John Pearse Violin Artiste Series Mezzo (loop end E), 3500

"Thirty years ago, when John Pearse began to develop his unique string-making technology, the making of violin strings was pretty much of a hit and miss affair. To this day, he remembers toiling over long, wooden troughs of evil-smelling sheep intestines, the temperature up around ninety Farenheit, "combing" and "waulking" the fibers to prepare them for the stretching and twisting that would transform the unlikely looking stew into top-quality strings for the violin and viola. With all the care in the world, however, the discard rate for unacceptable strings was almost twenty percent. the waulking solution would be too acid, making the string brittle, or the lipid level was too high, causing the finished string to not hold a satisfactory torque.

In the intervening years, many manufacturers, John Pearse included, switched to Perlon for a core material because of the relative ease of working it--and its reliability. Good though Perlon is, however, it does not have the majesty of projection that one associates with the older gut strings.

Although players the world over accepted his Perlon core strings and endorsed them enthusiastically, John has never been satisfied. The thing that made gut strings so special was the fibroid construction that allowed the string to accept--and retain--a strong torque, giving it great projection, and an immediate response. There had, he reasoned, to be a way to manufacture a material that would have the same properties when placed under similar torque.

In mid-1992, after countless disappointments, he hit upon the present bonded molecule formulation--and made up a dozen or so prototype sets which were mailed to concert violinists the world over for their critical evaluation. the response was ecstatic! Three months later, the set, now dubbed the "ARTISTE", was added to our catalog, and made available on a limited production basis. Since then, its sales have soared and it is now the set de choix of soloists and symphonies worldwide.

It is the finest violin string in the world!"