Tarisio sells a cello made by Stradivari

[Pierre Tavlitzki]

The autumn sale of Tarisio will take place in New York and London from 21 to 23 October. The auction house specializes in musical instruments.

Upon entering their site, I was attracted by the announcement of the masterpiece of this sale, a cello made by Stradivari in 1717. Its last owner was Amaryllis Fleming. The instrument comes from her succession and will be sold for the benefit of the Royal College of Music in London.

The auction house tells us that the date of 1717 is in the best period for Stradivari, and that the model of this cello is the same as those of Yo Yo-Ma and Rostropovich. In this area where each instrument is tracked by the finest musicians on the planet, this detail is important, especially because it would remain in the world only 60 cellos of the master, according to Tarisio. This one was reworked in the mid-eighteenth century by the Spanish luthier José Contreras.

The estimate is to be asked to the auction house, but its site is so good that there are all orders of magnitude that can be searched in this area. Indeed, two years ago, Tarisio has listed hundreds of price results of instruments carried out at auction since 1980 by them and by their main competitors.

Leaving the catalogue to view the database, we see that Tarisio got $ 950 K of a Stradivari violin made before 1700. A good violin of the master is worth between 1 and 2 million $.

In the most recent results not yet visible at Tarisio, Christie's sold in New York a Stradivari violin at $ 3.5 million in New York on May 16, 2006, and another one $ 2.7 million on April 2, 2007. A cello from 1692 appears to be the last Stradivari of this type that was sold at auction. Christie's had obtained £ 550 K of that one in London on March 17, 1999.

Now that the price ranges are established, let the passion of musicians being excited or not on the sonic qualities of the instrument, because that is what makes the difference in the prices.

[Pierre Tavlitzki]

This sale held only on the web ended October 31, with a failure. The cello has not been sold. It was estimated £ 900 K. A single buyer makes an offer, £ 820 K, below the reserve price.

Buyers of Stradivari instruments seem to prefer violins to cellos, despite the rarity of cellos.