Mrs. Ralph Isham purchased these five instruments for the Isham Library because she firmly believed that the seventeenth and eighteenth century music housed by the library should not only stimulate scholarship but also be brought to life through performance. The collection of instruments itself has an important place in the history of the performance of early music, for it was used by the Munich Quintet of Viols, one of the first professional chamber groups of the twentieth century to specialize in early music. The ensemble and its instruments were assembled by Willi Schmid, a cellist, musicologist, and music critic for a Munich newspaper. Throughout the early 1930s, the quintet toured across Europe performing varied programs ranging from Dufay to Purcell. The members were: Prof. Valentin Haertl, diskantviole, Prof. Anton Huber, altviole, Willy Stuhlfauth, altviole, Josef Koehler, tenorviole, Dr. Willi Schmid, bassviole. Tragically, their great success was cut short by Hitler and a terrible mistake, for Willi Schmid, confused with a different Schmid marked for assassination, was taken from his home during the Night of the Long Knives in 1934 and shot by the SS. The last concert of the quintet was two weeks later on July 16 where the quintet performed with Rudolf Hindemith, Paul Hindemith’s brother, taking the place of Willi Schmid on bass viol.
Thanks to the efforts of countless performers and scholars in the intervening years, it is now known that none of the instruments in the quintet were originally built to be played together as part of a viol consort. Indeed, one of the instruments, a viola d’amore is not a viol at all and was used in the eighteenth century as a solo instrument. Two are pardessus, an instrument that was invented in eighteenth century France so that amateurs, mostly upper class women, could play violin sonatas easily (with frets) and in a more dignified playing position (in the lap). The star instrument in the collection is the Barak Norman bass viol, but, since this was made in 1717 long after the last consort repertoire was composed, it would have been intended as a solo or continuo instrument in chamber music. The last instrument in the collection, currently a very large bass viol, has been so altered from its original condition that it is difficult to tell exactly when it was made. However, it has been cut down from a much larger instrument of double bass size and is probably eighteenth century work. If so, it would have been used originally in the continuo section of baroque orchestras. Since no music was ever composed for such a disparate set, the Isham instruments are no longer played together as a group; they may, however, still be heard separately on special occasions. Although the collection was originally acquired in order to present the priceless manuscripts in the Isham Library to the public, it is now recognized that the instruments themselves are equally rare and irreplaceable testaments to the musical culture of their time.
