SOURCE: Heller, Amanda. Review of The Countess of Stanlein Restored, by Nicholas Delbanco. Boston Globe (19 August 2001): D3.

In the following review, Heller describes The Countess of Stanlein Restored as an intriguing account focused on both the art of the musician and the art of the luthier.

It is one of those confluences of circumstance best summed up as “genius of place”: For a number of variably evident reasons, about 300 years ago in the vicinity of Cremona, in northern Italy, a handful of craftsmen briefly produced the most sublime violins and cellos the world has ever known. Their names speak for themselves: Amati, Guarneri, and the most famous of all, Stradivari.

The author and scholar Nicholas Delbanco is fortunate enough to have a Stradivarius cello in the family (for such an exquisite creation is treated by its owner not as an inanimate possession but rather as a beloved, with...