At Easter 2022, I left my previous occupation as a church musician and started new life as a self-employed musician. Shortly before the Easter, I still have many vacation days available, so I travelled to Freiburg, Dresden, Postdam and Berlin for spinett shopping plus visiting my favourite concerts (Schubert’s Winterreise, Bach’s family). I remembered it …
Who were the guests staying in Hotel du Lac?“It seems to be permanently reserved for women. And for a certain kind of woman. Cast-off or abandoned, paid to stay away, or to do harmless womanly things, like spending money on clothes.” These were the hotel guests that the novelist Edith Hope spent time with in …
Ring, ring …“Hello?”“Hi, good morning, your organ is ready, I am calling to organize the delivery date with you.” I could not believe my ears, I could not believe what I’ve heard, I could not believe this day is actually coming and in the foreseeable future. I still vividly remember a month ago, how my …
“No one who was there will ever be able to forget the poignant effect of the St. Thomas Boys Choir singing Bach’s St John Passion on Good Friday in 1945, the first year of peace, performed in the beautiful old St Thomas Church, which had been largely spared from the war, but the windows were …
“At what point did one’s youth become part of history?” Peter Hunter, the Cambridge alumnus revisit his university and felt he belonged to the past. But have he and Eleanor grew up since they left Cambridge? One becomes a best seller author, another one becomes a TV celebrity, both are Cambridge graduates, beyond dazzling and …
The first week in January, I was planning to get my own organ. Second week in January, more jobs coming in. Third week in January, I went to Augsburg for organ shopping and ordered one. Yesterday, a friend helped me remove some of my old furniture. The day after tomorrow, a new shelf is arriving. …
Hollandsche Schouwburg in Amsterdam, October 1942. The Jews were locked up in Hollandsche Schouwburg until they were deported to concentration and extermination camps. Their children were sent to the nursery opposite the Hollandsche Schouwburg. In the nursery, a secret rescue operation was happening, this book describes the underground rescue network. Sadly, out of 10 children, …
I spent the first week of 2024 with corona at home. I have had plenty of time to pray, video call with friends and family, reflect on the 2023. I was reluctant to make plan for 2024, because my plan for 2023 has failed thoroughly. Then one friend called, I help her a little bit …
What is Christmas to you? As for me, Christmas is when God left His paradise home. This picture is particularly vivid this Christmas after reading the book “Die Weisheit der Lilien” by Weifan Wang. A book that I encountered in a public bookcase not long ago. “When Adam left paradise, we human began to feelthe …
Today I accompanied 3 funerals on the organ. It was a very special day to accompany funeral on 19.12. Around 90% of the funerals that I played, bereaved families wish to have Dietrich Bonhoeffer’s “Von guten Mächten” (By Gracious Power) at the funeral. This poem is originally written for his fiancée Maria von Wedemeyer-Weller, in …