THOUSAND OAKS : Learning the Craft of Violin Making

While children in summer camps master the finer points of wooden Popsicle stick art, eight adults are learning the centuries-old violin-making craft during a special two-week class at Cal Lutheran University in Thousand Oaks.

The hands-on course is taught by internationally renowned master craftsman, author and teacher Karl Roy, retired director of the Bavarian State School of Violin Making in Mittenwald, Germany.

The workshop is one of four on violin and bow making and instrument repair taught by experts during the second annual California Summer String Institute at Cal Lutheran.

Sponsored by the university’s office of continuing education and the music department, the institute was established in August for stringed-instrument teachers, serious stringed-instrument players, and members of West Coast violin makers’ societies.

Last year the institute’s bow-making and repair class attracted students from as far away as Japan and Taiwan. The violin-making course was added this year.

“This is the only place on the West Coast that offers these types of classes,” said Denise Aiani, director of continuing education. Previously only the University of New Hampshire offered such courses, she said.

She credited Thousand Oaks resident Gordon Maury Kingman, a retired engineer, with proposing the institute to Cal Lutheran after he had studied with Roy at a summer class in New Hampshire. Kingman, 72, has been making violins and bows as a serious hobby for 40 years.

“You don’t really need many tools to build an instrument,” said Roy, 59. “But it’s very important to have the right tools and to handle and care for them properly.” He demonstrated by

sharpening an arching gouge on a hand-held whetstone for Jim Bruno, 51, a UCLA professor of education.

Then, as fellow students observed, Julie Hinthorne tentatively shaped the maple back of her violin under Roy’s watchful eye. Hinthorne, 46, said she plans to make violin making her profession.

Students may still register for the second week of violin making. The course costs $400 a week. “Basic Bow Making” will be offered July 6-10 for $375 a week. Call 493-3130.