A History of Violins – Director: Cal Coons/Writer: John Callaghan
This one starts with Frankie and Trudy attending a violin concert featuring a famous (but somewhat reclusive and eccentric) violinist named Natasha Petrov. Frankie and Trudy run into several interesting people before the concert: Frankie’s mother, Nora, who’s there with her latest beau (a music dealer called Patterson Rogers); a know-it-all named Tamara Gordon, who’s
pontificating about Natasha’s very expensive violin; an arguing couple (Marcel and Helen Guillaume) that Frankie has to threaten to get them to shut up: and a friendly woman named Simone Jordane, who’s a huge fan of Natasha Petrov. The concert finally starts and Natasha wows everyone (playing on a balcony above the stage), but the concert is interrupted when the lights go out in the theatre. Natasha screams and when the lights come back on, her violin is gone, stolen right out of her hands.
The cops aren’t too concerned with the theft, so Natasha hires Frankie and Trudy to find her violin, which she values more for its playing than its 
monetary value. Frankie talks to Patterson, who says he doesn’t go near stolen merchandise, but suggests Frankie talk to Tamara. At the theatre, a stagehand tells Trudy and Natasha that some guy pushed past him and jumped into a taxi. He didn’t think to stop the guy at the time, but did manage to get the taxi number. Tamara tells Frankie the stolen violin is one of a kind and probably worth at least $50,000 but says the cultural loss is even greater. Simone shows up to hire Frankie to find her car, which was stolen from outside a restaurant the same night the violin was taken (although Simone doesn’t think the two thefts are related). Frankie can’t spare any time from Natasha’s case, so she introduces Simone to Mary, who’s eager to help. Trudy and Natasha talk to the taxi driver and
when he tells them where he dropped off the guy from the theatre, Natasha freaks out. Frankie runs into Nora at the office, who asks her not to mention any of Nora’s past “indiscretions” since she really likes Patterson. Frankie gets a call from Trudy and goes to meet her and Natasha at the address the cabbie gave them. Turns out Natasha’s asshole of an ex-husband (Connor Griffin) lives there and she’s ready to strangle him for stealing her violin.
Connor admits he took the violin but figures it kinda belongs to him since he bought it for Natasha as a gift before their divorce. Trudy finds one of Patterson’s business cards and Connor says he called Patterson’s office to 
ask about selling the violin, but didn’t get an answer. Before he had a chance to try another dealer, two people (a man and a woman) busted in, hit him on the head, and took off with the violin. Natasha is apparently not too pissed off at Connor, since they end up making out. At Patterson’s place, he really comes on strong with Nora but she seems to be holding out for a commitment. Frankie waits until Nora leaves and asks Patterson about the violin. He denies stealing it, saying Nora was with him the previous evening. Mary meets with Simone and quickly realizes her car wasn’t stolen, it was towed for being illegally parked. At the office, Nora gives Frankie shit for suspecting Patterson and
confides that she thinks he’s getting ready to propose. At the police station, the officer in charge of impounds is a total asshole when Mary asks him to look up info on Simone’s car and Mary ends up feeling like shit. Simone gives Mary a pep talk, telling her she needs to be more assertive. At the office, Tamara harangues Frankie for not finding the violin yet, which pisses Natasha off. Tamara tells them a story about Claude Debussy, who supposedly spent some time in Canada with some mystery woman, for whom he wrote a sonata. That piece has been lost ever since, but Tamara has heard rumours that Natasha’s 
violin holds the key to finding the missing sonata. Tamara doesn’t care about the monetary value of the sonata, but wants it to be shared with the world. Connor tells Frankie and Trudy he bought the violin at an estate sale a year or so ago, which doesn’t really help much. Natasha goes to Wendy’s to drown her sorrows and Frankie sends Flo to keep an eye on her. Their fun time is interrupted when Marcel and Helen show up with a gun.
Wendy tells Frankie and Trudy about Marcel and Helen taking Natasha and Flo at gunpoint. At the police station, Mary has taken Simone’s advice to heart and bullies the impound officer into giving her the info on Simone’s
car (though her new assertiveness is probably helped by her threatening to report him for dereliction of duty). Mary gets the call about Flo and Natasha being kidnapped and Simone offers to drive her to the office. Marcel and Helen take Natasha and Flo to their music store and interrogate Natasha about how to use the violin (which they stole from Connor) to find the lost concerto, but of course Natasha has no clue. Simone tells Frankie she overheard the Guillaumes at the theatre the night of the theft talking about their record store, so they all head over to check it out. Flo has left a message traced into the grime on the 
front window, so they know it’s the right place. While Mary distracts the couple, Frankie and Trudy sneak in the back and get the drop on them. The Guillaumes admit they stole the violin, but say they just wanted to find the lost concerto so they could sell it at their store and keep the business from going under. Simone shows up and picks up Helen’s gun, forcing Natasha to extract a piece of paper from the violin with a short sequence of musical notes on it. Frankie tries to stop her, but after a brief fight Simone threatens them with the gun again and takes off.
Natasha memorized the sequence on the paper, which Trudy figures out is a secret code. They take it to Patterson, who tells them it refers to a specific cello at the University of Toronto’s music department. They go to the
University and check the cello, finding a note inside that says Clair de Lune (Debussy’s most famous piece). They check the sheet music for Clair de Lune and find the lost concerto, but when they hear a noise, Trudy leaves the music on a table. The noise was Simone, who hands over the gun and tells them the concerto was written for her mother, who was Debussy’s mystery lover. Her mom was senile before she died and hid the concerto, so Simone has been looking for it, trying to talk to Natasha at the theatre and using Mary to keep tabs on 
Frankie’s investigation. Frankie and Trudy agree the concerto should belong to Simone, but when they go to get it, the table is empty and Paterson is gone. Frankie confronts Patterson as he and Nora are getting ready to leave town. But when Nora finds out he stole the concerto, she gets pissed off and punches him in the balls. Later, Natasha plays the concerto for a select group (Frankie, Trudy, Mary, Flo, Nora, Simone, and Tamara) and Simone apologizes for lying to Mary. Frankie also apologizes for screwing up Nora’s romance, but Nora thanks Frankie for looking out for her.
This is a pretty good episode that gives us a good mystery with a ton of suspects. As far as I can tell, the whole thing about Debussy having a Canadian lover is made up; it’s said that Debussy came to Toronto when he was 23 (which would’ve been in 1885) and met Simone’s mother, but Debussy spent 1885-1887 in Rome studying music. It’s possible that he did
make several trips back to France during that time to visit his mistress, Marie Vasnier, and he supposedly did write a piece for her that was lost after being sold at auction in 1926 before being rediscovered in 2018, a year before this episode aired. So maybe that was the inspiration for this story, with the writer changing Marie Vasnier into a Canadian woman to bring the mystery into Frankie’s territory. Simone is an interesting character, who’s willing to do anything to recover the concerto that meant so much to her late mother. Simone is a bit manipulative at times, but ultimately seems like a good person (and a 
pretty tough broad … she takes a couple of punches from Frankie and keeps going). I like how Simone inspired Mary to stand up for herself … at times, I almost felt like there was a slight vibe between them. That would be interesting; Mary’s never shown any attraction to women, but she did recently say she was ready to give up on men because she was having so much trouble finding the right guy, so it would’ve been cool to see her explore other options (and Simone does invite her to dinner at the end of the episode). Unfortunately, it looks like Simone never appears again, so that’s an opportunity wasted.
Noticeable Things:
- Tamara mentions the Mona Lisa being stolen “ten years ago”. That happened in 1911, which would put this episode in 1921, but maybe she just meant approximately ten years ago.
- Natasha says Debussy died “about five years ago” and since he died in 1918, that would mean this episode is set in 1923, which fits better with surrounding episodes.
Favourite Quotes:
- “Well, it’s best to get an early start.” Mary when Simone questions her desire to start working at six in the morning.
- “All right, all right, no need to make a moment out of it.” Nora when Frankie points out how fond Nora is of Patterson.
- “Seriously, Connor, a clarinetist!” Natasha pissed off that her ex was cheating with someone from the woodwind section.