Are Sky-High Strad Prices Actually A Good Thing?

Another Stradivarius sold at auction for millions of dollars last week, and once again, it’s a sure bet that the buyer wasn’t a musician. In fact, there are nearly no musician-owned Strads left, thanks to the ever-escalating value collectors place on the Cremonese gems. But is this necessarily a bad thing? Yes, it does mean that most musicians, even great ones, will never get to play on the best of the old Italian violins, but it also forces the music world to pay attention to the stunning number of great instruments being crafted by living makers.