A violin by Giacomo Rivolta

The Milanese maker Giacomo Rivolta benefitted from contact with Count Cozio and Francesco Mantegazza in his home city, where he worked at the sign of ‘Santo Re Davide’ in the Contrada San Margherita, close to the Mantegazza shop. He was also clearly influenced by his predecessor there, Carlo Ferdinando Landolfi, but today his work is relatively little-known and rare. This violin is a very pure and well-preserved example, which draws on all these influences, and even that of Giovanni Battista Guadagnini, another exalted member of this Milanese circle in the mid-eighteenth century, who worked with Cozio at the end of his life in Turin.

The violin is a very strong and characterful piece of work, the arching in particular indicating power and penetration of tone, and a confident and experienced maker. Rivolta made several very impressive cellos that were clearly based on the Stradivari ‘B’ form, presumably closely modelled on the cello he obtained from Cozio. His violas are also exceptional, but strangely unrelated to the Stradivari form and more identifiable with Mantegazza or even Andrea Guraneri in form and proportion.

The Milanese tradition stalled a little after Rivolta’s death in 1844, reviving with Gaetano Antoniazzi’s arrival in 1870. Rivolta’s own influence on later makers is relatively scant, but the work he did produce makes up a very fine and distinguished contribution to the great Italian tradition.