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Manufacture of pianos in the Czech Republic: yesterday and today.

Article Excerpt
The production of pianos, upright and grand, has a relatively long tradition in the Czech Lands. Together let us look back to the 18th century and the origins and development of a field that is today a significant part of the Czech music industry. Let us compare the joys and woes of piano makers of the past with those of present-day manufacturers, and briefly consider at least some of the difficulties faced by current Czech producers especially as a result of the uncontrollable boom in Asian competition which abides by absolutely none of the traditional trading and manufacturing rules.

Pianos were made in Bohemia and Moravia from as early as the end of the 18th century and the number of manufactories and small workshops producing and repairing pianos gradually increased to the order of hundreds. The first grand piano builders at the end of the 18th century included for example Jan Zelinka from 1796 in Prague or Jacob Weimes from 1798, while in Brno the important Buchta family business was established from 1770 and the Ignatz Spitzka firm in 1785. Czech instrument makers were also strongly represented in Vienna.

The nineteenth century, especially the latter half, brought a real "boom" in the foundation of new firms producing grand and upright pianos. Many small workshops were opened which gradually expanded production and by the end of the 19th century there was a settled stratification of producers by size. There were small workshops composed of just the owners and a few assistants, who apart from making instruments mainly provided service--tuning and repairs; then there were medium-sized entrepreneurs operating on the basis of a license for the production and repair of grand and upright pianos and finally quite large producers, whose factories were nationalised by the communists in 1948 and placed under the single state concern Tovarny na piana [Piano Factories], later Ceskoslovenske hudebni nastroje [Czechoslovak Musical Instruments].

The Origins and Development of Production

To get a better understanding of situation, context and starting points of today's manufacturers, let us take a brief look at the history of some of them.

The firm Rosler started production in the later 19th century, although the sources differ on the actual year, which was either 1868 or 1878. (For comparison: the piano works of the most famous and to this day the largest Czech manufacturer Antonin Petrof dates from 1864.) After a number of moves, it settled in Ceska Lipa and already made a name for itself in the 1870s in expert circles by using English mechanics. On the death of the firm's founder Gustav Rosler, the works were inherited by his wife, who in 1897 entrusted the running of the firm to her brother Ludvik Gatter. At the beginning of the new century Gatter successfully expanded production and built up public awareness of the trademark by taking part in world exhibitions (The firm won the highest award in the form of a medal at the World Exhibition in Paris, for example). By 1911 the firm had a hundred workers and employed another fifteen externally. Production was characterised by a high level of modernisation and self-sufficiency. Apart from Austria-Hungary, which was the destination for most of the output (25-35 % to Vienna alone) the firm exported to Great Britain and even to South Africa,...

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