Ouchard and quite a lot Lotte. The modification by Mº Petracchi makes it impossible to leave a complete vision of the bow head.

The curve is pulled very well even if the octagon reveals on the bow head how fast the craftsman worked; at least one bow a day if working slow.

As written, "Honor to the laborious planer".

To read more about this topic:

MARCEL CHARLES LAPIERRE AND THE MEN OF GOOD WILL   

CHARLES LOUIS AND CHARLES ALFRED; THE LAST BAZIN   

EMILE AUGUSTE OUCHARD; THE BOWMAKER OF TWO WORLDS   

FRANCOIS AND ROGER LOTTE; ANOTHER SMALL FAMILY   

So long,

Paolo