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Franz Geissenhof: the Viennese Stradivari

21 March 2025

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Franz Geissenhof’s instruments have always been highly regarded, but how far was he influenced by his Cremonese predecessor? Rudolf Hopfner compares a typical Geissenhof violin with Stradivari’s work to find out

The active period of the Austrian luthier Franz Geissenhof coincides with the Viennese Classical period, a musical epoch that marked an absolute high point in the field of instrumental music. Born in 1753, Geissenhof took over the workshop of his teacher Johann Georg Thir (1708–79) after his death. The few instruments that have survived from Geissenhof’s early period show Thir’s influence and are in the tradition of the Viennese school of violin making at the end of the 18th century…

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