Giuseppe Rocca

Who was Giuseppe Rocca?

Giuseppe Rocca was an Italian violin maker of the 19th century.

Rocca's preferred models were the 1742 Alard Guarneri and the 1716 Messiah Strad. His instruments are appreciated today and are considered better than those made by his son Enrico Rocca.

Rocca was born in Barbaresco, a small village in the Langhe hills near Alba in Piemonte, and died in Genoa.

His parents were Maria Teresa and Giovanni Battista Rocca. He was educated and served in the military and soon after married Anna Maria Calizzano. At the time, Rocca was a baker. The circumstances are unknown what brought him, in a few years, to take up an apprenticeship in Giovanni Francesco Pressenda's Turin workshop.

By 1834, his wife died and he moved to Turin to pursue his craft. It was during this time that he became acquainted with Luigi Tarisio, a violin dealer, who had in his possession the Alard and the Messiah. These then became the models Rocca used for his violins.

He remarried. His second wife, Caterina Barone died in 1842. Rocca remarried a third time to Giuseppina Quarelli. They had three children, one of whom is Enrico, born in 1847. In 1850, Rocca's third wife died.