The European Synchrotron, the ESRF, played host to the most famous violin in the world: ‘Il Cannone’ violin, crafted in 1743 and played by the great virtuoso Niccolò Paganini. The Municipality of Genoa and the Premio Paganini teamed up with ESRF scientists to use the world’s brightest synchrotron to carry out X-ray analysis of the iconic violin.
The conservation of ancient violins of historical and cultural high interest, such as “Il Cannone”, Niccolò Paganini’s favourite violin, which ranks among the most important musical instruments in the history of Western music, requires constant monitoring of their state of health. The Municipality of Genoa in Italy and the Premio Paganini have developed a programme with the ESRF for an in-depth monitoring and analysis of the behaviour of the violin in different situations, in order to better preserve and understand this precious historical artefact. In this context, the Municipality of Genoa and its conservators have teamed up with ESRF scientists to define a measurement protocol and perform a unique experimental X-ray study – using non-destructive X-ray techniques – of the structural status of the wood and the bonding parts of the violin. Working day and night, they used a technique called multi-resolution propagation phase-contrast X-ray microtomography at the ESRF’s new BM18 beamline to scan the violin.
‘ll Cannone’ was built in 1743 by the great Cremonese luthier Bartolomeo Giuseppe Guarneri, also known as ‘del Gesù’. Paganini enjoyed an almost symbiotic relationship with what he called “my cannon violin” for its acoustic prowess. The ‘Cannone’ became an exceptional partner for the virtuosities of the musician, who developed new violin techniques by exploiting the instrument’s potential to the full. Niccolò Paganini left the ‘Cannone’ to his hometown, Genoa, “so that it may be perpetually preserved.” The violin has been kept in Palazzo Tursi, the seat of the Municipality of Genoa since 1851. The ‘Cannone’ is rarely played. Some famous violinists have performed with the ‘Cannone’ in concerts in Italy and abroad; however, playing the precious instrument remains a privilege reserved for the winner of Genoa’s biennial Premio Paganini International Violin Competition.
The technique applied at the ESRF has been widely used for palaeontology over the last two decades. This technique has reached a new level of sensitivity and resolution thanks to the ESRF’s new Extremely Brilliant Source, which, since its commissioning in August 2020, provides experimental performances at least 100 times better than before. Combined with the unique capabilities of the new BM18 beamline, it offers the unprecedented capability to reconstruct a 3D X-ray image of the complete violin at the wood cellular structure level, with the possibility to zoom in locally anywhere in the violin, down to the micrometric scale. As a result, the experiments carried out at the ESRF provide a full 3D vision of the conservation status of the violin, but also a super-precise representation of the details of the bold structure of “Il Cannone”, which possesses a uniquely powerful voice, and also full mapping of the previous interventions and reparations done in the past by lute makers.
Read more on ESRF website
Image: Close-up view of Paganini’s “Il Cannone” on the experimental station BM18 at the ESRF.
Credit: ESRF/P. Jayet