A Dangerous Journey to Germany

Late in 1813, Lord Burghersh was appointed Commissioner (‘Military Attache’) to the headquarters of the Austrian Army in Berlin, where the ‘allied sovereigns’ (the Emperors of Russia and Austria and the King of Prussia) were in the field against Napoleon and his army, then retreating from Russia.

(Lord Burghersh)

Thinking it might soften the pill of this unexpected development, Lord Berghdersh insisted on packing me up to take my place among his wife’s multiple travelling accessories – accoutrements to keep her entertained during our trip!  Music as cheesecake or wallpaper, perhaps?

Severe damage

We eventually set sail from Yarmouth bound for Sweden in order to enter Germany, avoiding French territory. When we entered the narrow harbour at Stralsund, in northern Prussia, my body suffered such a severe blow that my neck was completely broken, and my scroll was severed from the head of my fingerboard!  This decapitation was caused by a violent explosion on a passing transport brig that was carrying 9,000 barrels of ball cartridges!  Thankfully none of the passengers was seriously injured, but somehow – God only knows how – I lost my ornate scroll head, even though I had been tucked up safely in my velvet-lined case!  Also, part of my outer rib cage had been torn into, creating a large hole in my side, and the top part of my back was dislodged. My body was truly broken.

Caspar Hobf – repairer

When we finally reached Berlin, Lord Burghersh found Caspar Hobf, a highly respected craftsman and well-known Protestant, a native of Bohemia, to carry our my repairs.  He had recently travelled to Berlin from a village near Herrnhut in Saxony (the famous Moravian settlement) in order to be near some forward-thinking friends, and live without fear of the Catholic Habsburg rulers and their infamous and intrusive ‘spy machine’.

Moravian singing

Caspar worked on me, in a manner so reminiscent of my Thomas Kennedy, and he sang Moravian hymns and songs as he did so, with much feeling and emotion. It crossed my mind – as strings cross my bridge – that I was witnessing something of the passion which affected John Wesley so profoundly when he heard fearless Moravian missionaries singing during a violent storm on board ‘The Simmonds’ on their way to Georgia back in January 1736. The spirituality and legacy of the Revd John Wesley and his followers was to have a profound impact on me in so many ways, as will become clear as my story continues.

New resonance

Caspar did a wonderful job, and in some remarkable and indefinable way, managed to enhance my sound!  With the physical replacement of the scroll, the glueing together and the insertion of fresh maple wood, a new tone was somehow added to my voice, even though the scars, the joins and wounds remained ever since. It became richer, and the lower register in particular produced a new resonant quality to my voice which became distinctive – but only ‘to those who had ears to hear it’, of course!

In future years you will witness how I became exposed to a great deal of hymn-singing, as well as how I met players with connections to the region around Herrnhut.  I seriously wonder if Caspar Hobf’s Movarian singing somehow became ‘infused’ and ‘injected’ into my new repaired body.

(Morgenstern auf finstre Nacht – manuscript of a popular Moravian hymn)

Enter the famous Schleiermacher!

While working on me. Caspar invited an old friend, Friedrich Schleiermacher (a famous Berlin preacher, theologian and historian), to ‘try me out’ before returning me into the hands of my owner,Lady Priscilla. It was Professor Schleiermacher who found the new resonance and richness in my voice, and I am convinced there was a connection here with the views he shared at the workbench with my sensitive repairer, Caspar. I learned later that Schleiermacher himself had been brought up in the Moravian Settlement at Herrnhut, and valued the experience – especially the unique heart-felt singing he witnessed there.

• In his writings, Schleiermacher put great emphasis upon the value of our emotions – expressing the view that humanity’s reasoning ability, though a truly wonderful fruit of Enlightenment thinking, must give due and full credit to the significance of emotional experience.  He once told Caspar that he wished he had known me a few years earlier, in 1805, when he was writing his ‘Christmas Eve: Dialogue on the Incarnation’, an essay which describes how music and its powers expose the heart of true religion.  I was flattered!

Repair, Resurrection or Resonance?

In all this, are there parallels with the story of Christ’s damaged and broken body at the crucifixion?  Could my richer sound after my ‘repair’ be compared to the resurrection of Jesus from the dead, even with his wounds remaining?  If our understanding of ‘resurrection’ is perceived as an entirely ‘new life’, (and not just a ‘resuscitation’ or a bodily ‘repair’), could it not also appear as a new ‘sound’ or ‘resonance’, as never heard before?