“To have world-renowned Suzuki instruments in our catalog is an honor and a great benefit to our dealers,” says SLM’s Jim Eaton, vice president. “Today St. Louis Music is among the strongest and fastest-growing
SLM VP Jim Eaton with Suzuki Violins
wholesale music distributors in the country, and we are looking forward to re-establishing the Suzuki string instruments. The quality and the name are well known to educators everywhere, and we’re pleased to do business with great old friends.” (Both Eaton and SLM’s CEO Mark Ragin worked with members of the Suzuki team during various times of their careers, including when they were in retail.)
Mr. Takashi Suzuki, president of the Suzuki Violin Company, Nagoya, Japan, states that he is “very pleased to have this highly respected line of instruments, a legacy of generations of the Suzuki family, represented by a company whose management team includes a number of individuals with years of experience working with Nagoya Suzuki instruments in the U.S.” St. Louis Music will exhibit the instruments at 2011 Winter NAMM and be prepared to deliver instruments from inventory in January of 2011.
Eaton adds that they have been working hard to price these instruments to be competitive with other student instruments, but “the quality of these instruments, which are still made in Japan, is far superior.”
For more information on placing an order or becoming a Suzuki Violin dealer, please email [email protected] or call 1-800-727-4512.
Suzuki Violin History
Masakichi Suzuki was born in 1859 in Nagoya, Japan. At age 14 he had worked in a lacquer-ware shop and later began his studies to become an elementary school music teacher. He started making violins and by 1888 he had hired several assistants to help in making instruments. Soon orders for violins came in one after the other. It was during this time that he created the first fractional-sized violins.
In 1914 a severe earthquake in Europe, coupled with World War I, prompted a huge increase in orders for Suzuki violins from Japan. The high quality of Japanese workmanship was quickly discovered by the world. Suzuki’s workforce rapidly increased to over 1,000 employees. In 1930 the Suzuki Violin Manufacturing Corporation became a publicly traded company. Suzuki was president, a son-in-law was the administrative assistant, and his son, Umeo, became the managing director.
Shinichi Suzuki, one of 12 children of Masakichi Suzuki, was born in 1898 and would develop the famous Suzuki Method, which strongly incorporates listening skills. It is one of the most popular methods of learning the violin, and thousands of children around the world use it. Educational violins, for which the company enjoys the top market share, are the first violins that beginners take in their hands. There are seven fractional sizes available for the violin, two fractional sizes for the viola, and six fractional instrument choices for the cello.
In regards to pricing, the company does not cut corners on quality because it knows how important this is for young people. A violin that gives the joy of producing beautiful sounds without spoiling its original function is what people need when they are beginning to play music. It is the expert technology Suzuki has developed and handed down through generations of craftsmen that allows it to manufacture easy-to-play, quality educational violins today. From start to finish, the Nagoya Suzuki is the most dependable and well-suited instrument for the progressing student.
The people at SLM have a rich history with the Nagoya Suzuki company as well. “My personal experience with Nagoya Suzuki goes back to 1968 in education, 1979 in retail, and 1981 in wholesale,” says Eaton. “Mark [Ragin] was selling Nagoya Suzuki at retail probably since 1975. [President] Stan Morgan managed Nagoya Suzuki at SLM for five years when he managed the string division.”
