RICHARD OSBORNE

BRITTEN’S GERMAN MUSE

The Scherchens were remarkable.

First, there was Hermann, the selftaught son of a Berlin innkeeper who would become one of the century’s most influential and radically minded conductors. Then there was his longsuffering second wife, Auguste (‘Gustel’), whom Scherchen helped flee Germany in 1933 when a Nazi labour camp looked the likely destination for Gustel and her Leftist relations.

Finally, there was their son Karl, affectionately known as ‘Wulff’, who in nine remarkable months in