In the photo:
«The Violin Maker's Workshop,» from the Aclap exhibition «Classical Violin Making: A Method. Stradivari and the Cremonese School»
Simone Fernando Sacconi
in the testimony of Franco Feroldi
(Vice president Aclap)
Cremona
December 4, 1985
In conceiving and promoting the international publication «From Violin Making to Music: The Life and Work of Simone Fernando Sacconi» the Cremonese Association of Professional Artisan Violin Makers (Aclap) intended to pay homage – twelve years after his death – to the figure of that great Maestro who donated so much of himself, his wisdom, and his heart to the city of Stradivarius.
The Aclap, founded in Cremona on May 28, 1973 as an association of interdisciplinary professional nature, is profoundly grateful to Sacconi. In fact, the association is directly indebted to him for its very constitution, made on the basis of the foundamental lesson which this great violinmaker and restorer proffered, as well as for its statutory aim of dedication to the full revaluing of the classical Cremonese tradition of violinmaking.
Our efforts toward the creation of a modern, high-quality school of violinmaking have their origin in Sacconi's experience and works, which bore fruit in the rediscovery of the antique masters and in a renovated interest in their works and methods. This modern school, on the inspiration of the classical Cremonese one, is designed to promote live technical experimentation in a direct rapport between violinmaker and great musician.
Creativity and individuality, quality and professionalism are the original characteristics revived from a tradition that Sacconi was able to resuscitate by the pure force of his own enthusiasm, passion, and immeasurable competence. It was through this tradition that he managed to instill in those who accepted his teaching the joy and love that come of creative work: the search for that perfection – supreme and perhaps unattainable, yet completely human – which he recognized in the works of Stradivarius, his great idol and true teacher.
«For Sacconi, violinmaking was simply a form of life,» according to violinist Henryk Szeryng.
Sacconi's way of considering and practicing violinmaking may not be the easiest or the most diffused of all those in existence, but we feel certain that it is the best.