Johann Fritz Grand ca 1814

Recognising that first and foremost we have a collective duty to conserve as complete a historical record of what has come down to us, there are nevertheless many cases when restoration of early pianos, like other antique instruments, is justified and desirable. The process of restoration itself can play a part in preserving much of the original instrument, thus adding to the ‘record’. Furthermore there is the legitimate need to discover as far as possible what early pianos sounded like. And finally, restoring early pianos to playing condition invariably adds to our knowledge of the original instruments: how they were built and what materials were used.

Every instrument that comes in for restoration or rebuilding presents its own unique difficulties and challenges. As far as possible we must try to imagine how the original builders created these instruments. Since we always know less than we would like to know about tools, techniques, objectives and materials, we are almost always faced with a daunting task. Our objective must in general be to preserve as much of the original instrument as possible and to come as close as we can to re-creating the original sound. Inevitably we can never be entirely successful or completely certain of what we have achieved. There is tremendous satisfaction, however, in bringing old and sometimes neglected instruments ‘back to life’.

The following photographs give a glimpse of restoration work I have recently undertaken on two instruments. First there is a Viennese Grand by Johann Fritz ca 1814 brought back from the United States where it lived for some considerable period. This restoration required an extensive amount of rebuilding: the original soundboard had misguidedly been replaced with a plywood one and the action was virtually unworkable but fortunately almost complete. There was also the matter of lost and damaged casework decoration. Much of the latter work was undertaken by Adrian Jones and Andrew Garlick.

The second instrument is a Clementi Upright Grand 1806 which when it reached my workshop needed to have the action completely rebuilt. Hands other than mine (including those of Tim Hamilton, Tony Smith and David J. Law) had carried out much fine restoration work on other parts before I tackled the action.

Both of these instruments form part of the Mobbs Keyboard Collection located in Bristol and the photographs are shown here by kind permission of the owners, Kenneth and Mary Mobbs.