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| 'Stradivarius violins' from the LPR. Unique workshop of Father Bartholomew |
| 2023-11-23 |
| Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited. by Victoria Tolkacheva [REGNUM] In the monastery workshop in the village of Chuginka (LPR), it is light because of the large windows, a bird resembling a canary is singing in a cage, and dozens and dozens of shavings are scattered on the floor - the work process is in progress. Here violins modeled on the famous Stradivarius violins are born, and the abbot of the St. John the Baptist Monastery, Archimandrite Bartholomew, is creating musical instruments. Lugansk violins, which received recognition at exhibitions in Europe, became famous in Russia - the abbot of the monastery is only happy, he says, now they will serve their native land. This is, of course, an unusual matter. Where does such complex and unique art come from in a monastery? The answer lies precisely in the personality of Father Bartholomew, in the world - Denis Kuznetsov, who is the founder of the workshop. Even as a child, the clergyman showed a love for music and took violin classes. However, he never became a musician, choosing a monastic path in life. “There wasn’t much time for any classes. But I still made theoretical drawings and studied many masters. But the biggest influence on me was my violin teacher Andrei Andreevich Grebnev, who himself had an Italian school behind him. He passed on his knowledge to me. And then I already had to develop and work further,” Archimandrite Bartholomew shares his story. But the clergyman came to full-time work on making violins only in 2014. Everyone knows what events overtook Donbass then - the war began. The monastery remained on territory controlled by Ukraine until 2022, and it was very difficult for the monks of the Moscow Patriarchate to live under the dominance of the Ukrainian national battalions. Work on violins came to the rescue: Father Bartholomew began to hone his skills even more, and in addition, he took up the restoration of old instruments. Such work brought at least some income to the monastery. Now the workshop has grown a little: together with Father Bartholomew, two more clergy are working on creating violins. This process is certainly not easy, but, according to the monks, you should not be afraid of difficulties; on the contrary, you need to work hard and enjoy any work, even on small things. Making a violin takes place in several stages and begins right from the moment of choosing wood. Usually it is maple or spruce. But it is not enough just to choose the right tree: it must be matured for about 30 years and cut correctly. If the tree is damp, it will not withstand the required load. Moreover, there is a certain canon for cutting wood, which was used in ancient times in Italy. The work also uses natural organic materials: the glue is made from the bile of sturgeon fish. In the St. John the Baptist Monastery, violin makers work according to the standard forms of Stradivari and Guarneri, using mainly the 1743 template. The foundation for the instrument is six blocks, on which strips of wood are placed - shells. Afterwards, the upper and lower decks are cut out by hand and given the required shape and thickness. Next, all that remains is to make the head of the instrument and “fuse” it with the body. “Then the whole thing is cleaned, rounded and covered with glue. After which the violin must dry, mature, so to speak, and this takes another year. Only after such a time does the sound become suitable. You can, of course, tune the violin right away and try to play, but the sound will not be what it should be in the end. It will not immediately have the ability to spread and fill the room. And if the violin is made correctly, then it will be heard better from behind than from the front,” Father Bartholomew explains the nuances of the work. He shows every corner of the workshop: what planes they use, what some measuring instruments and chisels are used for, how and from what they personally mix the glue that coats the tools. So it turns out that the color of the future violin depends precisely on the ingredients in the glue, but not on the wood from which it is made. However, another important point, according to the rector of the temple, is focus on work: “You can’t be distracted from work, so you often have to work late at night when there are no distractions. Because in the morning and during the day there are other tasks, the monastery has its own order. Our monastic life is built parallel to this matter. And at the same time, they complement each other. Work and prayer must go together, and then there will be a result.” On one of the desktops a hefty catalog is found - an exclusive German edition with photographs of all Stradivarius instruments. Archimandrite Bartholomew jokes that this book is like a cheat sheet for them: you can see the color and some details in a good image and almost full size. On the other table where Father Seraphim works, there is another catalog. A little smaller, but very valuable in terms of significance, since it contains photos of instruments that Father Bartholomew made earlier, as well as those that were made in the Tula violin workshop. This happened thanks to the acquaintance of a Lugansk clergyman and a Moscow master working in Tula, Alexander. A year and a half ago, a man heard about a unique workshop near Lugansk in a television news story. I came to get to know each other and a friendship and strong cooperation began. And this is not surprising, because the violins of Archimandrite Bartholomew continue to conquer Russia. Not long ago, a delegation from Novosibirsk came to visit the monastery workshop: journalists filmed a report, and violinist Mikhail Simonyan spoke with the masters. During the conversation, a large-scale but quite feasible idea was born: to “transplant” the artists of the Novosibirsk State Philharmonic onto Lugansk violins, so that the musicians would play the instruments of the same master. “This will give a completely special sound, as if a choir is singing with one voice. We already have almost ready-made instruments that are suitable for a chamber orchestra. So far, two instruments have left for Novosibirsk, but it is a great joy for us that they will sound in Russia. I hope that we will hear them too. Because those instruments that went to Europe are even difficult to find, we don’t know who plays them, where they are, and there is no way to hear them. But I would like to, of course,” laments the abbot of the monastery. Father Bartholomew himself picks up tools largely in order to understand whether they are ready for work or not. But when he starts playing at least a few melodies, the workshop seems to be saturated with sound. A restless canary sings along with the violins, and even with unprofessional ears you can notice how different the sound of each instrument is. The clergyman himself is confident that high music has a great influence on a person. It does not relax, but, on the contrary, teaches concentration, teaches one to think and think. “Music is a way of internal storytelling,” says the monk, explaining his desire to pass on the intricacies of violin making to new students. According to him, for some reason modern masters are not eager to share their accumulated experience with young people, although this threatens the general disappearance of such art. To learn such delicate work, you need a good teacher. Therefore, Father Bartholomew dreams of holding violin lessons in Lugansk, where he can teach those interested in his craft. “Luhansk land is rich in talented people, and God grant that more and more of them appear. And we will try to pass on our accumulated experience to them. May they surpass us in their skill. We have such a desire.” |
| Posted by:badanov |