2013-2017  On the Market and ‘Kenosis’

In September 2013, after Harvey retired from his ecumenical job, I was handed over to a violin dealer in Farnborough, near Bromley, who began to look out for potential buyers for me!

As you know, I have changed hands numerous times in my long life, and it has never really bothered me – until now.

When Harvey placed me into the dealer’s hands, I had been with Harvey for 49 years – by far the longest single period of settled ‘belonging’ to any owner/player since 1810.

As we have already noted, I had poured out my life during these 49 years, bringing many emotional experiences into play from a vast array of musicians, composers, philosophers, theologians, rogues and humble friends.  I know that these experiences affected Harvey’s playing from time to time, and some of them even affected him in a physical and bodily way.  There have been ‘spine tingling’ moments, tears, and involuntary movements of the whole body induced by the resonances and sounds called up from all my past years.

So, why did I feel this separation so keenly?

I know that Harvey’s body endured a huge trauma in 2014 when his son Daniel was diagnosed with a brain tumour, which led to his death in 2017.

Was I strangely connected and mysteriously sharing in a bereavement trauma?  Is it possible that over 49 years, our bodies had somehow become as one musically, and Harvey was grieving for me and feeling my loss, in addition to bearing the intolerable pain of losing his own flesh and blood?

Is it so strange that a separation such as this could have a serious effect on both our bodies?

One thing I do know, during these years, is that Harvey began to find new meaning in the ‘kenotic’ theory associated with the life of Jesus Christ.  The idea that, in Christ, God had poured himself out into his created universe, and emptied himself of all but love, took on a freshness for him.