Maker and Restorer of Fine Bows Expert Appraisals © Michael J. Taylor             have been involved with stringed instruments ever since leaving school in 1968 which began, for a period of four years, with a company called Arnold Dolmetsch Limited, serving my apprenticeship on the manufacture of early stringed instruments. This period set a precedence with which I would continue: To individually hand make every part.  During this time I made a number of viols (of different sizes), rebecs, small harps, a five string guitar and numerous baroque bows. In 1972, after leaving Arnold Dolmetsch Limited I moved to  Ealing String of London and went on to head their bow workshop for many years.     Under the guidance of Malcolm Sadler my knowledge of the ‘modern’ bow developed and along with that grew my love and admiration for the classic French bow makers. Whilst attempting to make copies of these makers it became very apparent that these makers were much more than fine craftsmen, they were true artists. They seemed to understand how and why a bow worked. I felt that if I were to try to emulate their work then self criticism would need to be on the highest agenda. During this and later periods, I began to understand more about the ‘chicken and egg’ theory where everyone knows the answers but nobody knows why. The repairs and restorations were helping my new bow making however, the making of new bows were also helping the repairs and restorations. During my  years with Ealing Strings I saw and/or worked on, in excess of 15,000 bows; which included many fine specimens by all the great makers of the past.      1975 saw the 100th anniversary of the birth of William Charles Retford. Ealing Strings published a book and held an exhibition in his honour and although I played a relatively small part, helping Brian Parkinson - a founder partner of Ealing Strings - with the photography in this exhibition, the experience I gained helped enormously with the next  exhibition seven years later in 1982; the bicentenary of the birth of Nicolo Paganini. For this I made 24 violin bows mounted with gold and ivory, and ‘scrimshaw’ engraved 24 miniatures of Nicolo Paganini. These were completed with bars of music from each of the famous ‘24 Caprices’ by Nicolo Paganini engraved in gold with incredible precision by Derek Tipson whose superb work I have always been proud to see on my bows. Ealing Strings also published a monograph on this exhibition.      1987 saw three exhibitions in the shop of Ealing Strings, the first to praise the work of the Portuguese maker Antonio Capela, the second in praise of the English maker William Luff and the third and final exhibition of that year was to commemorate the 350th anniversary of Antonio Stradivari. Both Capela and Luff had made a number of copies of Stradivari and the idea was to bring together the above copies with the influence Antonio Stradivari had on the rest of the violin making community. The result was the ‘Eternal Influence of Antonio Stradivari’. My involvement was not only to make a violin, a copy of the famous ‘Hellier’ inlaid Stradivari of 1679 and also to photograph all the violins, violas and ‘cellos used in the exhibitions and catalogues, but also, in part, to produce the catalogues and the final book.    About Michael Taylor