The audience beats
the jury in
a sound test
The fact that an interested audience can sometimes outdo a panel of experts was demonstrated recently during the sound test organized last month by the Musical Instrument Fund in collaboration with the Grachtenfestival. Several top-quality antique Dutch instruments were compared with one another during this test.
The expert jury selected a 1766 Johannes Theodorus Cuypers as the best violin, with a 1680 Cornelis Kleynman violin as a close second. The audience, however, voted overwhelmingly for the Kleynman as the best violin: the Cuypers chosen by the jury received only a few votes and finished in second-to-last place!
The Musical Instrument Fund has re-examined the test results due to the slight discrepancy between the jury’s verdict and the public’s strong preference for the Kleynman violin. Elisabeth Perry, who played all the violins, noted that the Kleynman had been quite difficult for her to play due to a “flat bridge,” which caused her to hit the wrong string when applying significant bow pressure. As a result, she had not been able to feel free to “get the most out of the violin.” This means that this violin could have sounded even better than it already did. After extensive consultation with all individual jury members, it has now been decided that the Musical Instrument Fund will purchase the violin that received the public’s preference. It is a Cornelis Kleynman, built in Amsterdam around 1680. So the audience was right after all!