Markneukirchen – The World’s Music Corner

In 1945, Fred Wilfer, a violin maker, found himself engaged in international espionage. Using a borrowed US Army truck, he was smuggling goods from the Czech region of Bohemia and his hometown of Markneukirchen, both of which had fallen behind the Iron Curtain, to West Germany. As he reached the border, Czech officials called for Wilfer to stop. He felt panic rising as they moved to search his truck. Suddenly, an American soldier vouched for him, and Wilfer crossed the border without revealing his truckload of contraband.

What was so important that it would turn a violin maker into the instrument world’s James Bond? Tonewood and instrument-making tools for the luthiers that had fled to West Germany. The border between Saxony and Bohemia is known as the Musikwinkel, or Music Corner, for its centuries of instrument production, and Fred Wilfer wasn’t going to let that long tradition die.

Markneukirchen’s Early History

Violin-making in the Musikwinkel has always been shaped by war. After the Thirty Years War, a small group of Protestant luthiers from the Bohemian town of Graslitz fled the Catholic region for Markneukirchen in Saxony. In 1677, twelve Markneukirchen luthiers founded the Violin Makers’ Guild, Germany’s oldest, continuous trade organization. The guild codified high standards for violin-making and training. Prospective luthiers would begin as apprentices to a master. Next, they would become Journeymen and enter their “Wandering Years,” traveling throughout the region to work under various masters and perfect their craft. To finally be recognized as a Master, a Journeyman had to complete the Meisterprüfung, a guild exam that included creating a Meisterstück, or “master piece” instrument to demonstrate their skills. Once a Journeyman became a Master, he was allowed to set up his own instrument-making workshop and take on his own apprentices, starting the training cycle anew.

Markneukirchen luthiers’ detailed craftsmanship led to the town being nicknamed “the Cremona of Germany,” after the famous center of Italian violin-making. In the early 1800’s, Musikwinkel violins were often characterized by free-form rib construction and a singular piece for the neck and upper block. In many instruments of the period, the presence of high arching calls to mind the Tyrolean style of Jacob Steiner. Early nineteenth-century luthiers like Johann Georg Schönfelder II and Johan Gottlob Finker I reflected Italian influences. However, the sheer volume of violin-makers in Markneukirchen makes it difficult to lump these truly unique instruments into a single category. There is a Markneukirchen violin to suit everyone’s individual tastes and needs!

Expansion and Industrialization

Markneukirchen’s guild quickly made it the center of the Musikwinkel, and the related industries of string and bow making blossomed alongside violin-making over the next century. Markneukirchen was not marked for purely local success, however. In 1713, the Violin Makers’ Guild made a decision that set the stage for international success. It admitted a merchant, Johann Elias Pfretszchner, who opened the small town to wider and wider markets. As the Markneukirchen violin-making industry grew, traders’ power began to eclipse the guild. Dealers would pile up a wheelbarrow full of instruments and travel from town to town. Eventually, as international trade became easier and increased at-home music making raised demand for instruments, the wheelbarrow traders transformed into large firms. The Violin Makers’ Guild continued to exist, but its power over the quality and distribution of Markneukirchen instruments diminished.

At the dawn of the nineteenth century, Markneukirchen luthiers were producing about 18,000 violins a year. Luthiers responded to the Industrial Revolution by shifting from making entire instruments to specialization. Artisans would specialize in one part of the violin, such as the fingerboards or tailpieces, and supply them to Masters who would put the whole instrument together. Masters purchased premade Schachtels, meaning “boxes,” which comprises the back, neck, top, and ribs of a violin, to customize. Bohemian women, known as Botenfrau, carried Schachtel across the border on their backs to Markneukirchen luthiers. These production changes allowed violins to be quickly and cheaply produced to meet the hungry, international market for Markneukirchen instruments.

Markneukirchen blossomed into a small, prosperous city, boasting more millionaires per capita than anywhere else in Germany. By 1913, the Musikwinkel produced 40% of the world’s string instruments, totaling over 150,000 violins a year.