If Viotti's arrival in Paris, a turning point in the history of the violin, took place in 1782, a few decades earlier, in 1769, Wilhelm Cramer, a celebrated violinist in Mannheim in London, introduced his bow — the so-called Cramer bow, developed in Germany — in the Parisian capital.
This is by far the most famous transitional bow model and featured a head that was stronger, heavier, and bigger than the Baroque bows and the stick was longer and had a concave cambre. This was the first step towards a bow that could produce a more equal sound at the heel and the tip and was better suited to playing sustained melodies.
This active quest to improve the technique of craftsmanship and to seek new forms of bow engineering is known as the Transitional period of bow making. This search was a response to the rapid development of the music and a different performing style as the halls got bigger and orchestras became larger, and the bow needed to have the ability to sustain and project.
According to the chronicles of the French violinist Michel Woldemar. Until the French Revolution in 1789, most violinists in Paris used the Cramer model.
Fig.2: François Xavier Tourte Cramer model bow, c. 1775. [Photograph] Tarisio.1
The enormous political changes created by the French Revolution favoured the bow makers in France. In particular, the abolition of the Parisian guild system in 1791 removed the many restrictions and allowed for the first time for the bow makers to work as equals to violin makers.
The influence of the Tourte family was essential in the development of the bow at this pivotal time. Nicolas Pierre Tourte and his sons Nicolas Léonard and François Xavier rapidly replicated the style of the Cramer bow. They produced an impressive amount of high-quality bows, with lots of improvements: they were even longer, having different designs of the head (more hatchet-like) and they used a ferrule on the frog to spread the bow hair evenly which allowed the ribbon to be wider and allowed therefore more stability. By 1790, the new Tourte model had achieved its final shape, which would influence all future bow makers.
As we saw in the former chapter, upon Viotti’s arrival in Paris, his concept of the violin concerto — an imaginative mixture of Italian, French, and German elements — was eagerly absorbed and developed by his French disciples and ultimately became known as the French Violin Concerto. As a result, a brand new repertory was created: Viotti published twenty-nine concertos, Kreutzer nineteen, Rode thirteen, and Baillot nine.
By 1800, it is reported that "in Vienna and St. Petersburg, in London and Paris, everyone played Viotti" 2. Also, Woldemar notes that around that time, in 1802, most people in Paris had dismissed the Cramer bow, favouring the new model of the Tourte bow; the choice of sound production, represented by the bow, was a matter of social and political identity, particularly during and after the Napoleonic Wars3.
Market demands dominated public musical performances after the Bourbon Restoration, where virtuosi were on the rise. Their popularity rose even further especially after the death of Napoléon in 1821 when his myth as a promoter of French Revolutionary ideals grew even more. Therefore, the “heroic” violinist embodied perfectly the Zeitgeist of his time. The celebration of bravery and leadership seemed to be the main characteristic of these French concerti. As Boris Schwarz noted, its “idealised march character and military pulse” pervades the opening movements of many of Viotti’s concertos. Its “martial airs, bellicose defiance, stark realism, sweeping passion, and characteristic grandeur and pomp” redefined what "military" meant because society as a whole was going through a significant transformation4.
The “military” content of the French concerto shared common ground with the musical language of revolutionary operas. This historically important sub-genre emerged at the height of the revolutionary decade (1789–99) when the opera became symbol of the Old Regime, this kind of “people’s theatre” was built. Viotti and his students made some significant connections with opera composers like Cherubini and Méhul who took part in this kind of production. “Terror” and “rescue” operas, displayed Republican fervour by including patriotic songs like the Marseillaise or by evoking a military spirit through marches and fanfares.
Viotti, Kreutzer, and Rode frequently led the Paris Opéra at various stages of their careers, and Viotti himself even founded a new opera house in Paris, the Théâtre de Monsieurs (later the Théâtre Feydeau). We can even find some evidence that demonstrates that the opera stage was the customary setting for this type of violin concerto in the 1790s. As Adélaïde de Place has stated in her study of musical life in France at the time of the Revolution: “It was standard practice to conclude certain theatrical performances with a piece of instrumental music usually performed by a celebrated virtuoso5”.
Thus we can trace the sound ideals sought by the new technical improvements of the bow in this relationship with the opera genre. The powerful, singing tone pursued by all Viotti devotees was precisely what the Tourte bow and the new bowing technique could provide. This image of violinists as military heroes also can be attributed to the bow's emerging symbolism as a sharp weapon, particularly with the shape of the updated Tourte: straighter, concave rather than convex, and hence resembled a sword. In wielding his commanding instrument and conducting the orchestra, the solo violinist assumed the figurative role of an army general, especially as soloists, often played the role of the modern conductor at this time, and the often under-rehearsed orchestra got their cues from observing the violinist's bow motions.