We picked up a guitar lute from the flea market in Zug at the weekend intending to give it to someboday as a present. A little research in the net has thrown up the possibility that it is around 100 years old and could be worth about 2000 chf. I have managed to find a dealer/restorer in France but would prefer to try to offload it in Switzerland.
Any leads gratefully received.

Give it to me. I will ensure that sufficient peopled are annoyed by its playing. i've never played a lute, but I have been to a few lute recitals and suffered death-by-arpeggio...

Try taking it to some Luthiers and they may be to help value it.

dave

Brilliant answer, but where would I find a luthier? They don't seem to be as common as alphorners.

All the below links come from searching for Luthier on www.directories.ch.

http://www.geigenbau-koch.ch/home.html

http://www.hess-geigenbau.ch/

http://www.bossert-luthier.ch/home.aspx

http://www.violon.ch/

http://www.geigenbau.ch/

http://www.luthiers.ch/main/index (this one in English)

Do you know, I didn't even think of doing thatThank you so much.

Some may charge for a valuation. Try and search on net initially for makers name or signature if present.

dave

Be careful,

the swiss Luthiers are very expensive.

I knew 2 in Geneva, they charged 8000.- to make a violin.

I got me a used violin from the flea market, costed around CHF 50, but it had no bridge.

So I took it innocently to the luthier to have a new bridge put on. ( just put on I got the bridge from a shop ).

He wanted to charge me CHF 100.- to put it on . I argued with him, it could not be that expensive to cut out 4 slots on the bridge and shape the curve with a file and put it on.

He told me that was the artistry of the luthier and that was their "savoir-faire", and that a wrong shaped saddle would ruin the violin. blah blah...

Maybe he was right, but still it was too much

I want to sell it, not have one made. It does have a makers mark on it 'Goldklanger' and a man in France is possibly interested. I will get in touch with a couple of auction houses to find out if it is worth selling or whether we should just stick with our original plan and give it as a present.

It's worthless and my birthday tomorrow. Does that help ?

dave

it's my birthday today, does that help?

It was my birthday yesterday and no-one got me a present.... that helps the bestest....
Or I'll trade you some speakers that you might be interested in....

Barbra.

Good point. I know where you live, and its very close so I deserve the rootin'-tootin' lute. Besides which I'm Spartacus and used to play the lute - well the lyre at least.

dave

To be honest I didn't know what a luthier was so I looked it up & came accross those links in the process.

This one http://www.violon.ch that Lou mentioned is in Lausanne, so send it to me & I can get it appraised.



(how's that for subtle! )

Nice idea MM, but we have already decided it is far too much trouble to try to flog it. The lute thing is gift wrapped as I type. What a generous family we are.

How very kind, you'll be needing my address then?

Of course I won't. I know where you live and I know that you are unable to handle such a fine instrument let alone restring it even though we are providing the strings.