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Walter Mahr – Master of Violinmaking the story to the person

Located in the middle of an old village, between agricultural activities and traditional franconian
style cottages, you can find the settlement of violin-makers. Inside a beautiful restored country
house built from sandstone, Walter Mahr set up his own workshop.
The tradition of making fine stringed instruments was handed down from his mother to the franconian by birth. His grandfather was mandolin-maker, which is well known as a traditional
settlement for instrument-makers. Also his great grandfather was a violin- maker. Even as a young boy, Walter Mahr showed the propensity for handcraftmanship and so the choice of training as a violin-maker was rather obvious. After three years of apprenticeship, Walter Mahr graduated 1983 at the chamber of handlcrafts as the top of his class. 059-waltersw.jpg (40561 Byte)
Then he spend some years as journeyman with different masters of violin-making. In 1990 Walter
Mahr passed his trade examination at the chamber of handIcrafts in Nürnberg and subsequently
founded his own workshop.

Since January 2000 Walter Mahr is been a State-Certified Master for making stringed instruments. His expert opinion has been sought by Law-Courts and insurance companies. Walter Mahr manufactures and hires out violins, violas, celli and baroqueinstruments in all sizes. He offers in a wide range of instruments, starting with superior instruments for novice players with a well grained (textured) solid maple back, spruce wood top and ebony fittings, up to top line masterpieces constructed from marvellous textured (grained) maple, selected and well seasoned tonal wood (materials), lacquered each by hand with spirit- or oil-varnish.

Of course, Walter Mahr will also fulfill special wishes in regard to materials, manufacturing prosesses and design. A special field for Walter Mahr are sonorical improvements.
For this, Walter Mahr cultivates good relations with musicians from different categories. His masterpieces are all made of tonal wood which has been carefully seasoned for 20 and up to 100 years. Sometimes the good connections of his families to other old violin-makers are great help to find the exact required material.
But also the mixture (composition) of his oil- or spirit- varnish can vary according to the desired (expected) tonal properties (qualities). The customers of our young violin-maker are vendors all over Germany, but his masterpieces and students instruments are also sold in Asia, USA and the rest of the world.

As a Publicly Commissioned and Sworn Specialist for Violin-Making (the first person to hold such a title in Northern Bavaria) he has already produced several expert reports, made several valuations and been employed as an impartial expert by insurance companies and courts. Concerning high standards, the term “Made in Germany” is quite decisive for customers in whole world.

“The clientele of old musicans is very hard to reach”, says Walter Mahr
“because they strongly rely to their known violin-makers”. Confidence is an unwritten law in the relation between musicans and the maker of his instruments. “But I get it, step by step!”

The workshop of Walter Mahr will continue to be traditional handcraftmanship workshop even in the future. It is time to engage an apprentice and perhaps to employ a journeyman. Walter Mahr will attend the NAMM-SHOW in Los Angeles and if you didn´t had the chance to get a brochure or a pricelist, you can obtain them via mail, fax or internet.