‘The Wandering Civil Servant of Stradivarius’ by Desmond Cecil, CMG
In an extract from his recently-released memoir, Desmond Cecil retells the remarkable stories behind his life as a violinist and diplomat
This is not a ‘conventional’ diplomatic memoir about political ‘revelations’, but a passionate account of the vie extraordinaire of a young professional violinist in Switzerland, a senior British diplomat around the world, a nuclear environmental expert in post-Soviet Russia, and pro bono work with arts charities around Europe. The Russian language and culture feature strongly.
Desmond Cecil with Mstislav Rostropovich, Cremona, 2004. All images courtesy of the author
Hearing Yehudi Menuhin play solo Bach and Bartók in Oxford’s Sheldonian Theatre in 1959 would prove an epiphany for the seventeen-year-old Desmond Cecil. Already an advanced oboe student of Joy Boughton, he decided there and then, against all the odds, to become a violinist. This autobiography tells the remarkable journey its author took in his quest to follow his passion to perform music – eventually with his own Stradivari violin.
He decided, after Chemistry and PPE at the Queen’s College, Oxford University, to move in 1965 to Switzerland for full-time violin study with the illustrious Max Rostal, staying there for five years as a professional violinist, playing with and leading various Swiss chamber orchestras. He gives much detail on violin technique and repertoire. Eventually realizing he had started the violin too late to become a top soloist, and by then a fluent multi-linguist. he returned to the UK to join HM Diplomatic Service in 1970.
His initial diplomatic training was to polish up his Russian, studying with the Foreign Office’s top teacher, the formidable Countess Shuvalova, which resulted in him speaking with a ‘smart St Petersburg’ accent. After an aborted Moscow posting because of a visa war, he was first sent to Bonn as a junior diplomat albeit with fluent German, where he dealt directly with well-known German politicians. This was followed by a spell as UK Press Officer at the UN Geneva, handling the international press and visiting politicians. Later as Counsellor and Chargé d’affaires in Vienna, when the Iron Curtain was collapsing, he was able to use his Russian language, visiting the Soviet Union in 1988 for discussions with the Soviet Foreign Ministry – and for his first en situ encounter with Russian culture in Moscow and St Petersburg. Back in the UK, he was promoted to Under-Secretary level, handling the Americas, North, Central and South. He decided to take early retirement in 1995 while there was still time to look around for other opportunities, and he was appointed CMG by HM The Queen.
Post-Diplomatic Service in 1995 he was taken on by British Nuclear Fuels (BNFL) to coordinate their nuclear environmental clean-up initiatives in Russia. Making use again of his fluent Russian, he acted as ‘Russian political adviser’ to a Norwegian, Swedish, French, British consortium working together with the Russian Ministry of Atomic Energy and Governors and Admirals of NW Russia, to address the nuclear waste challenges from the former Soviet nuclear submarines which threated the environment of the Barents Sea. This was an extraordinary ‘diplomatic’ moment, as Russia opened up after the Soviet days and before the later clamp-down.
‘In the harsh cities and nuclear sites of NW Russia and the Kola Peninsula we were warmly received by the local Russian colleagues. They were grateful for Western technical and financial support in tackling common Northern European environmental challenges to the Barents Sea posed by the waste from the Russian nuclear submarine and ice-breaker fleets. To clarify, we were helping with the nuclear waste from the propulsion reactors in the vessels, which was either left in the decommissioned vessels or stored on shore in inadequate containers, with the eventual aim of transporting it to the Mayak site beyond the Urals, the Russian nuclear waste treatment equivalent of Sellafield. However, in the meantime the Norwegians, especially, were concerned by the potential threat from this untreated nuclear waste to their extensive fishing industry in the region – hence their major financial support for our nuclear environmental projects.
The citizens of NW Russia and the Kola Peninsula also had a special welcome for the British, remembering with gratitude the wartime Murmansk convoys – which of course had cost many lives in the British ships sunk by the Germans. Although Stalin and the official Soviet attitude for many years had played down the importance of these convoys, the local people had not forgotten. Indeed it was touching to experience after the collapse of the Soviet Union, how British Murmansk convoy veterans, by now elderly, were invited to Russian National Day receptions at the Russian Embassy in London, when their sacrifice was officially recognised by successive Russian Ambassadors.
Memorial to Captain Richard Chancellor (1553) on the shore of the White Sea, Archangelsk, 2000
On the shores of the White Sea near Archangelsk we were also shown a monument to the British Captain Richard Chancellor, who in the sixteenth century had developed initial trade routes from Britain to Moscow via the Arctic, the direct land routes being impracticable at the time. In 1553 when Chancellor landed on the shore of the White Sea, he was invited to Moscow by the Tsar, Ivan the Terrible, and travelled some six hundred snowy miles by horse-drawn sledge to get there – he was impressed with Moscow which he noted was bigger than London – and he was entertained to lavish dinners by the Tsar in his luxurious palace.
Life was certainly harsh during winter in the Kola Peninsula, with less than an hour of greyish ‘daylight’ and very low temperatures. I recall that after a visit to a nuclear submarine plant at -40C our Western team literally cuddled together for sheer warmth during the coach journey back. When we could finally chill out at the post-visit dinner with our Russian hosts, we all reached out for the ubiquitous vodka bottles as a source of warmth – although medical advice said the opposite – but needs must when recovering from -40C.
In December 1999 the Murmansk Shipping Company (MSCO) celebrated the 60th anniversary of the Russian nuclear ice-breaker fleet (Atomflot) at a big event in Murmansk. There were many speeches and toasts – including a compulsory one from me as the Russian speaker for our Scandinavian Industrial Group. Our Russian colleagues persuaded me to be photographed with Atomflot Director-General Vyacheslav Ruksha, and with the Commander of the Russian Northern Fleet Admiral Vyacheslav Popov, which would have been unlikely in the old Soviet days.’
60th Anniversary of Russian nuclear ice-breaker fleet (Atomflot). L to R; Commander of the Russian Northern Fleet Vyacheslav Popov, Atomflot director Vyacheslav Rushka, Desmond Cecil. Murmansk, 3 December 1999
Key friendships developed with senior Russian nuclear officials, which would have been quite impossible in the Soviet days – such as with the Deputy Minister of Atomic Energy Valeriy Lebedev who wrote officially;
‘Dear Desmond, We in Russia greatly value your contribution to our common work, which makes the world a safer place, environmentally cleaner and more stable……We all think with great pleasure of our meetings with you – a true partner, an interesting person and a wise interlocutor.’
‘Much as the example of Yehudi Menuhin first inspired me to study the Russian language, Russian culture and especially its music and musicians have been a lifelong inspiration to me. In my youth many great violinists were of Russian Jewish extraction, often with family ties to Odessa – which my wife and I visited recently, staying next to the ‘David Oistrakh Suite’ in the Londonskaya Hotel.
In 1998 I visited in Moscow’s Arbat quarter the home of the International Music Charity ‘New Names’ with its formidable founder lady Ivetta Voronova, which did excellent work in promoting the careers of young musicians. With the help and support (such as visas, travel and accommodation) of Ambassador Andrew Wood in Moscow, Ambassador Yuriy Fokin in London and the Russo-British Chamber of Commerce, we were able to bring a group of outstanding young musicians to the UK for concerts in the Athenæum Club and Wellington College.
Olga Adamishina, wife of a former Ambassador to London and a good personal friend, persuaded me to become a Trustee of her ‘Russian Arts Help’ Charity in Moscow, which likewise has done excellent work over the years in supporting young Russian artists and musicians. Rossotrudnichestvo, the Russian cultural office in Kensington, regularly puts on interesting music and arts events, often with young Russians, and of course vodka. These events continue, despite increasing UK/Russia political tensions
I only played the violin once in Russia, at a BNFL VIP ministerial reception, when an excellent string quartet from the Tchaikovsky Academy was performing. When the musicians were told that I was a violinist, the first violin lady ‘dragged’ me to her chair and thrust her violin into my hand. Normally I make it a firm rule never to touch alcohol before playing in public - in this case not possible because of the various vodka toasts in which I had been obliged to join. Fortunately the music in front of me was a Mozart Divertimento, with which I was reasonably familiar, so I managed to get through it without any serious mishaps.
I have worked on cultural matters with successive Russian Ambassadors in London, Yuriy Fokin, Grigoriy Karasin (whom I first met in Moscow on diplomatic business in 1988), Yury Fedotov, and most recently Aleksander Yakovenko. They have generously provided their Residence for concerts by our musicians which we have arranged – for example in partnership with the London Philharmonic Orchestra and its Russian-born Chief Conductor Vladimir Jurowski, and with other young UK/Russia musicians.’
Throughout his diplomatic career, his violin was always a huge personal asset – allowing musical escape from ‘bureaucratic’ frustrations, but also opening diplomatic doors, often playing chamber music personally with local officials and politicians. To this day he continues to play his violin – by now a genuine late Stradivari formally entitled the ‘Cecil’ (a story which he describes in detail) – with fellow professional and gifted amateur musicians, especially in chamber music and often in charity fund-raising concerts.
Desmond Cecil continues to do a great deal to help aspiring young musicians and students, working pro bono with various boards and trusts, including the London Philharmonic Orchestra, the Felix-Mendelssohn-Bartholdy Foundation Leipzig and its UK Friends charity, the Gstaad Menuhin Festival, Russian Arts Help, the Athenæum Club and the Queen’s College Oxford – with a Distinguished Friend of Oxford University Award.
The memoir contains fascinating insights into the music, diplomatic and nuclear callings, anecdotes of some of the important European and British politicians of the past forty years, and charming stories of the famous musicians he has known, such as Yehudi Menuhin, Max Rostal, Kurt Masur and others. It also describes in intimate detail some of his other interests, such as playing cricket around the world, downhill skiing in the Alps, Sherlock Holmes, chess and antiquarian travel books.
The Wandering Civil Servant of Stradivarius by Desmond Cecil, CMG is published on 4 February 2021 by Quartet Books, and is available online from the usual outlets, including Amazon and Waterstones. The author has decided to donate all royalties to arts charities, especially to support young musicians, who need all the help that they can get nowadays.