Sébastien Érard

Sébastien Erard (* June 5, 1752 in Strasbourg, † August 5, 1831 in La Muette at Passy, today 16th arrondissement ) was a French instrument maker in German - Alsatian origin with the baptismal name Sebastian Ehrhardt.

The company, founded by Sébastien Erard in Paris, from the time of his death under the leadership of his nephew, Pierre Erard, over several decades of the mid-19th century, the world's leading piano building companies.

• 2.1 Supplier idea for Steinway
• 2.2 Technical halt at a high level
• 2.3 Recent History of Erard

Life and work

Youth and Education

Sébastien Erard was a contemporary of the composer François -Adrien Boïeldieu and had his workshop in Paris, first in the basement of the villa of a wealthy aristocrat who supported him. They also helped Érard did better with no classical harp builder training, off the objections of the harp makers guild to continue a special permission from the French royal house, the harps, which wanted to forbid him his successful business.

In 1811 he brought the harp with double pedal mechanism to the market through which the harp regained that position, she had during past centuries in the favor of the audience. The new possibilities of the harp of Erard were soon used by many composers, including Berlioz.

The company grew Érard; his older brother, Jean -Baptiste Erard supported Sébastien Erard in the company management. At the time of the French Revolution Sébastien went to London and opened a new factory for harps and pianos that persist remained under the guidance of his talented nephew, after the turmoil of the Revolution in France subsided and Sébastien went back to Paris there. Later found only in Steinway with the emigration to New York and return to Germany and the Hamburg factory like it.

Sébastien Erard became very wealthy and could buy a castle at the Bois de Boulogne in Paris. There he died 1831st The management of the business fell to his nephew, Pierre Erard, son of his elder brother.

Pianos

From Érard comes the development of the double escapement at the pianoforte in 1821, which meant a significant increase in performance of this instrument. The invention has been further improved in details by Henri Herz. Your design still forms the basis of the relation to the high piano much better, much faster possible stop repetition of a wing. This so-called "double repetition " or "double trigger " according Erard with the essential element of the repetition lever that catches the rebounding hammer and allows a renewed before hitting full return stroke of the key, one of the most important inventions of piano building history.

Érard Beethoven gave in 1803 a wing of his production. This left the instrument 1824/1825 his brother Nikolaus Johann, by which it came into the possession of the Upper Austrian Landesmuseum in Linz in 1845.

In the first third of the 19th century, to the times of the young Franz Liszt as a tour forming virtuoso at the piano Erard rose to become the world's leading piano makers and overtook the leading English piano maker John Broadwood & Sons. The rapid repetition came to meet the new virtuoso pianists of the category Thalberg and Liszt.

More history of the company Erard

Even after the rise of the U.S. company Steinway & Sons, in Europe after the Paris World Fair of 1867, Erard kept the design principle found already in the 1830s the grand piano with attachment plate, steel support braces and straight stringing and complex occupied hammers with up to nine layers of leather, felt and fabric at.

Source of ideas for Steinway

European virtuosos brought up in the 1860s and 1870s on U.S. tours by ship with their own instruments, suspected that there was no good grand piano in the USA. This continues until, organized by William Steinway tour of Anton Rubinstein for Steinway in 1872 ended this suspicion. Previously concert grand Erard were then often sold "classic souvenir " of the pianist on the ship to the USA, they were highly profitable during or at the end of the tour in the USA. Louis Moreau Gottschalk, American pianist, toured only to his training to Europe and then - with several Erard grand pianos in the luggage - as a virtuoso by the United States.

Wing of this kind gave the U.S. piano technician and technology historian Bill Shull in Loma Linda in Los Angeles are clear indications that the Erard system of struts and the wing inside had the men of Steinway delivered an important template for their grand pianos from 1856. 's Father Henry Steinway had the world's leading wing, just the Erard, oriented, and also recognized that the Erard system could easily be adapted to other sizes and scale. The system Erard, in concert grand to have five strings fields between the struts and put the damper from the top is identical to Steinway. Pleyel had first six string fields and Mopstick damper under the strings. However, Steinway, especially the gifted son, Henry Jr. developed, the Steinway grand piano from this beginning out quickly nor decisively on, already 1858/1859 was the world's first bass crossed blades with one-piece cast iron plate of the type Steinway - the apprentice Steinway had his teacher Erard obsolete.

Technical halt at a high level

Also the emergence of from the 1880s very successful German piano maker, which also France with their products almost flooded, did not change the opinion of those responsible at Erard, their pianos are the best ever and needed no adjustment to the modern times. Iron in the piano was suspicious of them off the strings and was limited to the minimum necessary. An exclusive upper-class clientele in France held the Erard's faithfulness. Only in the 1920s, the last just strung Erard grand piano were built. From about 1875, already had the smaller competitor Pleyel, formerly a supplier of Chopin, facing the "American" system with bass crossover and one-piece cast iron plate in grand pianos.

The company Erard so was the " last of the Mohicans " of the building just besaiteter wings. Only very recently (2013 ) is, by Stephen Paulello in Burgundy, back to modern wings with straight strings (ie without bass crossover, but now with one-piece plate ) built in French manufactory partly on principles of Erard.

Recent history of Erard

Erard was merged in the 1960s with Boisselot, Gaveau and Pleyel, was sold in the 1980s to mold to Braunschweig, was bought out in the 90s again by wealthy Frenchman, a new production had opened on the northern edge of the Pyrenees, was a few years later returned to small parts of the old pianos halls in northern Paris. At the end of 2013, all production activities were terminated in order to prevent a reoccurrence bankruptcy. There are still the already -made wings sold off, but now ends a more than 200 -year-old piano building.