The collections of the Museo del Violino narrate, with remarkable continuity, the five-century-long history of Cremonese violin making. Now, a new chapter is added to this compelling story. Starting Friday, as part of the Friends of Stradivari network, a violin by Girolamo II Amati will be on display — temporarily entrusted to the Museum and to the city by Helen Brunner, soloist and music educator. With this maker, the story of the oldest Cremonese family of luthiers, active since the mid-1500s, reaches its full and exhaustive definition.

On Saturday 25 and Sunday 26 October, at 12:00 p.m., in the Giovanni Arvedi Auditorium, visitors will be able to appreciate the instrument’s tonal qualities in two dedicated listening sessions. The brief solo recitals will feature violinist Lena Yokoyama. (Single ticket €10)

Although Girolamo II Amati’s fame is somewhat overshadowed by the extraordinary achievements of earlier members of his family, he rightfully deserves to be counted among the great luthiers of the classical Cremonese school. Between the 17th and 18th centuries, he carried on the activity of the renowned family workshop during a period marked by lively competition and by numerous personal hardships and tragedies.

His father, Nicolò, who had survived the devastating plague epidemic of the 1630s — which wiped out an entire generation of luthiers between Cremona and Brescia — had for years relied on a large group of apprentices to meet the high demand for instruments resulting from this monopoly. These luthiers, trained to varying degrees in the Amati workshop — including Andrea Guarneri, Francesco Rugeri, their sons, and Antonio Stradivari — later became Girolamo’s rivals, challenging him when, after assisting his aging father in his final years, he took over the historic family business.

Gifted with exceptional technical skill, Girolamo (known as “the second” to distinguish him from his paternal grandfather of the same name) absorbed the stylistic lessons of his ancestors while also integrating influences from the assistants who had worked in the family workshop during his formative years — among them Giovanni Battista Rogeri — as well as from the natural inspiration provided by his distinguished contemporaries.

Unfortunately, these transitional years were marked by tragedy: in 1685, just a year after Nicolò’s death, Girolamo’s young wife Angela Carettoni passed away; two years later, their eldest son, only three years old, also died.

Skill alone was not enough to maintain the workshop’s supremacy. In the same period, numerous commissions from leading figures of the European clergy and nobility marked the unstoppable rise of Antonio Stradivari, who would go on to dominate Cremonese violin making for nearly half a century.

Overwhelmed by debt, Girolamo left Cremona shortly before 1700, returning only about twenty years later, when he resumed violin making sporadically. His death in 1740 brought to a close the violin-making history of the Amati family — a story that had begun two hundred years earlier with the legendary figure of his great-grandfather Andrea.

The Brunner violin, ca. 1670, was crafted during the period when Girolamo’s contribution to the workshop had become predominant. Built on the smaller Amati model, it bears witness not only to the maker’s technical virtuosity but also to his personal stylistic vision, clearly visible in the craftsmanship of the edges and the execution of the purfling.