A talk with Stephen Cournoyer
By Scott Douglas
Stephen Cournoyer, age 30, describes himself as a violinmaker, but he also makes cellos and violas. He lives in North Gorham and has his studio at the Dana Warp Mill in Westbrook. Our conversation started at his work table, as we examined his latest finished product.
The Bollard: So this is a cello you made. How long did it take to make it?
Cournoyer: It took about two months to make from start to finish. I don’t know how many hours.
You don’t keep track of how long it takes to make something?
I don’t. I try to work as efficiently as possible. I tend to work seven days a week. In order to make a buck as a violinmaker, it’s not easy. So I’m always working on multiple instruments. Right now, I have a complete instrument, one that I’m varnishing, a couple of others that I’ve just started, and… plans and pieces of wood for the next ones. So it’s a perpetual cycle.
How did someone know to come to you to have a cello made?
I don’t run a retail operation, per se. I’m not a storefront — I don’t stock instruments. Mostly what I do with them when they’re done is I shop them around to different dealers, either in Maine or outside the state — at wholesale to dealers, who then retail them. I do have a couple of retail clients in the state, and hopefully as time goes on and people learn about me, I’ll have more. I mean, I’ve never turned someone away.
So you just thought, “There’s a need for a new cello somewhere in the world”?
Yeah, that’s it, absolutely. I like making them. I don’t make that many of them, nor do most violinmakers. The average violinmaker might make two cellos a year, and probably ten violins, and a couple of violas.
Is making the different instruments essentially the same process, just with different sizing?
Yeah, essentially it is. Everything I do is based on what we understand as the classical Cremonese system of construction, proportion and design.
What is Cremonese?
Cremona is the town that harbored all the great violinmakers from Italy in the 17th, 18th centuries. They were all stuck in this northern Italian town, the most notable being Stradivari. Everybody knows what the name means — it’s synonymous with quality. Everything I do is informed by that long tradition. Modern violinmaking is just a continuation of that tradition. It’s changed very little. You look around here, there aren’t a whole lot of machines, there’s nothing computerized. It’s almost all handwork.
How does one get started in the business?
I got started by kind of a convoluted path. It wasn’t planned — I wasn’t a child longing to make violins. I sort of stumbled into it while I was in the Air Force.
I had an interest in music — my instrument was the bass. As I transitioned from electric bass to upright bass, my interest got piqued in how interesting these string instruments are. I’d always had a fascination with building things with wood.
So I started out making electric basses. As I picked up the upright bass, my interest became, ‘Well, maybe I can make one of these?’ But they’re huge. So my first step was to make a violin. I just bought a book. The book had a lot of holes in it. It wasn’t very clear — it was written by another amateur maker, which a lot of the books are, so they’re not so helpful. At the time I was living in Baltimore, so I made my first violin on my kitchen table in Baltimore.
When was that?
April of 1998. So once I did that, I was hooked. It was all I could think about, all I wanted to do.
I started to go around the Washington, D.C., area. I met a couple of other violinmakers and I tried to get an apprenticeship with them. They just said, ‘I’m sorry. Your instrument is okay, but we just don’t have time to train someone who doesn’t know anything. You don’t have the basic skills you need.’ Basic skills are usually considered to be sharpening skills, tool-handling skills, traditional woodworking skills. Their advice was to go to violin-making school.
Up to that point, I had never thought that that could exist. I think there are three or four in the country. This violinmaker I was talking to narrowed it down pretty quick. He said, ‘Well, you can go to Salt Lake City, if you’re into that sort of region.’ The other alternative was a school in Boston, in the North End, that has a long tradition of training people in traditional crafts, be it cabinet- and furniture-making, jewelry, that sort of thing. They had a program that was three years, dedicated to violinmaking and restoration.
I did that program in about two-and-a-half years. I accelerated my way through it because I was so into it.
As fate goes, while in school I had met a maker who lived here in Maine, and I had done an apprenticeship with him while I was in school. As it came time for me to graduate, he had somebody working for him who left and I was looking, and it seemed perfect. That’s what brought me to Maine — the opportunity to work for an already-established maker. I don’t think there are too many opportunities like that in the country, because most makers are solitary.
I did that for four years. After four years, it seemed like the next step was to move on and focus on my work. It was just this last March or April that I left him, and this summer that I set up here in this building.
And is there a buck to be made in Maine making violins?
Sure. There’s obviously a large tradition of fiddle music in Maine, and classical music has a strong home in Maine. So the musicians are here, and the music is here. It’s just a matter of me connecting with the public. I’m a one-man show, so it’s hard enough to keep afloat making the instruments. I’m not out promoting myself all the time; I haven’t figured out yet what’s a good marketing strategy for an instrument-maker.
The way I see, there are lots of plusses to buying a new instrument as opposed to an old one, especially when you’re connecting with the maker of that instrument, because you can get involved to whatever degree you want to be. If there’s something size-wise or model-wise or tonally — if you know what you want — a new maker gives you that possibility of having it made specifically for you. You can’t do that with a dead violinmaker. An old violin is just an old violin. I guess if you like it, you like it. Undoubtedly, there are some great ones out there, ones that are valuable. But for the most part, older instruments are more of a liability — they’re cracked oftentimes, they have old repair work that’s going to fall apart. If you’re going to spend the money, you might as well get exactly what you want. And then you have that connection with the maker.
You said most of your stuff is not commissioned, that it goes to a dealer. Do you know where most of your instruments wind up?
In general, most of my instruments, because of their price, end up in the hands of serious student musicians, like people on their way to conservatories, or maybe amateur musicians who have a stable career and can afford them.
How much are we talking here?
My violins and violas are $9,000, and the cello is $20,000 — which, for a new maker, it’s not that high.
Is that what the retailer is paying you?
No, that’s the retail price. Different wholesale situations have different attachments — they might take more or less, or it might be on consignment. That’s variable, but what isn’t variable is that if you want to buy my instruments, it’s going to wind up costing you $9,000 for a violin. When you think about it, if you’re making money as a musician…
You kind of need one.
Yeah. One violin that costs $9,000… People are often, ‘Whoa, that’s a lot,’ but if you play guitar in a rock band, you probably have five guitars, amps, all these pedals, and in the end, you have $10,000 worth of stuff, easy.
There are far more expensive instruments available. I can’t command the higher prices because of my relative age, the fact that I haven’t been around for 20 years.
Where do your materials come from?
Materials come from all over the place. Predominantly, [for cellos] I use spruce that comes from the Alps.
Why is that?
It’s an elevation thing and climate thing — the trees tend to grow very straight and very slow. As far as other wood, violins are always made out of maple. That sometimes comes from Europe, and sometimes I use North American maple. I have a substantial amount of maple that was cut up in the Rangeley Lakes region. It looks different from European wood, and sounds a little different, so depending on what someone might want or what I want, that will affect my choice of wood.
How do you know when an instrument, like this cello, is done and ready to sell?
Well, first I should point out while you’re looking at this cello, you’ll notice that the finish looks imperfect — it looks worn. I don’t do anything that looks new.
Musicians have a great aversion to new-looking instruments. No one wants to be seen with a bright and shiny instrument. So for all the positives of buying a new instrument, there’s just something in the brain where you see something old, you think, ‘It has to sound good. It’s been around forever. Somebody’s loved it.’
Another thing with the imperfect finish: If you’ve just invested a substantial amount of money in a new instrument, it removes that fear and dread of the first scratch. I’ve taken care of that.
