Italy's violin-makers struggle to hit profitable note

Updated: 2016-05-13 10:57

(Agencies)

Japanese student Yuma Murata, 26, poses for a photograph with the violin he is working on inside a chapel at the Antonio Stradivari institute of higher education in Cremona, Italy, April 22, 2016. [Photo/Agencies]

Edgar Russ, an Austrian who came to Cremona in 1984, says it is tough to make a living by crafting only master instruments and that the town's violin-makers need to change.

"At the end of the day, you work for free," he says.

Russ offers various levels of craftsmanship, a model he says does not sit well with Cremona's traditionalists. But he believes it is a way of prospering and ensuring it remains a thriving centre of violin-making in the long-term.