Instrument makers featured at Sweetwater Music Festival

Luthier Greg Walke works in his Paisley workshop. BILL HENRY The Sun Times

By BILL HENRY
The Sun Times
The little shop where luthiers Sybille Rupert and Greg Walke work glows in bright afternoon sunshine.
It’s been a summer of intense heat and high humidity — not ideal for assembling and varnishing fine, wooden, handcrafted musical instruments.

Paisley luthiers Sybille Rupert and Greg Walke set up her newest cello at their Paisley workshop. They are among builders taking part in a luthiers forum as part of the 2011 Sweetwater Music Festival Saturday, Sept. 16 at Division Street United Church in Owen Sound. BILL HENRY The Sun Times

Rupert winces as she at last slides strings through the pegs of a new cello, the varnish still not quite hard, and begins to turn and tighten. This is the latest of dozens she and her husband Walke have both made, along with violins and violas, at the workshop behind their home in Paisley where they set up shop more than 20 years ago.
“It’s a little nerve racking,” Rupert said, tuning up the Stradiveri-style instrument. “It’s not my favourite time. Especially after a summer like this.”
Rupert was raised in Germany, Walke in Toronto. Both switched directions to pursue luthiery, he from biology studies, she from languages. They met in 1980 as students at the Welsh School of Instrument Making and Repair.
They began their careers in Germany, working in repair shops and building instruments on the side for several years before coming to Canada, first to Bognor, then Paisley, lured by affordable living costs and friends in the area.

Greg Walke works at his workbench. BILL HENRY The Sun Times

“When things are going well and there’s money in the bank and I’m working, I like it very much,” Walke said at the shop. “To come in here where it’s quiet and just work is a wonderful thing to do. I can hardly imagine doing something else.”
Along with Walke’s brother Bernard, an Ottawa-based bow maker, the couple are among 10 distinguished instrument builders who will display their work at a luthiers forum Saturday as part of the weekend’s eighth annual SweetWater Music Festival.
The idea evolved from now artistic director Mark Fewer’s landmark 2002 performance at Leith Church several years ago, playing mostly Bach music on violins built by Grey-Bruce area luthiers. They included Eduard Bartlett, as well as three builders scheduled to take part Saturday — David Prentice, John Newton and Lou Currah.
Since then, the SweetWater Festival has always celebrated local luthiers and local instruments, including a Rupert cello played as part of one concert. Fewer has recently made recordings using a violin made by Prentice, a longtime Flesherton luthier.
“These musicians, or some of them, are very welcoming of new instruments, which is not the usual thing,” she said.
The luthiers’ forum Saturday, from 11 a.m. until 2 p.m., builds on that tradition, and expands it with the inclusion of several highly regarded builders from outside the area. They will bring finished instruments and work in progress and several will address their peers on aspects of their craft, Rupert said.

Violins, violas and cellos at the Paisley workshop of luthiers Sybille Rupert and Greg Walke. BILL HENRY The Sun Times

The event at Division Street United Church runs in conjunction with annual student festival master classes there. It is open to the public and university string music students, and young string players from Grey- Bruce have been invited and are encouraged to try these fine instruments with no obligation, Rupert said.
Some of the SweetWater musicians are expected around noon to perform informally in small ensembles with these new instruments, she added.
The “rare event” puts makers in touch with musicians, which is vital for luthiers and always a challenge for people like Rupert and Walke working in remote studios.
“It’s good for the musicians, but also good for ourselves,” she said. “You can get very introverted working by yourself. It’s good for you to see what other people do. We are always struggling to stay in contact with the music community, because we are so far.”
I watch through my camera as Rupert and Walke tune up and tinker with her newest cello. It’s unusual, they said, to work together like this.

Paisley luthier Sybille Rupert considers her newest cello at the shop she shares in Paisely with husband Greg Walke. BILL HENRY The Sun Times

Usually, they toil alone on their own projects in this shared studio, although they have recently worked together on a smaller cello with Canadian woods that has a strong, promising, focused sound. It’s something they may pursue more together, Rupert said.
Walke is mainly a builder while Rupert also does some repairs, especially for better instruments.
“I’m not unhappy doing certain repairs. I like the contact with the musicians. So I’m also less prolific than Greg,” she said. “If it’s an instrument that merits the repair, then I’m OK doing it.”
Walke expects to return, of necessity, to more restoration work. Faced with growing competition, especially from inexpensive but often very good handmade Chinese instruments now more readily available, he fears a diminishing demand for North American-made instruments.
“Before, people started off with a factory instrument and when they need a better instrument they had to come to us. They don’t have to anymore,” he said. “Now there’s another level.”
Through long years of experience and experimentation, they’ve come to know what to expect from their materials and the designs each prefers. They avoid hard Ontario maple, preferring softer wood.
“It’s a hard earning curve. It’s really hard to work scientifically within this business. There’s a high demand on the wood and tiny differences make huge differences in the sound,” Rupert said.
As we talk about the artistry of their craft, and why they chose it, I want to know their thoughts on the romance and mystery behind bringing the music out in the wood.
“It’s experience and a bit of luck and the materials are extremely important,” Rupert said.
“There is some luck in there,” Walke added. “But you have to be able to make them well. They’re all different. They usually come out at a certain standard but you hope for the one that really stands out.”
This moment with this any instrument, hearing its potential for the first time, can be daunting, they said.
“We have experience enough to know that we have to get to know each instrument,” Rupert said. “The whole creep hasn’t happened. The belly goes up, the back stretches. Ideally you give it to a good player to play it in.”
“It’s a nerve racking thing,” Walke said. “You’re making and you’re waiting for this moment and you’re hoping that this is the one.”
The goal with every instrument is “full, even, brilliant sound that goes through the whole range and projects and speaks easily,” she said.
Every instrument is different “and occasionally we make instruments that we don’t mind showing to good players. That’s rewarding when that happens.”
bhenry@thesuntimes.ca