A phoenix from the ashes

Lutherie

Points of interest to violin and bow makers

Luthier Shlomo Moyal explains how he restored a 1685 viola da gamba that had been almost destroyed, in a project that took a whole year of patient reconstruction

How the instrument first arrived in Moyal’s workshop

The final negati ve plaster cast of the top plate

ALL PHOTOS COURTESY SHLOMO MOYAL

I never thought I would take a particular interest in the viola da gamba or its instrument family. Like many luthiers I graduated from the Cremona International School of Violin Making and I later worked in ateliers in Europe and Israel, restoring antique and modern instruments and crafting my own. In February 2019, however, I took receipt of an instrument in an appalling state: a viola da gamba that had made international headlines after being severely damaged on an Alitalia flight. Its owner, Myrna Herzog, said that the airline had taken full responsibility for the damage and would pay for the instrument’s full restoration.

According to Herzog, the instrument was properly called a ‘division viol’ and was made by the great British maker Edward Lewis from wood of a single tree, cut down around 1662 (according to a dendrochronology report by the British luthier John Topham). It had a deep, big, resonant sound, with an organ-like low D and a bright and singing high register. When this interesting, broken instrument arrived in my workshop I felt a sense of deja vu - as though it was familiar, but at the same time a complete mystery. The viol, which has a carved back with a slant, double purfling and beautiful deep red-brown English varnish, were all parts of my world - but in pieces, like a jigsaw puzzle.

My first task was to rediscover the instrument’s original shape. I began by taking all the remaining pieces apart, putting them in order, and gluing them as level as possible, so there were no bumps between the cracks - not an easy task in old instruments. Even before the accident, the viol had been through a lot: there was evidence of restoration from diflerent periods by many craftsmen. The entire centre of the belly was covered in woodworm, and had been reinforced by all kinds of studs; I had to remove each one before I could start gluing the cracks and fractures. To top it off, there were many small pieces missing. These had to be replaced with new wood with matching characteristics, such as grain and fibre direction and refraction, as well as similar flames and rays.

As luck would have it, Myrna Herzog had a ‘twin brother’ to the viol in her collection. It, too, was made by Lewis, and wood from the same tree appears to have been used for both. To have an original instrument right there on the workbench for measurement and comparison was like a dream come true, especially given the scale of this reconstruction. It significantly sped up the process.

To return the belly arching to its original shape, I created several plaster casts. First I made a cast of the assembled distorted arching. Then I started reshaping the plaster negative, and pouring plaster into a positive cast in order to observe the change. When it felt right, I created the final negative, in which the distorted form is pressed with custom-made bags filled with warm sand for a long period of time, until the belly reaches the proper form.

The most difficult task was fitting a bell patch to the inner side of the belly, as it involved touching the original wood. In this case I had no choice, since the woodworm tracks made it look like a net. When you have a hollowed surface that is very thin, it’s as if the wood ‘wants’ to return to its distorted shape, so it requires a lot of pressing. The problem is compounded when you have to fit the patch, which is the main reason why I chose to use a carving duplicator, a tool rarely used in the workshop, but necessary in this case.

large bell patch was required in the centre of the top plate, along with many smaller patches

Time spent on wood choice equals time saved on varnishing

The carved belly, in its cast, is inserted into sealed plastic connected to a vacuum pump, so that the plastic shrinks and presses the belly to its cast; then an inner negative plaster is made to be copied by the manual duplicator. This is the safest way to create an exact patch that will be properly glued in place, avoiding any air channels between the surfaces. Casts become your workbench: they’re the base platform you use while pressing, gluing and reinforcing.

Once I’d glued the bell patch, and cleaned and re-glued more than 30 cracks – old and new – I fitted new studs and doublings for reinforcement, installed a new bass-bar and added many missing parts of the edges and ribs to the outside surface. Every piece, even the tiniest, had to match. This meant spending a considerable amount of time looking for the right piece of wood, with the right grain and natural light refraction, otherwise one might encounter difficulties in subsequent retouching work. Time spent on wood choice equals time saved on varnishing.

For the lower ribs I had to remove very old doublings from the inner side. The original wood was too thin – in some cases less than 1mm. It was a complex puzzle, broken in all imaginable directions. Several pieces were glued to a larger part, sometimes added afterwards, like an inlay. Throughout this process I had to keep the whole picture in mind. The belly had to return to its natural place, so every millimetre was crucial.

Fortunately the modern neck, crafted by the Baroque musician and luthier Amit Tiefenbrunn, was not damaged, and could still be inserted into place perfectly. After weeks of retouching, cleaning and polishing, this beautiful instrument came back to life. One year after the gamba was entrusted to me, Myrna was able to play it for the first time in my workshop. Her love of music, and of the history of musical instruments, inspires us both.