To my knowledge the only qin maker who makes some of his qins specifically for use with silk strings is Wang Peng in Beijing.¹ I now generally use a Wang Peng qin for performance, and in 2004 I arranged to have him send me some qins for resale. Reasonably good ones generally start at about US$1,200 (without shipping).

For many years my main concert instruments were made by He Mingwei in Chengdu. In general their finishing is unexceptional, but I have some with a very good silk string sound. He stopped making qins some years ago, then apparently began again recently. However, I believe these are now aimed purely at the metal string market. Because of the quality of Wang Peng's better qins (which generally cost over $2,000) I can now re-sell one of my He Mingwei qins and/or the one I have by Zeng Chengwei, also of Chengdu. These cost me about $2,000 when I bought them in Hong Kong some years ago.

Before buying a qin, the first question you need to ask is: do you want to play the instrument, or simply hang it on the wall, perhaps with no strings but with the famous couplet attributed to Tao Yuanming, 365-427 CE),

If you do want to take the trouble to play, be aware that the quality of instruments ranges from very bad to exquisitely good; and while I can mention a few guidelines in selecting one, I don't at all consider myself a specialist in this area. Some people apparently can tell the quality simply by knocking on the body with their knuckles and playing a few notes. I cannot do this.

If you see a qin in a general Chinese music/music instrument store, almost certainly it is a glossy factory made instrument. In 1979, in the Cantonese feature film House of the Lute (), for which I provided the music, I observed what seemed to me at the time the two most appropriate uses for such an instrument. It hung on a wall (with strings: one night a string broke, strangling a rat in the process). And it was subsequently used to bludgeon an old man to death.

Some shops perhaps can tell you about qin teachers. In this case you should try to contact the teacher and ask for advice.

An instrument which at first seems to have quite an ordinary sound might improve after a few years (or centuries!) of use; however, a lot of old instruments have very ordinary sound. An instrument, new or old, might be improved, for example, by adding soundposts inside. A good luthier may be able to help with this.²

My biggest problem in testing qins is that almost invariably they come with metal strings on them. It is my observation that almost all qins today are tested with metal strings during the construction process. Since the best qins for use with metal strings are not necessarily the best qins for use with silk strings this means that for me to judge a qin I must first take it home, put on silk strings and try it in the dead of night, perhaps for several weeks.

In the United States the major source of metal string qins is via the website of Wang Fei's North American Guqin Association, in the San Francisco area. Her catalogue sometimes indicates that an instrument can be used with silk strings, but since to my knowledge Wang Fei never uses silk strings,³ this information is difficult to verify.

Appendix: Information dated 1998

I acquired most of the instruments I play today through Dr. Tong Kin-Woon (TKW)⁴ in Hong Kong. The following information comes mostly from him, supplemented by advice from other interested people (particularly in Singapore).

There are factories in several parts of China, including Beijing, Shanghai and Yangzhou, where qins are made. Sometimes they look nice and shiny, but the sound is rarely any good. Often they are painted rather than lacquered, and have hidden structural flaws. The wood may be untreated, hence crack easily.

On the other hand, some of these instruments are quite good. Recently there has been a mini-boom in the demand for qins, and quite a few are being made with false cracking, which gives them something of the appearance of age. As of 1998 there were about 16 factories in Yangzhou making the instrument.

One of the reasons for the rush to make qins is said to be the dwindling supply of good wood, much of it old wood taken from old buildings or even coffins. (Old wood is not necessary better than good quality new wood which has been properly cured, but good quality new wood is also in short supply and it may not be properly cured.)

There are some qin makers in Hong Kong and Taiwan, but the cost tends to be higher than products of similar quality from China. In addition, there are a number of individuals in China and elsewhere who have made a few qins, some of them of very good quality, but these are harder to find. Some are made only for personal use.

The following are the best professional makers, together with an approximate price range (in US dollars; 1998):

• Chengdu:
  He Mingwei: $1,400 - 8,000 (TKW: personally selected, so start at 2,500)
  Li Xingqi : $1,000 - $3,000
  Zeng Chengwei : $700 - $3,000
• Xi'an:
  Li Mingzhong $1,200 - $2,000 (though he is know to ask for as much as $10,000)
• Guizhou:
  Li Guangyi: $500 and up
  good wood is available in Guizhou and Mr. Li apparently has been advised by Shanghai player Gong Yi, so that some of his instruments may be a good bargain.
• Shenzhen:
  Yan Ming has been working with TKW to make instruments, some quite good, starting about US$2,000; output is still very small, though.
• Yangzhou:
  a variety of sources, with prices from about US$500 on up (see below).

As mentioned above, I have a number of new instruments by He Mingwei. The basic sound is very good, but he was rather casual about the finish, typically using ceramic instead of deer horn powder in the lacquer (more recently he is apparently sometimes using deer horn powder), and not rubbing the surface to optimum smoothness.⁵

Variation in price is sometimes due to sound quality, but also sometimes results from some precious stone being imbedded in the instrument or it being a copy of some famous instrument or style. In the case of Li Mingzhong, he is able to get very good old wood (some perhaps Han dynasty, though this is not necessarily the best), and some of his instruments are really very good.

Yangzhou is a center for making music instruments of all types; there is good potential for qins as there is a lot of old wood available. There are factories where the owner hires skilled woodcraftsmen who may know nothing of qins; then he gives them an instrument and asks them to copy it. The result may be a hundred or more identical instruments. Another factory might copy a great variety of styles. One is particularly known for instruments with cracks in the lacquer which look authentically old.

TKW said that one of the best sources has been the factory of a Mr. Tian, because he had as advisor a certain Mr. Liu. After a time Mr. Liu made an agreement that he would be paid by being able to select for himself a certain number of instruments. Since he knew a good sound, he took the best ones; he keeps them at his home in a village an hour or so drive from Yangzhou, and sells them with a healthy markup.

This is typical of the complex factors involved in buying a new qin. It is easy to go wrong if you don't know what you are doing. With an antique the problems are similar (there are a lot of fake antiques, some quite good) but the stakes are much higher.

Hence, unless you are confident of your ability to find a good instrument yourself, I recommend going to someone like Dr. Tong. He currently has about 300 new instruments, including several by each of the individuals mentioned above and many from Yangzhou. He can give good advice on quality and so the result is likely to be better than going directly to a mainland source.

Tong also has several antique qins. Of these he says "certainly one is Song dynasty and some might be older, but it is difficult to prove." Their prices range from about US$10,000 to over 30,000.

In closing I pass on this story from Dr. Tong. In 1994 Christie's sold a Ming qin for over US$100,000. The American buyers paid so much because it had the seal of a Ming prince as the maker. They didn't realize that the prince (Lu Wang) had made dozens of these not-particularly-good instruments, and so they are not much valued by knowledgeable collectors.

See related information under Qin construction or return to the Guqin ToC.

 
Footnotes

1 Wang Peng says that the main differences between his qins for use with silk strings are in three areas.

1. Wood for metal string qins can be thicker than that for silk string qins
2. The top surface of a metal string qin should be a bit flatter than that for a silk string qin
3. The shape of the sound box is somewhat different
   (Return)

2 See further comments under Qin Construction; search for "sound posts" and "metal strings". (Return)

3 As of 2006 the "Listening Room" on Wang Fei's website includes one track of her playing with silk strings, so perhaps this situation may change. (Return)

4 For more on Dr. Tong's actitivies See Tong Kin-Woon Initially I had mine improved by getting a violin maker to rub the surface smoother with a special cloth). Later, after further damage was caused when checking in my qin for trans-Pacific flights, largely due to the change in temperature in the unpressurized airplane luggage compartment, I gave them to Wang Peng for further repair. Their appearance improved considerably as a result. (Return)

5 Initially I had mine improved by getting a violin maker to rub the surface smoother with a special cloth). Later, after further damage was caused when checking in my qin for trans-Pacific flights, largely due to the change in temperature in the unpressurized airplane luggage compartment, I gave them to Wang Peng for further repair. Their appearance improved considerably as a result. (Return)