George Craske

Craske, although his father was a foreigner, was of English extraction, so he once told my grandfather, who was a fiddle enthusiast. He said that an ancestor of his named Cross had settled in Russia, and afterwards in Germany, and the present form of the name was due to these migrations. Mr. George Crompton, who was intimately acquainted with this wonderful man, does not say anything about the matter in his sketch of him in the June number of The Strad, 1893. However, on the strength of this statement, I venture to include him here as a British maker of British blood. He was not an Anglo-German or French, but a thorough Britisher in character and sentiment. And so is his work. Out of the three thousand odd instruments that he is said to have made, I have seen only about a dozen — that is to say, only about a dozen that I knew to be his work. But very many of his instruments have a forged label in them, and as he made very fair imitations of Joseph Guarnerius and other Italians, his work is not always recognised. I cannot say that there is anything about Craske's work to excite ecstatic utterance. However clever the workmanship may be — and in much of his work we may concede that it is clever — the tone will never give him a seat amongst the mighty : it is too hard and metallic. I have carefully tried the specimens which from time to time have been brought to my notice, and I must honestly say that I have always been disappointed with the tone. It is a large, round, and piercing tone, but it lacks unction. It is stronger than the tone of any of our classical makers, but will not for a moment bear comparison as regards mellowness and sweetness. Craske's instruments are splendidly adapted for orchestral purposes, but as solo instruments they are never likely to be in great demand. In some catalogues of old instruments issued recently I find that there are specimens of his work offered at £30. This sum is more than double the intrinsic value of anything I have seen by him. The workmanship, however, is honest and solid, and we must give Craske his due that he never attempted to sell his clever imitations as originals. Craske was a pupil of " old Forster," and he made many instruments for Clementi and for Dodd, the bow-maker. Besides copying Guarnerius, he made several copies of Amati and Stradivari, from templets and measurements taken from a Strad and an Amati in the possession of Sir Patrick Blake, of Langlam Hall, Suffolk. Whilst in Birmingham, he is reported to have been once engaged by Paganini to do some repairs to his violin, which had met with an accident. Craske lived in Salford, amongst other places, where he worked for about twenty years, leading the life of a recluse, allowing no one to enter his workshop except Mr. George Crompton, his friend and successor in business. He lived a retired life for some years before he died, at Bath, in affluent circumstances. He died in November 1889, at the advanced age of ninety-eight. He was a man of striking appearance and personality. " His head was exactly the same shape and measure as Shakespeare's, and his memory one of the most remarkable that ever was known " ; such are the concluding words of Mr. Crompton's biographical sketch.