Segelman Trust London

The Maggini Foundation manages the world-famous collection of the London collector Gerald Segelman (1899–1992), which today belongs to the Segelman Trust UK. The collection comprises 28 violins, one viola and two cellos by important Italian and French violin makers, and ranks among the most extraordinary private string instrument collections of the 20th century. It was complemented by an equally impressive holding of historic master bows.

Gerald Segelman was born in Leeds, the son of Austrian Jewish immigrants. Even as a child he showed an interest in music, though he did not become a professional musician but rather a successful businessman. He made his fortune initially in the cinema business, which he built up together with his brothers before later running his own venues. His well-known pseudonym is thought to have arisen from the name of one of his later companies: in public, the ever-reticent collector went by "Mr Black", a name under which his auction invoices were also issued.

Gerald Segelman (1899–1992), known in the violin world under the pseudonym "Mr Black".

The Collection

From the early 1940s onwards, Segelman began assembling important string instruments with remarkable intensity – within just a few years he had brought together numerous works by Stradivari, Guarneri, Amati and many other significant violin makers. His interest lay less in prestige of ownership than in the craftsmanship and tonal quality of the instruments themselves. The true extent of his collection remains difficult to determine to this day, as he was constantly buying, selling and trading, and kept his records in a highly chaotic and partly coded manner.

Particularly noteworthy is the so-called "Rode" violin by Antonio Stradivari, Cremona 1722, one of the most famous instruments in the collection. Its later owners included the French violinist Pierre Rode and the violin maker Nicolas Lupot. Segelman acquired the violin in 1954; since 2015 it has been held at the Ashmolean Museum in Oxford as a long-term loan from the Segelman Trust.

Historic newspaper cutting about the anonymous collector "Mr Black", the name under which Gerald Segelman operated for decades.

Personality

Segelman was no typical collector of his era: reserved, publicity-shy, and, despite his considerable wealth, strikingly modest in manner. In old age he became increasingly withdrawn and, although he owned several properties, lived very simply. For decades he was accompanied by his companion, who also served as his secretary. He also took a practical interest in violin making and crafted a few instruments himself, albeit with rather more modest craftsmanship than his collection might suggest.

Under his pseudonym, Segelman published several articles from the 1970s onwards in the trade journal The Strad, in which instruments from his collection were featured. His enthusiasm was always directed at the instrument itself – its history, its sound and its craftsmanship. In 2009, the book Mr Black's Violins – The Extraordinary Obsession of Gerald Segelman by Andrew Hooker was published, documenting the instruments in the collection through high-quality photography while telling the fascinating story of one of the most significant violin collectors of the 20th century. This exceptional book is available from the Maggini Foundation.