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Old 03-30-2008, 05:00 PM
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Ken Smith Ken Smith is offline
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Cool Leopold Noiriel

This maker is listed as a French maker, not Italian. Even the first name is German I think.

Quote:
The basses are even described as new. Who could have made them? Virtually the only basses known from Torino during these years were made by the Frenchman Leopold Noiriel, who was born in Mirecourt in 1789 and who moved to Turin shortly after his marriage in 1810. We lose track of him after 1835, and his death is unrecorded. He could have been the maker of these instruments. We can only speculate as to whether he was an employee of Guadagnini.


Quote:
The prime instruments that were being made in the Lete-Pillement workshop were violin and guitar family instruments as well as chamber organs and serinettes. After Lete=s untimely death in 1819, his employees began to go out on their own. A number of Frenchmen turn up in the trade at this time. These included Nicolas Denis and his sons, makers of organs, serinettes and general music vendors; Francois Mulot, a maker of all sorts of instruments, Leopold Noiriel and Francois Calot, the last two makers of violins, basses, and guitars. The business did not close immediately but continued in the hands of his widow for at least another eight years. Their style and method of working would ultimately become the Turin style.


Neither Noiriel or this Pillement (Lete) are listed in Henley but do have only a slight mention in Jalovec. Thanks for posting this. I quoted the phrases mentioning Noiriel which took some reading to find. If this is true, I have learned something about the Turin region that I was before only barely aware of.
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