In a small workshop on the ninth floor of an apartment building in southern Taipei, 49-year-old Chiao Chung-hsing has already been carving a piece of spruce for two hours. The work will go on for another couple of days before the spruce is shaped to the desired curve and thickness for a violin soundboard and glued to the instrument's other parts, which are made mostly of maple. "Italian spruce from the Alps is best for the soundboard and maple from Yugoslavia for other parts," Chiao says. "The temperature, rainfall, drying process and all the small details make a lot of difference."
Chiao has been making violins for two decades. His entering the trade, however, was totally unplanned. He sang in the choir at his church when he was growing up and, after deciding that he wanted to become a vocal artist, entered National Taiwan Institute of Arts (now National Taiwan University of Arts) and majored in vocal performance. He did well and, with his fine baritone voice, was encouraged to continue developing his vocal technique abroad after graduation. "Vocal artists--especially male ones--have never been seen as real artists in Taiwan and demand for them has been low, with few job opportunities," he says. "But since I was so passionate about it and thought that continuing my education in Italy could at least help me secure a college teaching job when I returned to Taiwan, I decided to give it a try." After four years of working as a sales representative for an air cargo company, he managed to save enough money to buy one-way air tickets for himself and his wife and headed for Milan in 1986.
Living in Milan
He did not find entrance examinations to art schools difficult in Italy and tuition was minimal, but the high cost of living in Milan was another matter. The US$1,500 the couple had taken with them was only enough to rent an apartment and purchase a few necessities. For someone who lacked financial support from his family and spoke little Italian, becoming a waiter in a Chinese restaurant was the best solution Chiao could find for generating some income. "The money was barely enough and I sometimes had to rely on taking leftovers home for us to have enough to eat," he recalls. "But that kind of material difficulty wasn't a big deal for a young man who was full of passion and trying to realize his dream."
The tough times grew more difficult when Chiao's wife became pregnant. Desperate to start making more money, Chiao began growing bean sprouts for Chinese restaurants in his rented apartment. However, because he lacked experience with growing crops and with the physical demands that accompany the work, he soon injured his back. The injury was so severe that he could not even stand for very long, let alone long enough to sing on stage. To make matters even worse, doctors told Chiao that his chances for a total recovery were slim.
"My mother, who couldn't write, sent me a tape recording," Chiao says. "She was crying and saying she wanted me to go home since I could no longer sing. But the bottom line was that I could either go home as a loser, or I could stick around and see if there was anything else I could do."
Chiao thought of Antonio Stradivari's International Violin Making School in Cremona, northern Italy, where he had paid a visit to a Taiwanese student at the school when he first arrived in the country. Chiao had been fascinated by the craft, but since he had come to Italy to study vocal music, he had never seriously considered trying to learn it. But after his back injury derailed his plans for a career as a vocalist, Chiao decided to give violin making a try. "It was related to music, and it looked interesting," he says.
His lack of training in woodcarving, carpentry or any other craft was not a hindrance to getting admitted to the four-year violin making program at the Stradivari school, as it was designed to turn the "illiterates" into craftsmen. The difficult part, however, was that after completing the coursework, graduates were required to take a national examination to earn a certificate as a qualified luthier, or stringed instrument craftsman. After familiarizing himself with the tools, it took Chiao only a few months to complete his first violin. He sent it to a local violin-making competition where his instrument was eliminated in the first round.
Visiting the Masters
Instead of becoming discouraged, however, Chiao took his failure as an indication that he needed to work even harder. In addition to his coursework, he began spending time visiting the workshops of master craftsmen, hoping to learn their secrets. During his second year in Cremona, Chiao was offered the opportunity to visit the workshop of master craftsman Francisco Bissolotti. "You don't know how the craft can be perfected until you walk into his workshop," Chiao says of the thrill he still remembers experiencing when he visited Bissolotti.
After learning the purpose of Chiao's visit, the master craftsman asked to see an example of the young man's work. "Basically, he told me that it's a long trip from Taiwan to Italy, and it was a trip too long for the kind of violin I was making," Chiao says. "But he was kind enough--or probably diplomatic enough--to ask me to bring over anything else I made so that he could offer some feedback."
After leaving Bissolotti, Chiao immediately went back to his apartment and attempted to employ some of the techniques he had just seen in the master's workshop. He brought the resulting violin to Bissolotti the very next day. Chiao's craftsmanship at the time probably did not impress the master, but the young man's enthusiasm certainly did. In the following years, Chiao's enthusiasm led him to visit the workshops of other master craftsmen such as Giorgio Ce and Giobatta Morassi, and he progressed rapidly.
Chiao explains that the sound of a violin depends on its shape, the wood it is made from, the thickness of its profile at both the top and the back, and the varnish which coats its outside surface. A minor imperfection in any of these areas or a flaw in craftsmanship can ruin the whole thing. "The deeper I got into the craft, the more fascinated I was," Chiao says. "There's just more to making violins than one can learn in a lifetime."
It takes six months--one to craft the instrument and five to wait for the glue and paint to dry--to complete a violin. (Photo by Huang Chung-hsin)
International Honors
Hard work finally paid off in 1991, when Chiao took 16th place out of 200 competitors in the Antonio Stradivari International Violin Making Competition in Cremona. Named after the renowned violin craftsman, it is the most important international contest in the craft. To date, Chiao is still the only Taiwanese maker to have won an award in the competition.
In 1992, Chiao completed his coursework at the violin making school with the highest score in his class, and he then passed Italy's national examination to become a certified master craftsman. He sent one of his violins to the United States for another important international competition held by the Violin Society of America and won a silver medal in the violin tone category. No gold medal was awarded in the category that year.
The silver medal from the Violin Society of America is also the highest award a Taiwanese maker has received in an international competition. The award-winning violin is now used by Chiao's eldest daughter, who majors in violin at National Taiwan University of Arts.
Chiao explains that the only way of describing the sound of a tone or of a voice is through the use of adjectives--powerful, elegant, rich and so on--and it is a very subjective issue, since the interpretation of an adjective's meaning differs from person to person. "Makers express their interpretations of the adjectives in their violins, and the different interpretations make each maker--and each violin--unique," he says.
Winning important awards is usually accompanied by business opportunities in the international violin makers' community. After winning the silver medal, Chiao was offered an opportunity to work for a centuries-old American company, but he declined and returned to Taiwan to help care for his mother.
Market Oddities
Winning important awards, unfortunately, did not translate into more business at home. "Taiwan probably has the highest density of students learning to play the violin in the world, but none of them use violins made by local craftsmen," Chiao says. "Beginners use cheap Chinese ones, which start at NT$3,000 (US$100), and university violin majors buy handmade Italian ones, which cost at least NT$400,000 (US$13,333)," he says. "But there isn't a market in between."
According to Chiao, five Taiwanese have completed the courses at the Stradivari school in Cremona, but he is the only one still in the trade. The others are either repairing violins, which is quite profitable, or selling violins, which is even more profitable.
When he first returned to Taiwan, Chiao thought of going into the business of importing violins since the demand for locally made, handcrafted violins was so low. He knew violins, had a good source for them and there was an established market, so it would have been easy money. The only problem was it would have reminded him of the days he had worked as a sales representative. "Selling violins or air cargo services were the same thing," he says. "Oftentimes, you need to exaggerate things or even stretch the truth to close a deal. And I really dislike the feeling that everything goes back to zero once a business deal is closed."
With a dearth of satisfactory opportunities at home, Chiao worked briefly for a Taiwanese-invested violin factory in mainland China. "It was basically a group of farmers who had been recruited to assemble violin parts made of average-quality wood," he says. "I couldn't manage the workers and couldn't do anything about the quality of the products, so there was no reason to stay."
Growing Reputation
Chiao returned to Taiwan and made a living by repairing violins, gradually establishing a reputation and connections in the local market. Positive comments by internationally renowned violinist Lin Cho-liang, after he tried one of Chiao's violins, also helped business. Violin making, however, is very time consuming, which limits business opportunities. It takes six months--one month to craft the instrument and five months of waiting for the glue and paint to dry--to complete one. Working seven hours a day, Chiao now delivers six to seven violins a year. The waiting list for one of his instruments currently extends to two years for new orders.
In addition to repairing old violins and making new ones, Chiao also teaches the craft--a "market" he accidentally developed. This sideline started about a decade ago when a father sent violins used by his daughters to Chiao for maintenance. The father asked Chiao why the handmade Italian violins were so expensive and wanted to learn everything about violin making. Today, "tuition" to study under Chiao is NT$280,000 (US$9,333)--the same as the price of one of his violins. After completing his own violin under Chiao's instruction, the father thought it was as good or better than the expensive Italian ones. "People just assume that any violin not made in Italy is substandard," Chiao says. The father later dropped his career as an electrical engineer and set up his own violin-making business. "The more that people know about the craft, the more they can appreciate good violins and reduce some of the 'myths' surrounding Italian violins," he says. "Maybe someday an internationally renowned violinist from Taiwan will be playing a violin made in Taiwan for an international audience."
Most of the other students that study under Chiao are hobbyist makers from different walks of life. There is no time limit for the coursework, so students can take as long as they want to complete their violins. Most of the time, Chiao is the only person in the workshop, chiseling, sanding or painting a piece of wood. "It's work and it gets lonely," he says with a joyful baritone voice, "and I happen to enjoy it."
Write to Jim Hwang at jim@mail.gio.gov.tw