MALVINNI STRINGED INSTRUMENTS

My name is Vedant Koppera, and I am a professional violinist in Santa Barbara and have been playing the violin for over 25 years (
). My experience with David Malvinni of Malvinni Stringed Instruments has been extremely NEGATIVE, and I would recommend avoiding this business.
I contacted Malvinni Stringed Instruments to rent a violin from him after my own violin was stolen. Despite telling David my story, giving him my professional business card, driver’s license, and credit card, he repeatedly asked me if I was going to run away with his instrument, which was insulting at the time especially given the the circumstances under which I had contacted him. However, I desperately needed an instrument to perform, so I ignored it. I asked him if he would be willing to prorate the 3-​month rate on a monthly basis, and he agreed, making a note of it on the contract. Unfortunately, I have not been able to find my contract to prove this point, but I do have another witness who was with me when I signed this agreement.
When I came to return the instrument after two months, asking for the last month amount to be returned, he said he did not prorate his rentals. When I disagreed, he said I was being aggressive for using his first name, claimed I had scratched his instrument in two places, and was at fault for breaking a string (which he initially said he would have been happy to replace for free). He gave the impression that he had been doing me a favor for renting a violin he normally doesn’t rent out, which was a lie. The reason I had selected this particular violin, because it was rented out previously to a UCSB student for a year, and sounded more broken in than the other ones he had shown me. So the violin I had was not brand new, and I am sure the scratches he accused me of producing were from prior renters. I told him to just keep his money.
The truth is that I used his instrument for a total of 2.5 hours over two performances. The second time, the D string broke at the peg while tuning, a sign of an old string, and nothing I had done. I had to run home to grab my spare violin for that performance, and since then, I have been using my own spare violin that I setup with nicer strings and a $ 10 bow from folk mote music, while I search for a proper replacement of my stolen instrument.
Based on my above experience, I would not recommend Malvinni Stringed Instruments.
If you are looking for anything related to violins in Santa Barbara, I would recommend Jim Wimmer and Folk Note Music. If they can’t help you directly, they know people who can. Most importantly, they are friendly and respect their customers.