Buying a Bratsche in the Berge

(That is, buying a viola in the mountains...)

Mittenwald houses, with frescoes, nestled in the mountains.
(Julia's picture)

My parents were here for ten days, during our kids' two-week Pfingstferien (school vacation for Whitsun or Pentecost -- Bavaria has lots of religious holidays!).   While they were here, my mother really wanted to see Mittenwald again, a quaint mountain town in the Alps near the Austrian border.  We had learned a few years ago that the violin my mother had played as a child, which is now Benjamin's, was made in this town (probably before the war) and we were considering looking for a viola there too, for Julia.

 Mittenwald has been famous for the manufacture of violins, violas, and cellos since the late 17th century, and about a dozen Geigenbaumeister still have workshops here.








We learned a little history of the place from the Geigenbaumuseum (violin making museum):  in the middle ages Mittenwald was a stop on the trade route over the mountains between Italy and the Germanic regions to the north.  A native of the town, Matthias Klotz, learned lute and violin making in Padua, Italy (and probably also in Füssen, in the Bavarian Alps), then returned home around 1685 to set up shop.  Mittenwald was a good location to start a luthier business, being on an established trade route, but also the mountain slopes had plenty of high quality spruce and maple trees.

Staute of Matthius Klotz,  Mittenwald's
first master violin maker.

Klotz's workshop, and his students and sons, established the long and successful tradition in Mittenwald as a production center for world-class string instruments.

So... May 21st, Julia and I and my parents arrived on the train (Benjamin stayed in Munich with a friend, Thomas was at work) and walked around the picturesque village for a bit before walking into the first violin shop on the main street.

This first stop was not a success.  Partly my mistake for telling the guy how much (actually, how little, in hindsight) that we were hoping to spend, and partly because his shop is probably the most visible and so he must be a bit jaded about non-serious tourists.  Anyway, he only had two violas, and Julia tried the less expensive, while I got a lecture (in German) about having to pay for hand-made craftsmanship versus instruments made in China...   The patronizing tone unfortunately turned Julia, who was already shy about this whole process, into being very reluctant to walk into other shops.  Ah well, this was a learning process.

 We had a list of addresses and a map, so we walked around (dodging the rain clouds) and tried a couple workshops located in the residential parts of town.  For three of them there was no answer upon ringing the doorbell (since I had foolishly not made appointments in advance, and it was also during the 12-2 lunch hour, it was not a surprise I suppose), but we did find master Anton Sprenger in his workshop, and he was happy to show us a few of his violas.  We didn't find one we loved (Julia thought they sounded like her rental instrument), although it was interesting to learn from him that his family had made Mozart's violin!

Some of Leonhardt's violins, in his showroom.
(Picture by Julia)

Refreshed after a Kaffee und Kuchen break (yum) we convinced Julia to try one more shop.  Luckily.

Rainer Leonhardt's workshop was large, bright, and had over a dozen violas (and cellos, and scores of violins).  I had realized by this time that, of course, you get what you pay for, so I didn't squawk when he pulled out several violas with pricier tags on them as we tried to find the best size for her.  (Unlike violins, which are standard sizes, violas are not, and come in lengths from about 38 to 43 cm.)  As we narrowed down to the 40-41 cm range, Julia picked up a beautiful dark-stained 41 cm instrument.  She played a few notes and her eyes lit up -- it had a warm, rich sound, even for the open A-string (which for many violas seems difficult to achieve).  One of Leonhardt's apprentices, who plays well, came in to demonstrate for us the three or four violas that Julia was considering, and although they all sounded wonderful, the dark-stained one was clearly for Julia (and me) the favorite.  But with price at nearly double what we'd originally thought, Julia seemed very worried about her grandparents spending that much money on her.  She talked to Thomas on the phone for a while, and as it was now after 5 p.m. and she was obviously tired and worried, he suggested we all go to dinner and think about it.  Herr Leonhardt was of course fine with us coming back later, and he drove us to a lovely Bavarian restaurant with really great food.  That helped the decision, which for me and I think my parents was already clear (my mother really wanted to buy Julia a viola).  So after dinner, just having avoided a downpour, we walked back to the workshop and bought a viola!

Julia with Geigenbaumeister Rainer Leonhardt.
(My dad took this photo.  Yes, that's a blue violin behind him...)

My mother took pictures of his workshop while I
dealt with finances.

After it was all settled, with a fabulous viola procured, Julia's mood
skyrocketed...

I miss the baggers...

Grocery shopping is not an insubstantial part of my days here.  I call myself "the packhorse" sometimes:  feeding a family of four effectively-adult appetites means I'm grocery shopping every day, sometimes twice, and then usually get a good arm workout on my walk back home (since we go through the heavy things like milk and fruit the fastest, of course).

Now, living in a big city downtown area certainly has its advantages, but I'm going to complain, just briefly, about one of my pet peeves here:  there are no baggers in the (tight and busy) grocery stores!

Maybe it's the same in central New York or Boston, I don't know, but going to the in-town grocery stores can be somewhat stressful if you're getting more than a hand full of things (which I always am).

Our closest grocery store has very narrow, tightly packed aisles.  If I shop early in the day, I can avoid long lines at the cash, but then the aisles are full of people restocking from big cases...

The most nerve-wracking part is during check-out.  The cashier simply pushes your groceries down a small chute (which should be one of two, but the second is always full of things to return or shelve...) and then I'm fumbling with my wallet and my cloth bags as I try to pack and get out of the way as the groceries of the person behind me accumulate around mine.  *sigh*  Luckily, the people behind me usually don't have much, so they grab their few things and scoot around me as I'm bagging.

I now very much appreciate the baggers at home, whom I'd always taken for granted!  And, I must say, our North-American grocery personnel are usually much friendlier than the cashiers here (but then again, working in these tight and busy spaces all day would make me pretty grumpy too).

 OK, despite my complaints about the lack of baggers, and tight spaces, there are a couple good things here that we could learn from German grocery stores:  first, you have to pay for bags (only 10 cents or so for the plastic ones, but it's enough to deter) so almost everybody brings their own bags or baskets.  Secondly, the cashiers sit.  Why do we expect our poor cashiers to be on their feet for hours at a time?

Starnbergersee, solo

Yesterday was one of the first (at least partly) sunny days in what seems like ages, so I hopped on an S-Bahn in the morning, and in three quarters of an hour was at beautiful Starnbergersee (Starnberg Lake).  Although not perfectly clear, you can see the Alps in the background!

I'm sure this place is packed in high season, and as I walked along the lakeside path there were  many places to sit and ingest or imbibe...

My "lunch"

One of the places along the lake path, which I'm sure gets busier than this!

There were only a few Schifffahrt (boat trip... yes the German word has three f's in a row) possibilities since this was still off-season, so I decided on the one-hour version (versus the 3-hour one) in order to get back before the kids came home.

This is the spot on the lake where King
Ludwig II drowned in 1886
(either alone or with help...)

The boat tour took us around the northern half of Starnberg Lake, which is lovely, and aside from the Alps in  the distance, reminded me somewhat of home.

Town of Starnberg, at the north end of the lake

I wouldn't say I normally like exploring on my own, but it was vey peaceful and relaxing to just enjoy the lake and sun and mountains and not talk to anyone.

A place fit for kings

The Königsplatz, or "Kings Square," is one of my favorite places here, and is very near to us in downtown Munich.  (I even did a presentation on its history for my German course in January, so I've already taken and assembled lots of pictures...)

View of the Propyläen from the steps of the Antiques Collection museum, Königsplatz

Portrait of King Ludwig I, by Joseph Karl Steiler
(from http://www.pinakothek.de/joseph-karl-stieler/
koenig-ludwig-i-von-bayern-im-kroenungsornat

King Ludwig I was the ruler of Bavaria from 1825 - 1848, and had very grandiose ideas for building Munich into a world-class city of art and culture.  (This is also the grandfather of "crazy" Ludwig II who built all the fairy-tale castles outside of town.)

Together with his architects, mostly Leo von Klenze, Ludwig conceived plans for a regal square of ancient Greek architecture, which would serve as a western gate to the city and also be part of a royal corridor from the Residenz, the principal palace in the heart of town (earlier post here), to the summer palace, Nymphenburg (see here).

Von Klenze and King Ludwig I envisioned a "German Athens" for Munich, and in the design of buildings surrounding the Königsplatz you can certainly see elements of the Acropolis...

Glyptothek, designed by Leo von Klenze, built between 1816 - 1830.

The first building on the Königsplatz, in very neoclassical style, was the Glyptothek.  It was designed to be a space worthy of the king's large collection of ancient Greek and Roman statuary.

Interior view from 1900.
from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:
Munich_glyptothek_interior_1900.jpg

Current view of the Glyptothek interior, with Benjamin and me,
discussing the pros and cons of statuary versus pictures...

When we visited the Glyptothek museum I was impressed with how classically sparse the interior is.  Originally the walls and ceilings were covered in colorful frescos and paintings, as you can sort of see in the archive picture. The building was badly damaged by bombs during the war, however, and when it was finally reconstructed, the inside was rebuilt very simply from lightly plastered red brick, which I think shows the statues better.

The Barberini Faun, an original Greek statue from

 c. 220 B.C. (discovered in Rome c. 1625) is the 

most famous piece here.  It is very impressive. 

(And anatomically very correct.  Well, if I knew 

what a real Satyr looked like...)

Opposite the Glyptothek, on the south side of the square is the Staatliche Antikensammlung (State Antiques Collections) which was built in the 1840s to be a counterpart to the Glyptothek and to house the collection of smaller Roman and Greek artifacts:  vases, jewelry, bronzes...  I don't find it quite as interesting as the statuary, but I spent a hour or so in there the other day.

The Staatliche Antikensammlungen, south side of the Königsplatz

 

Most of the artifacts in here are from Greece, originating between the third century B.C. to around 400 A.D.   There were lots and lots of decorated vessels, depicting many stories about Greek gods and heroes.







The most impressive part of the Königsplatz has to be the great western gate, built from 1848-1862 to evoke the mighty Propylaea which served as the entrance to the Athenian Acropolis.

The Propyläen dominates Königsplatz, on its western side.

The Propyläen was erected partly as a monument to a son of Ludwig I, who (being second son and therefore not destined to inherit much at home) had been made the first modern king of Greece in 1832.  The friezes here show battle scenes from the Greek War of Independence (1821-32, against the Ottomans) and the crowning of son Otto, King of Greece.  Ironically, the monument was was completed and inaugurated in 1862 only days before Otto was deposed from the Greek throne...









Of course the grandeur of Königsplatz was a huge draw for the Nazi party, which originated in Munich in the 1920s, and after they came to power they built four pompous buildings on the east side of the square.

The southern of the pair of former Ehrentempel, with one of the
Nazi administration buildings behind it.  April 1938.
(Picture from the Bundesarchiv, via Wikipedia)

Two of these were the so-called 

Ehrentempel ("honor temples") which, in open air, housed the sarcophagi of 16 "Nazi martyrs" killed in the failed 1923 Hitler Beer Hall Putsch. 

These were dynamited by the Americans in 1947 as part of de-Nazification, but you can still see the foundations

Current view, roughly same as archive picture above, with the foundation
ruins of the Nazi temple in the foreground of the former Nazi
administration building (now the university center for Egypt studies)

The other two Nazi buildings from the 1930s are still standing (and I sing in one of them, now the College for Music and Theater, every Monday evening, opposite Hitler's office(!)... more about that in another post).  

View of Königsplatz, from inside the Propyläen, c. 1937
(Picture from the Bundesarchiv)

The Nazis laid concrete tile over the entire Königsplatz, to make it effectively into a large parade ground for their rallies.  After the war the tiles were removed, and the square was thankfully restored to its grassy pre-war appearance.
It is now a beautiful part of town, but still a little eerie (as with many places in Munich, which was the "city of the movement") when you think about how central it was to the Nazi party and the horrors they planned here.

Current view, same vantage point.

In the summer there are often outdoor concerts and theater here, and now as the weather improves, you can see many people simply sitting out on the grass, or on the many steps of the museums, enjoying the regal splendor of the place (and often a bottle of beer)...

Athena looks onto the Königsplatz from her
pedestal on the steps of the Antikensammlungen.