Nicolò Amati
Nicolò Amati (b Cremona, 3 Dec 1596; d Cremona, 12 April 1684)
He was the son of Girolamo Amati. He was the most refined workman of the family, and today its most highly regarded member. His training would have commenced during the first decade of the 17th century, and by 1620 his had become an evident and even dominant hand in the instruments emanating from that workshop. The plague that killed his father in 1630 and much of his immediate family had been preceded by two years of famine, devastating the city of Cremona. The same plague killed Maggini, the Amatis’ great rival, in 1632, and so, apart from a few provincial followers of the Brescian School, Nicolò Amati was suddenly the only violin maker of any consequence in Italy. Commissions for new instruments, needless to say, were likely few and far between during this decade, and violins from this period are exceedingly rare.
By 1640 the violin-making momentum had been regained, and Nicolò and his work entered a second phase. Once more, instruments poured forth in response to heavy demand, and the 1640 census returns show that Nicolò had assistance in his work from outside of his immediate family. Among the known violin makers who appeared in his household were Andrea Guarneri, G.B. Rogeri, Giacomo Gennaro, Bartolomeo Pasta and Bartolomeo Cristofori (probably the same Bartolomeo Cristofori who later invented the pianoforte), and there are several documented makers for whom there is no surviving independent work. Jacob Stainer may at some time have been Nicolò’s pupil as well, and others with personal connections to Nicolò include Francesco Rugeri and Antonio Stradivari.
Most of Nicolò Amati’s production seems to have consisted of violins, the proportion of violas and cellos being very small compared with that of his father and uncle. Although, as previously, the violins were of differing dimensions, from about 1628 he favoured a wider model than before, known in modern times as the ‘Grand Pattern’ (fig.2), and these violins are the most sought after. Well curved, long-cornered, and strongly and cleanly purfled, they perhaps represent the height of elegance in violin making. The soundholes too have a swing to their design, and the scrolls are in the best Amati tradition. The varnish leans away from brown and towards golden orange in colour: it must have been quite soft, as the top coat has now usually worn away. The arching shows a tendency towards what is known as ‘scoop’ near the edges. This degree of flatness, invariably exaggerated by imitators, causes the flanks of an instrument to be thin, resulting in a sweetness of sound which lacks power, at least in comparison with instruments of Stradivari and Guarneri ‘del Gesù’. Nicolò Amati’s instruments are appreciated for the noble quality of the sound, combined with ease of response.
In 1645 Nicolò married Lucrezia Pagliari, and their son Girolamo took a leading hand in the workshop as soon as he was of age. This becomes evident in the 1660s, and by about 1670 the Amati shop was firmly in the hands of Girolamo. Once again the character of the violins changed, and the ‘Grand Pattern’ became rarer, though the golden varnish remained. As great as Nicolò’s creative achievement was, ultimately his greatest influence lay in the impact that his workshop had upon the art of violin making as a whole. His numerous pupils and employees carried the concept of the shop to almost every major commercial centre in Italy and in some cases abroad, thus enhancing the overall quality of Italian violin making and helping to give it the cachet that it carries to this day.
