Notable Sales: Antonio Stradivari | Violin, 1667
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Ex-Jenkins
Cremona, 1667
labelled Antonius Stradiuarius Cremonensis Faciebat Anno 1667 AS
length of back 35cm.
The first official sale record of the ‘ex-Jenkins’ is of its sale in 1899 by Count Cesare Nichesola to W.E. Hill & Sons. It was sold in 1902 to J. Younger before coming back to W.E. Hill & Sons in 1947. In 1948 the violin was bought by Tom Jenkins (1910-1957), from whom it eventually received its name, ‘ex-Jenkins’.
Jenkins began playing the violin aged 8 and gave his first public performance at 10 years old. He became a sensation, billed as “The Amazing Violin Virtuoso, Tom Jenkins, considered the Greatest British Soloist of his Generation.” by the Prince of Wales theatre, London, in 1936, and even went so far as to insure his hands against injury for £10,000. Jenkins led the BBC’s Grand Hotel broadcasts on Sunday evenings in the late 1940s and early 1950s.
After his death, Tom’s widow, Michelle, sold the violin at Sotheby’s in their June 1995 sale to the young German violinist Christine Thomas and used the money to found the Tom Jenkins Trust. The trust set up the Tom Jenkins Award, an annual award for the maker of the best bowed string instrument, won in 2022 by Francis Lawson. This award is continued today by The Musicians Company. The ‘ex-Jenkins’ Stradivari was owned by André Rieu in the first decade of this century and is currently in the possession of the Canimex Foundation in Canada.
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