Stradivarious Copy by Chow and Sons

Chow and his two sons are Chinese violin makers.  Like some of the other Chinese luthiers they too use German designs when making violins.  This is their Stradivarius copy.  It's 100% handmade using spruce top and flamed maple back, ribs and scroll.  The varnish is a combination of oil and spirit to give it a semi-gloss finish which was then antiquated.  This is a wonderful finished violin that has an aged look.  The overall colour is a brown with orange hues.

From my experience the Chow and Sons workshop produces very consistent sound signatures on their Strad-copy.  The tones are more laid back (not as forward sounding) in comparison to the Frank Lee or Opera House.  Warm sounding could one way to describe it.  I prefer to say it's more neutral in presentation as it's not really muffled and it's not really bright.  It has a very clean sound in the body and resonance of the G and D strings.  It reminds me more of a French sounding violin as it's sweet, clean and vibrant rather than bold, powerful and bright of the Germans.

It has very good balance across all the strings with very good overall projection.  As a bit of eye candy it does have a more ornate pegs and tail piece than the usual black.  Like most lutheirs who are trying to compete in the world market, it's a well made violin with excellent to back up the workmanship.  A very good starter violin, you'd be hard press to find a better one in the city.