Giovanni Battista Guadagnini is known as a great violin maker of the latter half of the18th century following Stradivari and Guarneri “del gesu.”
Guadagnini was born in a small residential area, called Bilegno, in Piacenza Prefecture in the northern Italy of today on the 23rd of June in 1711. His life and career can be divided into four periods, according to his residence in four cities: Piacenza, Milan, Palma and Turin.
It is said that he resided in Cremona in and around 1758, but there is no clear evidence for it.
In 1771, Guadagnini moved to Turin, where he lived the last day of his life, and two years after that, he came to have very close relationship withCount Cozio di Salabue, a well-known violin collector. In their close relationship, Cozio supplied good-quality materials to Guadagnini, and purchased almost all the finish-ups. Besides, he purchased violin-making references from Paolo Stradivari, who was a descendant of Antonio Stradivari, handed them to Guadagnini, and persuaded him to copy Antonio Stradivari.
At the end of the description on the label of this violin made in Turin in 1779, it is written as:
"alumnus Antoni Stradivari"

Its arch shows the particular characteristic out of Stradivari that cannot be seen on any of his artwork made in any other city.
Delicate, transparent feeling and reddish varnish reappeared on this violin, which was often used on the artwork of his days in Milan. Its sound is strong, dense and deep.
Please take a look at this violin, which is Guadagnini finally reached at after many tries and errors and successes in the four cities in the time of 44 years.