Charles Jean-Baptiste Collin-Mezin violin, France, 1911

Charles Jean-Baptiste Collin-Mezin learnt violin making in Brussels from Nicolas-Francois Vuillaume, brother of the famous Jean-Baptiste Vuillaume before establishing his own workshop and violin repair business in rue de Faubourg Poissonière, Paris. A number of prizes in the late nineteenth century by a select group of highly skilled workmen in Mirecourt. Like many of his Guarneri model instruments, this violin has a big, bold, almost explosive character, full of richness, colour and resonance even under considerable bow pressure, while speaking easily at any volume. Not a violin for the faint-hearted.