Wednesday, October 27th, 2010
Violinist Anne Akiko Meyers has purchased the “ex-Molitor” Stradivarius violin for $3.6 million.
The fiddle once belonged to Napoleon, according to a number of sources, and to a general in Napoleons amry, Count Gabriel-Jean-Joseph Molitor, thus the name. The violin more recently was on long-term loan to Jascha Brodsky, through the Curtis Institute. Meyers will play it for the first time in public this weekend, when she performs the Barber Concerto with the Pasadena Symphony. The purchase price apparently broke a record, the previous record being set by the “Hammer” Stradivarius, which sold for $3.54 million at Christies, New York, in 2006. Tarisio clearly is pleased!
