1929 Carlo Giuseppe Oddone cello

Cellos by Oddone are highly praised and sought after by players, as they are world-renowned for their sound, quality and consistency of tone. This cello is no exception: it possesses a very strong, focused, and complex voice. Created during the zenith of Oddone’s skills, this cello exhibits his most successful varnish to date.

The instrument is labelled “Carlo Guiseppe Oddone, OP.222 Fece Torino A-1929” and is made of a two-piece back slab cut of select quarter-cut maple and displays strong figure descending from the centre . The ribs and scroll are cut from matching maple. The varnish is a light golden brown over an amber base, and the chamfers of the scroll and the rib corners were blackened by the maker.

Carlo Giuseppe Oddone was born in Turin, Italy, in 1866 and studied with Benedetto Gioffredo Rinaldi for close to ten years. Rinaldi was a student of the acclaimed Giovanni Francesco Pressenda of Turin (b. 1777 – d. 1854). Oddone travelled to Paris to work with Georges Chanot III and later to London to work with Hills and Carlo Andreoli, returning to Turin in 1901. Oddone died in 1936.

The 1929 Carlo Giuseppe Oddone cello was played on for 12 years by former MIB recipient Rachel Desoer, cellist of the now disbanded Canadian ensemble Cecilia Quartet.

Donor: Dr. Robert S. Williams
Acquired: 2022

Past winners:

2012–2015 Rachel Desoer