Jost Thöne

Musician • Publisher • Instrument Dealer

Jost Thöne, son of music pedagogue and composer Karl Thöne (1924-1993), was born in Germany near Düsseldorf. Continuing the Thöne family tradition, he studied music and viola at the Academies in Dortmund and Muenster in Germany. During his studies, he also spent a great deal of time learning about the art of violin making and its history. After completing his studies, Thöne decided to become a dealer in fine stringed instruments, with shops in Germany and Italy.

Since 1998, when he established the publishing house “Jost Thöne Verlag”, Thöne has published a dozen large books about the Italian and French violin makers of the last four centuries. These featured more than 120 important violin makers along with their instruments and biographies.

The latest of these works was “Antonio Stradivari”, published in 2010; it became “state of the art” in violin documentation, showing in four volumes 300 violins, violas and cellos of the icon Antonio Stradivari in life-size. This documentation gained international recognition. Some of the books have been translated into four other languages besides English, and are available through international auction houses such as Sotheby’s, Christies or Tarisio in London and New York.

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Jost also founded the Violin Expo Cologne in 2006, creating a globally unique stage to present international contemporary violin making in the historic centre of Cologne. He supervised the exhibition “Antonio Stradivari – Myth and Music” in Cologne in 2010 as a guest curator of the Wallraf-Richartz-Museum & Foundation Corboud. This exhibition was unfortunately postponed due to cultural budget cuts by the city of Cologne.