A Beautiful Early 20th Century Violin By Hermann Dölling II, Germany.

Hermann Dölling II (1862-1923) was born into a dynasty of German violin and bow makers spanning two centuries and was trained by and eventually succeeded his father, Hermann Moritz Dölling, who founded the “Vogtländische Musikinstrumenten-Fabrik” in Markneukirchen. The factory produced instruments of a wide range of quality, from commercial student instruments for export to artisanal, handcrafted creations by master luthiers.

This fine example of Hermann Dölling JR’s personal work was handcrafted with the utmost attention to detail and demonstrates the finesse of mastery and timeless hallmarks of quality. The varnish, of an oil base, offers remarkable translucence and depth of color, from the honey-like ground to a luminescent orange-brown, with trace shadings of a deeper red nature. A well executed Stradivari pattern with a 358mm length of back, featuring carefully chosen and highly aesthetic tone woods. The table, of tight even grained spruce, with tightly flamed maple for the back, matchbooked in two pieces with a descending figuration and matching selections for the ribs and scroll. Precisely drawn f-holes, with subtle fluting through the lower wings, flawlessly executed purfling, upon which the graceful arching of the plates meets the channel into a consistently flared edgework for a decidedly bold character that terminates in deep troughs at the corners, highlighting the points of the purfling and otherwise continuing the slope of the archings. The scroll, highly concentric and of a graceful outline, with deep volutes that conclude into a bold round eye, with the throat gracefully cut to match. The plates of the back, pinned into the blocks symmetrically with four dowels.

Altogether, a beautiful instrument in a fine state of preservation of commendablly professional performance - the voice, powerful, well defined, and of perfectly balanced  response and flexibility.