The Instrument of Hope
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Not completely sure how I feel about this, but you don't often hear about custom trumpets by Josh Landress on NPR. It was part of "Weekend Edition" on NPR this morning.
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Old thread I know but I just saw this and had to speak.
This use of old bullets or perhaps the brass spent cartridge cases to manufacture a brass instrument is for me a wonderful use of old brass that has a bad history and could perhaps be healing for the community.
I wholeheartedly approve of such an enterprise.
I see a parallel here with Besson post 1918.
It is believed and well publicised that after 1918 brass was in very short supply in Europe in general and in France in particular, having been swallowed up in armaments manufacture.
Besson it has been said adopted a policy of acquiring all the spent brass shell cases that were littering the fields of battle and the trenches.
These shell cases were then used to manufacture their instruments.
The instruments played with a beautiful sweet tone which has in part been attributed to the characteristic annealing effect of the exploding propellant when the guns were fired.
To me both physically and emotionally the two enterprises, Josh Landress use of modern spent cartridges and the Besson use of spent shell cases fit well together.
If this were nothing more than an excellent and peaceful use of war material that would be enough but I feel that it demonstrates that we can turn away from war and move on and this re-use of these materials illuminates a beacon of hope that we can bring order from chaos and healing from misery.
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Beating swords into plowshares.
