For more than a week now, Jacob Brillhart has been live-streaming on Facebook as he expertly — but slowly — builds a violin by hand, from 7 in the morning until 11 at night.
“It’s absolute dedication,” said Emerson Gale, who’s helping Brillhart with the project. “He might take a short break to have some tea, pet the cat, eat dinner — but then he’s back at it.”
While Brillhart works on the violin 16 hours a day from his home in Chelsea, people from around the country have been tuning in to watch his process, and donating money for a chance to win the fully complete violin, along with a hand-crafted bow.
So far, $20,000 has been raised for the cause. The money is set to be donated in $250 chunks to musicians who have lost the majority of their income because of the Covid-19 pandemic.
Gale, who works with the Seven Stars Arts Center in Sharon, has been organizing the project, helping to find musicians in need and spread the word about the fundraiser. He’s already vetted more than 50 musicians who have applied to get help.
Within 48 hours of the project’s launch, $10,000 had been raised for the cause.
“Our original goal, when Jake and I first talked, was if we made $10,000 — the value of the violin he’s making — we would have been happy,” Gale said.
Now that number has been more than doubled. Plus, right before the project’s launch, Eben Bodach-Turner, a Vermont bow-maker, reached out and offered to craft a bow for the raffle, with the help of Evan Orman, a Colorado bow-maker. That bow is valued at $5,000.
“I think part of the genius of Jake’s idea is there’s this excitement of not just donating to a cause, but also connecting with a real, living craftsperson,” Gale said.
Gale said that same intimate connection was also important in their decision to make the fundraiser specifically about musicians.
“Musicians aren’t in hospitals, they’re not first responders, but in terms of their livelihood, without question, if you’re performing, you lost the majority of your income within the space of a weekend,” Gale said.
“They’re needing to pay rent and buy food, and there’s not a lot of specific projects oriented toward helping them.”
Gale said he’s aware of one project in the same vein as his own. That organization, the Artist Relief Tree, is raising money for artists in general — not just musicians. Gale said talking with the organizers of that project helped him and Brillhart fine-tune their own, making decisions like limiting relief packages to $250, so they’d be under the taxable limit.
“We also wanted to make it concrete for people,” Gale said. “Art in general, you get a little lost. Musicians specifically, you can connect that with faces and names, so the value becomes more clear.”
This weekend, Brillhart will finish building the violin. Then, the varnishing process will begin, which Gale said typically takes around five weeks.
During that time, the pair plans to hold a violin-building soundtrack contest. A panel of judges will decide which minute-long submission best embodies the process of hand-crafting a violin. The winner of the contest will receive a $500 cash prize.
Gale said that’s a big reason why the raffle goes until May 15.
“This is also putting Vermont out into the world, and adding to the Vermont brand,” Gale said. “We’re a state known for self-reliance and entrepreneurial thinking, and we’re showing that with this project.”
Musicians looking for relief can apply for an aid package here, and those interested in contributing can make a donation here.
Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly identified Eben Bodach-Turner.
