The man who invents chimes
Swiss manufacturer JMC Lutherie has created a resonating case to amplify the vibration of Audemars Piguet's chiming watches. An interview with Jeanmichel Capt, the man behind the concept of this melodious case.
The story behind the birth of this resonating case is as charming as that of Audemars Piguet's timepieces themselves. This because it is the fruit of a close collaboration between luthier and horology craftsmen who mingled their ancestral know-how and sensitivity in the heart of le Brassus, just a few steps away from Audemars Piguet's headquarters.
“When the horology Manufacture commissioned me to come up with a harmonious, wooden resonance support that would be able to amplify the very sustained sound of a chiming watch, I thought of a case that would look like a grand piano,” recalls luthier Jeanmichel Capt, who founded JMC Lutherie. This particular case comprises two ultra-thin harmonic tables made of Vallée de Joux's native spruce. Three chords tuned to the watch's frequency give sustainability (the ability to maintain a note) to the very short sound of the timbres allowing the watch's ring to be tuned. Mr. Capt's passion for his craft is obvious as he explains, “This allows the note to be prolonged while having fun approaching it as closely as possible” while demonstrating the chiming device in his workshop.
This unusually elegant object is not created by chance. The harmonious wood must be absolutely perfect. The specialist himself goes out to find it, selecting his trees in the surrounding forests. The best specimens are very rare, less than 1 in 10,000. “I learned the technique with a tree gatherer, an old lumberjack who spent the better part of his life in the forest. I found out how to discern perfection using objective – as well as subjective – criteria by trying to sense the tree's vibration,” explains Jeanmichel Capt. Once the tree has been felled, the trunk is quartered and stored all winter before being cut into thinner planks which are aged for 15 to 20 years. It's only after this long period of rest that the wood can reveal its sensitivity by vibrating on either an instrument or a modern audio speaker (Soundboard) the luthier manufactures.
The resonance cases are sent across the globe with Audemars Piguet's chiming watches.
www.jmclutherie.com
