"Vieuxtemps" Guarneri del Gesù Sings Again

Charles T. Downey, Anne Akiko Meyers takes Vieuxtemps violin to National Museum of Women in the Arts (Washington Post, March 29)

Air: The Bach Album, A. A. Meyers, English Chamber Orchestra, S. Mercurio (Bach's double violin concerto, with Meyers on both parts, playing her 1697 "ex-Molitor" and 1730 "Royal Spanish" Stradivari violins)

One of the most sought-after figures in classical music was heard in a concert at the National Museum of Women in the Arts on Wednesday night. The 1741 Vieuxtemps Guarneri del Gesu, a fabled violin valued at $18 million when it was up for sale in 2010, has staged a comeback, offering a demure program of mostly light music that showed off its mellifluous tone. After changing hands this year for an undisclosed sum paid by an anonymous benefactor, the instrument brought along its current player, American violinist Anne Akiko Meyers — who owns two other expensive Stradivarius violins — for the ride.

The Vieuxtemps has a striking sweetness of sound, capable of subtle beginnings and endings, heard in the simple and repetitive “Spiegel im Spiegel” by Arvo Part. Meyers drew out the instrument’s vocal side in Mozart’s K. 377 Violin Sonata, especially the winsome theme and variations, even while leaving out the repeats. [Continue reading]

Anne Akiko Meyers (violin) and Wendy Chen (piano)
1741 "Vieuxtemps" Guarneri del Gesù
Music by Mozart, Pärt, Ravel, Piazzolla, Falla
National Museum of Women in the Arts