Emil Heerwagen

Emil Heerwagen (born December 5, 1857 in Klosterhäseler , † January 28, 1935 in Weimar ) was a German organ builder . He headed the Heerwagen organ building workshop founded by his father from 1875 to 1935.

Life

Friedrich Wilhelm Emil Heerwagen was the son of the organ builder Wilhelm Heerwagen (1826–1875) and his first wife Karoline Henriette Heerwagen, née Keller. Emil Heerwagen grew up with an older sister, a younger brother died as a toddler. After the death of his wife Karoline Henriette, who died in childbirth in 1859, his father entered into a second marriage. In 1875 the father died. Emil Heerwagen took over the workshop. A master organ builder had to assist him as a guardian during organ acceptance tests until he was of legal age.

Burkersroda, village church: organ prospectus , 1879

When Emil Heerwagen was busy building the new organ for the church in Burkersroda in 1879 , he also conveyed spring poems through inscriptions: “At the time this organ was being built, my firm decision was to marry the daughter of (...) zu Lißdorf one day. Mine is now God - army car ", also:" The construction of this organ went very slowly. Army car, organ ”. On July 6, 1879, he married Karoline Wilhelmine Amalie Brandt from Lißdorf . Heerwagen was active in the region between Saale and Unstrut around Klosterhäseler until 1896. Here alone, over twenty new organs were built in a small area in villages between Naumburg, Nebra, Eckartsberga and Bad Kösen, almost all of which still exist today - with varying degrees of preservation. These instruments are on the one hand indebted to the romantic taste of the time at a high level of craftsmanship, but combine it with older traditions in organ building, which gives them a special utility today, but at that time also led to criticism because they did not follow the mainstream in everything, for example in sound the string register. But this relatively small area was not enough to get enough orders, so work was carried out in the Berlin area and in Halle. Nevertheless, Emil Heerwagen got into "Concours" in 1892. However, he was apparently able to come to an agreement with his creditors and moved his business the following year because of the railway connection to Bad Kösen to Borlachstrasse 68. On an organ that he built for the church in Briest near Brandenburg and in the hall of the inn "Zur Tanne" had set up, he gave a spiritual concert here in 1896.

Because he was increasingly receiving orders from the Grand Duchy of Saxony-Weimar, he moved to Weimar at Meyerstraße 35 in 1896 . As a result, instruments were created in the area around Weimar, Erfurt , Jena and Eisenach . Some of these organs, for example the one in Bucha near Jena , were accepted by the "legendary cantor", the Weimar court organist Gottschalg, and here he writes, "(...) that the organ in question is perfectly acceptable and that the builder deserves all credit" .

Heerwagen also remained active in his old homeland. When the prospect pipes of the organs were confiscated during the First World War as raw materials essential to the war effort, he made a virtue out of necessity and expanded it, albeit not without first making elevations of them, which were of great value for the later reconstruction of these pipes and which are today can still access archives. "For decades he has been traveling tirelessly from place to place to give old, dusty organs a new look and a noble, dignified sound (...) and many parishes enjoy the sound of his newly built organs every Sunday," he said after his death on January 28, 1935 in a Weimar newspaper obituary.

As a successor, he recommended organ builder Gerhard Kirchner (1907–1975), Weimar , to his clientele .

Literature & sources

• Rolf Walther: Wilhelm and Emil Heerwagen - organ builders shape a region. For the 180th birthday of Wilhelm Heerwagen. In: Ars Organi . 54, 2006, no. 4, pp. 228-229.
• Rudi-Arnold Jung: The organ builders Heerwagen in Klosterhäseler, Bad Kösen and Weimar . Typescript in the Klosterhäseler organ building museum .
• Parish archives Bad Bibra: church records from Klosterhäseler

Web links

• Website of the organ building museum Klosterhäseler