Unable to afford a violin for his then-young son, Svetozar Bogdanoski took matters into his own hands and painstakingly crafted the instrument on his own. Nearly 40 years later, Bogdanoski’s son is now an acclaimed violinist performing in Barcelona, Spain, and his line of handcrafted, award-winning violins are sought out by top musicians around the world.
“The talent that my son showed at an early age had to be accompanied by a good instrument. Since we couldn’t afford it, I got a crazy idea to make violins — one that would be perfect for him. That is how it started,” Bogdanoski, 69, said.
Based in a humble workshop infused with the smell of varnish and aged wood in North Macedonia’s Veles hill country, the self-taught luthier says he can spend months, even years, crafting a single violin.
Photo: AFP
First, the maple and pine are sourced from the forests of Bosnia and spend years drying before they can be sanded down, shaped and carved into a violin.
Bogdanoski estimates that between 10 and 15 percent of the wood he carefully selects and purchases actually makes the cut in the end. Then comes the complex process of piecing together the instrument and treating the wood, and later testing the violin to make sure the sound is pitch perfect.
“Our obsession, and the goal of our work, is not building violins. Millions of people do that,” Bogdanoski said. “It is about making a sound. That is an eternal search, just like the alchemist’s search for the philosopher’s stone.”
Trained as a painter, Bogdanoski says the art of crafting a violin is a creative pursuit that has little to do with the potentially large financial windfalls that come with making the classical instrument.
“Our work is not commercial, but creative,” Bogdanoski said, while refusing to disclose the price of his instruments.
“If there is commerciality, there is no art,” added his wife and work partner Marija, who is a retired violin teacher.
To date, they have won two awards from the prestigious Violin Society of America, which Bogdanoski said was “confirmation” of their excellence.
Along with the accolades, his violins have been played by prominent classical performers including Robert Lakatos of Serbia and Greece’s Jonian Ilias Kadesha.
However, even with the awards and a sterling reputation, Bogdanoski said crafting instruments capable of new, fresh sounds continues to inspire him.
“Even after three centuries of building instruments, besides the great Italian and Cremona masters, we still have space to search for and make different sound,” Bogdanoski said.
As the sun sets on another scorching Yangon day, the hot and bothered descend on the Myanmar city’s parks, the coolest place to spend an evening during yet another power blackout. A wave of exceptionally hot weather has blasted Southeast Asia this week, sending the mercury to 45°C and prompting thousands of schools to suspend in-person classes. Even before the chaos and conflict unleashed by the military’s 2021 coup, Myanmar’s creaky and outdated electricity grid struggled to keep fans whirling and air conditioners humming during the hot season. Now, infrastructure attacks and dwindling offshore gas reserves mean those who cannot afford expensive diesel
Does Argentine President Javier Milei communicate with a ghost dog whose death he refuses to accept? Forced to respond to questions about his mental health, the president’s office has lashed out at “disrespectful” speculation. Twice this week, presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni was asked about Milei’s English Mastiff, Conan, said to have died seven years ago. Milei, 53, had Conan cloned, and today is believed to own four copies he refers to as “four-legged children.” Or is it five? In an interview with CNN this month, Milei referred to his five dogs, whose faces and names he had engraved on the presidential baton. Conan,
Le Tuan Binh keeps his Moroccan soldier father’s tombstone at his village home north of Hanoi, a treasured reminder of a man whose community in Vietnam has been largely forgotten. Mzid Ben Ali, or “Mohammed” as Binh calls him, was one of tens of thousands of North Africans who served in the French army as it battled to maintain its colonial rule of Indochina. He fought for France against the Viet Minh independence movement in the 1950s, before leaving the military — as either a defector or a captive — and making a life for himself in Vietnam. “It’s very emotional for me,”
The Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP) Central Committee is to gather in July for a key meeting known as a plenum, the third since the body of elite decisionmakers was elected in 2022, focusing on reforms amid “challenges” at home and complexities broad. Plenums are important events on China’s political calendar that require the attendance of all of the Central Committee, comprising 205 members and 171 alternate members with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) at the helm. The Central Committee typically holds seven plenums between party congresses, which are held once every five years. The current central committee members were elected at the