The Manual of Musical Instrument Conservation

Stewart Pollens served between 1976 and 2006 as the conservator of musical instruments at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, where he restored and maintained a collection of over five thousand instruments. He is the author of over eighty scholarly articles and four books, including Forgotten Instruments (1980), The Violin Forms of Antonio Stradivari (1992), The Early Pianoforte (1995; reprinted 2009), Giuseppe Guarneri del Gesù (1998), François-Xavier Tourte: Bow Maker (2001), and Stradivari (2010), which won a 2011 Choice award for 'Outstanding Academic Title'. In 1997 he was the recipient of the American Musical Instrument Society's Nicholas Bessaraboff Prize for The Early Pianoforte, a study of the invention and early history of the pianoforte. He is also a contributor to The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians and writes frequently for The Strad.

• Introduction; Entries A-Z: Acoustics; Benzotriazole; Bleach; Boxwood; Brass, bronze, and nickel silver alloys; Brass and nickel silver cleaning; Brass instrument conservation; Bronze disease; Calendar; Cents conversion; Chemical analysis; Cleaning: soaps and detergents; Clavichord maintenance; Compo or pastiglia; Conservation reports; Dendrochronology; Dictionary of common and obsolete chemical terms; Disinfestation; Drill bits; Ebony and ebonizing; Electroplating and electro-cleaning; Epoxy removal; Ethics; Flutes; Fortepiano maintenance; French polishing; Frets, tied and fixed; Gilding; Glues, pastes, and other adhesives; Grain painting and marbling; Grit size comparison chart; Guitar stringing; Gut strings; Handling, storage, and transporting musical instruments; Harp maintenance and stringing; Harpsichord maintenance; Helmholtz resonator; Historical metrology; Humidity control; Hurdy gurdy stringing; Illumination level; Inscriptions, faded; Intervals; Iron and steel; Ivory; Japanning; Keyboard instrument conservation; Labels; Lacquer; Lakes; Lead and lead alloys; Leather; Lute stringing; Measurement; Measurement system conversion; Mersenne's Law; Metallurgy; Metalworking; Mold making; Mother-of-pearl and abalone; Nickel silver cleaning; Oddy test; Organ restoration; Overspun strings; Paper, pencil, and ink; Parchment, vellum, and slunk; Patination; Pegs; Piano action regulation (modern grand); Pitch; Proportion; Recording; Relative humidity; Retouching; Rosin; Safety equipment; Scaling; Sealing wax; Sharpening tools; Silver cleaning; Soldering; Solvents and solvent cleaning; Specific gravity; Staining wood; Stain removal; Stradivari's varnish; Stringed keyboard restoration; Tap drill sizes; Tapers; Temperature; Tempering steel; Textile cleaning; Tinning; Tortoiseshell, horn, and whalebone; Tuning and temperament; Vapor-phase inhibitor paper; Varnish; Viola da Gamba strings; Violin adjustment; Violin, baroque fittings and strings; Violin sizes; Violin and viola strings, modern; Vulcanite and ebonite; Wax cleaning emulsion; Wire gauge systems for early keyboard instruments; Wheat paste; Wood; Woodwind instrument conservation; Woodworking.

'As usual with Pollens's writings, this [book] is impeccably researched and thorough … [It] provides a reliable guide to various materials and techniques, from moulding to soldering and dealing with chemical treatments and solvents. It has the potential to improve and develop all techniques, and help us to understand and handle materials and methods with greater confidence. Few of us will ever have to tackle the problem of bronze disease on a bugle, but it's nice to know I now have access to that information, not far away from the immediately helpful entry on 'cleaning: soaps and detergents' … I am very happy and grateful to be able to add [this book] to my reference shelf …' John Dilworth, The Strad