Day 249 - Piano


 June 7, 2021

I came to Gallery 682 after spending almost an hour and a half at the Alice Neel show, which was crowded with pictures and people (not to mention waiting in the heat for 20 minutes before the museum opened in order to avoid an even longer wait to get into that show).  So I was intensely grateful that the gallery contains only one instrument, a piano.

But what a piano! I'm blown away by the beautiful finish and only slightly disappointed to learn that it's walnut veneer on spruce rather than solid walnut. And I love the lyre-shaped design that supports the pedals - a reminder that a piano is a string as well as a percussion instrument. The piano was made in about 1838 in Vienna by Conrad Graf, who became one of the leading piano builders in that city. Graf pianos were owned by a panoply of greats, including Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Chopin, Liszt, and Brahms, as well as by Carl Czerny (who, I learned, was Beethoven's student). It's interesting to see that the custom of displaying the piano's maker in a prominent place long antedates Steinway. 

But why does the piano have  only 80 keys? (I counted twice.) When did the 88-key keyboard become the standard?
later
On a subsequent visit, I realize that I was wrong about where this gallery begins and ends, and that it actually contains a second grand piano. This one has a dark rosewood veneer and is much more ornate,  with an inlay front, floral scrolls on the exterior alongside the keyboard, and an "egg and dart" molding framing the keyboard and running all along the bottom of the instrument. The molding catches the light and shines so brightly that at first I mistook the wood for brass studs.  I don't much like the instrument -- it's too fancy for my taste -- but it's interesting to note that it was made in London in 1827 by the firm of Broadwood and Sons -- and that Beethoven owned a very similar Broadwood piano! It's also noteworthy that instrument-building was a family business. Another connection to Steinway.

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