Here is the video from the famous BBC serie “How it’s made” , recorded in April 2012 in Caldogno (Vicenza, Italy) at the Aquila strings factory.
We tried to prepare everything to show them the whole process, but they didn’t want to film the smelly initial part.
I’m the one who plays and who scrapes the guts with the copper thimble.
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baroque music, double-bass strings, early music, gut strings, gut strings history, gut strings maintenance, gut strings manufacture, viol strings, viola da gamba strings, viola strings, violin strings, violoncello strings
Scarnatura: the first thing to do at the factory In this videos, originally Facebook Live, I went to the butcher to buy some lamb row intestines to show you the first part of the cleaning. This should never be done in a river directly, because the clod water will result in a stiffer gut. Normally
Read MoreDrying, polishing, packaging The strings dried and still on the frames were polished by hand, using horse hair, or equisetum, polish stone or powder, or, later, sandpaper. About horse hairs: equisetum is also called horse tail, so for a long time wi thought that when they say we polished with horse tail, they were referring to
Read MoreEverything it’s said in this great video is valid also for gut wound strings. Really clearly explained. We had round or ground wound (hand polished) until…. 1910 when Thomastick patented a machine to wound with flat wire.
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