grand piano, C. Bechstein

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The Spencer Museum’s grand piano was built by the renowned German piano manufacturer C. Bechstein expressly for the last grand tour of England by Franz Liszt, (1811-1886). From his early childhood on, Liszt was a virtuoso performer on the piano and he enhanced his performances with gestures and facial expressions. Liszt helped popularize solo piano recitals and performing in profile. In 1848 he was appointed Kappelmeister (director of music) in Weimar, Germany.

Liszt played many kinds of pianos during his long career, but in his mature years he particularly favored the Bechstein. He kept a Bechstein in his house in Weimar, where he continued to live after he had resigned his position in 1861 and been ordained an abbot in 1865. In April 1886, when his health was already failing, Liszt spent two and a half weeks in England, performing on this Bechstein. Sir Francis C. Burnard, a successful playwright and editor of Punch magazine, described Liszt performing: “For an hour or more I have sat entranced, as at the house of a friend where he stayed during his last visit to London, Liszt sat at the piano while his fingers wandered in rhapsody over the keys. He was repeating his own compositions, he was taking almost unconsciously fresh themes, developing them and playing on, holding us all spellbound in silence. That was such playing as never before have I heard, as never in this world do I expect to hear again.”

Elsie Fogerty, a celebrated drama coach, described his playing one Sunday evening: “A pause: then the first notes of a rhapsody prelude. It was only short - we were breathless; but one impression has never left me: the notes under his fingers were liquid; not the pearl-clear sequence of blended single notes, but an uninterrupted flow of liquid sound - then a flash of fire, like the flinging out of a jeweled string into the light.”

German firms were leaders in developing piano technology in the 19th century. The pianoforte had a great advantage over its predecessors the clavichord and harpsichord, since its strings were struck by hammers rather than being plucked. This made it possible to produce the entire dynamic range from fragile, quiet tones to full plangent sonorities. Composers responded to the richer-sounding instruments by writing music designed specifically for them. As piano compositions became more heroic and romantic, the keyboard technique of performers also advanced, and the age of the virtuoso pianist was born. The Spencer Museum Bechstein, then, represents the culmination of a century of evolution in piano technology, composition and performance.