Arthur Edward Smith MBE, known as A. E. Smith (1880 – 16 May 1978) was an English-born Australian violin and viola maker of world renown.
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A. E. Smith (violin maker)
Arthur Edward Smith MBE, known as A. E. Smith (1880 – 16 May 1978) was an English-born Australian violin and viola maker of world renown.
His violins and violas are prized for their excellence of tone and decorative elements such as the sound holes, scrolls and curves.
Amongst musicians, “it is his violas that have the greatest reputation, being easily counted amongst the greatest ever created, regardless of era or nationality.”
Smith is believed to have been born in 1880 at Islington, London. He began his violin-making hobby in order to improve upon the inferior instrument he played in the Maldon Amateur Orchestral Society.
This soon overtook engineering as his primary interest. Smith was self-taught, but guided by A. E. Hill’s book on Antonio Stradivari.
He rapidly acquired expertise, attracting the attention of the Maldon antique and musical instrument dealer C. W. Jeffreys, whose firm he joined in 1905 as repairer and violin-maker.
By 1909 Smith had made twenty violins and a quartet, his instruments already being notable for their excellent outline, arching and scrolls.
Wishing to set up on his own in an environment with fewer established competitors, he migrated to Melbourne, Australia. In 1912-14 he worked with the Hungarian Carl Rothhammer at San Francisco, exhibited a quartet of violins at the World Trade Fair, then moved to Sydney, where he briefly continued his partnership with Rothhammer.
In 1919 he established A. E. Smith & Co. Ltd, which was an importer and repairer as well as a manufacturer. Smith trained his craftsmen to produce violins, violas and cellos, enabling them to pursue the art privately if they wished.
A quartet of A. E. Smith instruments is held by the National Museum of Australia, Canberra, and a violin at the Powerhouse Museum, Sydney
Smith died in Canberra on 16 May 1978 aged 98.
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