Kyle Craft’s story of his lost violin found. Review on a nightmare that ended up well, thanks to worldwide André Rieu friends. By Kyle Craft, looking back on the summer of 2025. April 4, 2026 Every summer I travel to Germany and Austria. I visit my family, friends and go to Vienna to perform with colleagues/friends from Radio Wienerlied (Radio Songs from Vienna) on a small cruise ship. After 2 months of traveling, I was tired. When I travel, I always carry my precious (signed by André Rieu in 2017) violin with me. On my last day in Europe, I was staying at the airport in Frankfurt am Main (Germany). During my last day, I went out into the city to explore. After a big exploration day, I was going back to the airport hotel. During the train ride I put my violin down in front of me. As I got off the train, I left my violin in the train. I didn’t realize that I left it in the train, until 10 minutes after. As I realized that, I fell into panic and started calling the Deutsche Bahn (German Railway Company) and even went to the police office to see if they could help me. Because it wasn’t stolen, the police couldn’t help me. I did put a lost and found ad on the website of the German trains. It was already 7pm, so I couldn’t call any other place to see if the violin was turned in or found. The biggest problem was that the next day, I was flying back to the USA. My flight was leaving at 11am. I was told to call the Fundbüro (lost/found office) in Berlin at 8am. They didn’t open until 11AM. I was able to get ahold of them and luckily, the violin was found and turned in. Unfortunately, I had already checked in for my flight and went through security. At first, I didn’t want to make this public. When I realized that I wasn’t going to be able to get it back in time for my flight, I realized that I needed help. So, I made a Facebook post about it and was asking for help. Many people reached out for support. However, our dear German Fan Friend, Elke Freitag from Münster, immediately got on the phone and called the train stations. At that point, I was already back in the USA. We were discussing via E-mail how I could get it back. In the end, Elke said that she will have the violin sent to her house and I can pick it up when I come back. I was already planning on going to André’s Christmas Concert in December in Maastricht. Due to work, I was not able to attend the concert. Because I missed my violin, I decided to fly back to Germany, spend Christmas with Family and go visit Elke and Nino and pick up my violin. When I saw the violin, I almost broke into tears. Elke and Nino were so kind enough to invite me into their home, take care of my violin and we had the nicest time together. I want to thank Elke and Nino again from the bottom of my heart for saving my instrument. If it wasn’t for them, I would have never seen my violin again. Liebe Elke und Nino, nochmals DANKE DANKE UND DANKE. Note: to read more about Kyle’s special violin, click HERE (the 2017 USA-tour) and HERE

2017 San José concert, USA, André signed his violin.

Kyle’s violin case

Playing at fan events in Maastricht

Celebrating Kyle’s 30th birthday in Maastricht, July 2023.

Instagram video: work in progress.