University of Oxford

Graduate Student, Music

B.Sc. Hons. (Lond. Guildhall), M.Mus. (Leeds) D.Phil, (Oxon. - in progress)

St Cross College : benjamin.hebbert@gmail.com

Thesis Title: The Rise of Commercialism: Instrument Makers and the Material Consumption of Music in Early Modern London

About

In my professional life, I am an expert and dealer in fine violins for Stringers of London and Edinburgh (http://www.stringersmusic.com). I was formerly head of the musical instrument department at Christie’s in London and have represented and consulted with most things string related from instruments for students to eighteenth-century Italian masterpieces.

Recently, as an instrument maker I have made double bass and cellos for "Scrapheap Orchestra", a documentary by Love Productions shown on BBC 4 in December 2011. The BBC Concert Orchestra performed the 1812 Overture on a 44 piece band made of junk and recycled materials at the Proms in the Royal Albert Hall. The documentary tells the story of how they were made and the nailbiting journey from scrapyard to concert hall (http://www.facebook.com/pages/Scrapheap-Orchestra/153170721456291)

As an academic, my doctoral thesis uses a methodology of 'material musicology' in order to evaluate the history of music in England from about 1500 to 1725 through the experiences of makers and consumers, firstly to document the shift in London from a patronage based economy to a commercial market, and also to examine the integration between music and the broader cultural context of the time through the material medium of musical instruments and other physical artefacts. In simple terms, I am looking at the history of music from the instrument maker’s perspective, and seeing where it is different from the history written from the composer’s point of view.

I have taught on instrument making courses extensively at London Metropolitan University where I was a part time lecturer specialising in instrument design analysis and history, and at West Dean College where I was senior lecturer and program leader for musical instrument making, furniture making and furniture and objects conservation. I also taught history of decorative arts and material culture to MA level at West Dean through the University of Sussex.

I have also been awarded two fellowships at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, one in Art History and the other in Conservation Science in order to further work on issues of authentication. In addition I was also consultant curator to the Royal Conservatoire of Music in Toronto. In an earlier life, my professional training concerns the forensics relevant to the authentication of paper objects, and I worked first as an apprentice and then in the dealing department of Stanley Gibbons Ltd.

My work at Oxford is highly influenced by my training as a musical instrument maker, and by a desire to understand the genesis of instruments that we copy today. As a respected authority on the authentication and connoisseurship, I have been a consultant for numerous musicians, collectors, and museums worldwide.

See:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/30/nyregion/30violin.html

http://www.thestrad.com/nStory.asp?id=528

http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/letters/letters-stradivarius-violins-859959.html

Toronto Globe and Mail, 25 June 2009:
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/arts/rare-hart-house-viols-to-make-stage-appearance/article1195585/

Standard (Romania) 10 September 2009
http://standard.money.ro/articol_106243/viori_de_20_milioane_de_euro_canta_la____enescu.html

Money Express, 22 September 2009
http://moneyexpress.money.ro/articol_19168/cutia_de_rezonan__a.html

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