Northshore magazine showcases the best that the North Shore of Boston, MA has to offer.
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NORTHSHOREMAG.COM 44 APRIL 2018 to play, launching his future career. He even met his wife, Laurie, at a dance camp. Before too long, Rowen was buying violins in various states of disrepair at ea markets, yard sales, and thrift stores, all the while working as an engineer at General Electric. In 1995, he realized the side business he'd built had grown into a full-time job. "With my background as an engineer and technician, I already had the skills for tool-making and fabrication," Rowen says. "It was a natural thing—in terms of going into something I've never done before, my skill set matched." ese days, instruments come to him— sometimes in pieces—like the one he repaired for himself, a 99-year-old violin handcrafted in Lynn by Pierre Cyr, likely made from local wood. "People bring me violins that are practi- cally destroyed," Rowen says, noting that his brother, Marty, found the Cyr for him, and he knew right away that it was a special one, with a deep impression worn in the neck and grooves where the bow had hit the body. "Someone had played the heck out of it," he says—as he has continued to do for 30 years. Rowen's love of strings and careful attention to detail draw everyone from parents looking for a quarter-size rental violin for a kid just starting out to clients restoring family heirloom cellos and traveling musi- cians seeking emergency repairs. His studio is tucked down a long driveway on a wooded lot, marked only by a tiny violin-shaped sign at the top of the steps. Rowen prefers to purchase "unadjusted" violins and set them up personally for ease of playing—a complicated process that can involve a lot of woodwork, from tting the pegs to planing the ngerboard, possibly carving a bridge and a tailpiece, and stringing. "I set each one up as if my own child is playing it," Rowen says, explaining that even the distance between the strings and the / L I V E + P L AY / CONTACT rowenstrings.com ngerboard has an impact. A larger distance, which is often found on an inexpensive instrument, makes it harder to play. "If it's too far, you have to use so much energy just to push the strings down to the ngerboard," he says. "If the strings are just right, you barely have to touch them." Because violins are made from wood— which breathes and changes with the weather and the seasons—two from the same shop and even the same tree can have subtle dierences that need to be addressed. "A stringed instrument is like a snowake—no two are alike." While Rowen can understand the pricing appeal of shopping online or at a big-box store, he says you get what you pay for. "A week doesn't go by that someone doesn't come in here with an instrument that they bought online and are disappointed in," he says. But don't despair—he is here to help. "I can improve just about every instrument that comes in the door." Rowen, who works on about 1,000 stringed instruments a year, taught himself how to play the violin as an adult.