New Brighton violin designer helps save David Byrne's show at Orpheum Theater
MN violin designer helping save the day for musician
A Twin Cities violin designer helped save the day for a musician that plays a five-string violin. FOX 9's Maury Glover has more.
NEW BRIGHTON, Minn. (FOX 9) - By coincidence, Gary Bartig designed the five-string violin David Byrne's musical director had used for nearly 20 years.
‘Closest instrument to the human voice’
Local perspective:
Bartig has been playing the violin for more than 50 years and designing them for about 20 through his company, Acoustic Electric Strings.
But he never imagined one of his instruments would come to the rescue of a pop music icon.
"It was the furthest thing from anything I could imagine on a Monday afternoon, just doom-scrolling, you know, for a few minutes in the afternoon," said Bartig.
‘I was happy to help him’
The backstory:
On Monday, Bartig received a Facebook message from a member of the stage crew at the Orpheum Theater, where Byrne was going to perform that night.
The message said Byrne's musical director's five-string violin had been knocked off a stand backstage and broken and no music shops in the area carried a similar instrument to replace it.
When Bartig and Ray Suen talked on the phone, they realized Bartig had actually designed the violin Suen had been using for the last two decades.
"He said, 'I'm at the Orpheum tonight. Can I come over?' And I said, 'Absolutely. Come on over. I'll loan you one for both nights if you need them. No problem," said Bartig.
Not only did Suen go to Bartig's workshop at his home in New Brighton and buy two dahlia violins, he got Bartig and a friend tickets to the show the following night, so Bartig could see one of his instruments in action on stage.
The violin designer also got a backstage pass where he met the former Talking Heads frontman after the show.
"David said 'I thought the violin sounded better tonight' so it's like oh thank you. So it was just unbelievable," said Bartig.
A pleasant surprise
What they're saying:
Now Bartig's violins will be touring the world with Byrne and Suen, and that is music to Bartig's ears.
"I feel like a toolmaker to make tools for artists and other people take what I create and make it into a whole other art form, which to me, it just sends me. It's just awesome. It's just awesome. It's awesome," said Bartig.