LORIAN LEONHARD, a London violin dealer, keeps a large fossilised ammonite in his showroom. It echoes the scroll on a fiddle's neck, but it also has symbolic significance: violin-making, he says, is a “fossil profession”. He has a point. The first surviving violin was made in Cremona, Italy, by Andrea Amati in 1564. A modern musician could pick it up and play it. Apart from a few minor modifications introduced since, the basic design remains much the same today, and so does the way a high-quality instrument is made: by hand, slowly and with loving care.

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