It is the equivalent of “the Mona Lisa” in the world of musical instruments.
The Il Cannone violin, made in 1743 by the Italian luthier Antonio Guarneri, known as “del Gesù”, rival of Stradivari, is a treasure valued at more than 30 million euros.
It owes its fame as much to the exceptional quality of its sound tone as to the aura of its former owner, Niccolò Paganini, surely the most famous soloist in history.
Bequeathed to the city of Genoa, the violin has barely moved from the Palazzo Tursi since 1851.
A very good reason was therefore needed to move the instrument to Grenoble (Isère) and subject it to a unique scientific experiment: to screen Il Cannone with powerful X-rays.
“The primary challenge was to assess the state of conservation of this violin which is almost three centuries old.
And the only place in the world where we can analyze matter so finely is at the Grenoble synchrotron, the most powerful on the planet at the moment,” explains Luigi Paolasini, physicist at the European Synchrotron, with emotion. (ESRF).
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