George Gemünder
Georg (George) Gemünder (13 April 1816 Ingelfingen - 15 January 1899) was a German-born American violin maker who worked in Boston, Massachusetts, and later, Astoria, New York. With his brother August and others, he pioneered the construction of quality violins in the United States.[1]
Biography
He was a pupil of
He was unusually successful in the model and finish of his instruments, and especially the varnish. He so faithfully reproduced the distinctive characteristics of old Italian violins that those made by him are not infrequently mistaken for genuine Cremonas. At the Vienna exhibition of 1873, Gemünder's violin the "Kaiser" fooled the judges, who assumed it was an Italian violin from the classical period, and therefore ineligible for prizes.[2] Gemünder also received medals from exhibitions held in Paris (1867), New York (1870), Vienna (1873), Philadelphia (1876 “hors concours”), Amsterdam (1883), Nice (1883-1884), London (1884), New Orleans (1884-1885 “hors concours”), and London (1885).
He wrote a book called Georg Gemünder's Progress in Violin-making (
Notes
- ^ Frederick H. Martens (1931). "Gemünder, August Martin Ludwig". Dictionary of American Biography. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons.
- ^ Baumert, Thomas. "George Gemünder." In Immigrant Entrepreneurship: German-American Business Biographies, 1720 to the Present, vol. 2, edited by William J. Hausman. German Historical Institute. Last modified September 05, 2013.
References
- Wilson, J. G.; Fiske, J., eds. (1900). . Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography. New York: D. Appleton.
- New International Encyclopedia(1st ed.). New York: Dodd, Mead.
External links
| International | |
|---|---|
| National | |
| Artists | |
