This year's greatest luthiers have been announced at the 19th ANLAI International Violin Making Competition.
The award ceremony was held at the church of Santa Maria della Neve in Pisogne. The competition itself saw the participation of 200 luthiers, representing 21 different countries, and was judged by an equally international committee comprising Polish honorary president Tomasz Tomaszewski, German-born president of the jury Florian Leonhard, Chinese jury vice president Gai Tontong, and members Saulo Barreto Dantas from Brazil, Fernado Salvatore Lima from Portugal, Ichiro Tutsumi from Japan, and Giorgio Scolari and Roberto Collini from Italy.
The 2024 ANLAI prize was given to Cremona-based Stefano Conia, whom the competition dubbed the "dean of Cremonese violin makers" for his dedication to the craft. Italians also dominated in other categories: Virgoletti Paolo won the professional violin category, Ezio Usai the cello, Metto Crotti the guitar, Leandro Lendri the bow, and Emanuele Curtoni and Gabriele Natali the antiqued violin.
The first prize for the antiqued viola category went to Frenchman Leo Guilbert (who also won second prize for his antiqued violin).
Luthiers from Asia-who have been showing greater participation in recent years-have also made their presence known: Zhen Shab Xia and Weitong Zhang from China took the first two prizes in the viola category, Taiwanese Minseng Tai finished first in strings, Kin Quiwen from China and Chin Seng from Malaysia shared the third prize in antiqued violin, and Minfeng Tsai finished second in classical guitar.
Asian participants dominated in the amateur categories, with Haee Chol, Kwanghoo Lee and Daehee Jung from South Korea bagging first prizes in the violin, antiqued violin, and antique viola categories, respectively, while Hong Zeran from China won first prize in viola.
ANLAI-the Associazione Nazionale Liuteria Artistica Italiana-was established in 2006 by Gualtiero Nicolini and his associates for the promotion of Italian violin making. The Italian tradition of violin making-especially the Cremonese school-was declared a UNESCO intangible cultural heritage in 2012.
