Franz Martin Seuffert

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Franz Martin Seuffert (* around 1772 in Würzburg ; † July 3, 1847 in Vienna ) was a German - Austrian organ and piano maker .

biography

Martin Seuffert comes from a well-known family of organ builders in Main Franconia . Grandfather Johann Philipp Seuffert and father Franz Ignaz Seuffert were court organ makers in Würzburg. Martin Seuffert first learned the trade of organ builder. One of his organs has been preserved in the Volkach pilgrimage church of Maria im Weingarten in the Kitzingen district .

He went to Vienna to study piano building with Anton Walter . Subsequently he worked in the company Wachtl & Comp. Founded in 1802 . together with Joseph Wachtl and JF Bleyer on the development of an upright hammer piano , a so-called giraffe piano or giraffe grand piano .

After a dispute over the copyright to this invention, Seuffert left the company in 1811 and opened his own workshop with the address “Auf der Wieden in Alleegasse 75-76”. In the same year he received the Viennese citizenship and the master's right .

In 1815 Ludwig van Beethoven mentioned Seuffert in a letter to Joseph von Varena in Graz . Beethoven had looked around for a piano for his daughter on behalf of Varenas and now replied that you could get a good six-octave piano either from Johann Schantz for 400 or from Seuffert for 460 guilders .

From 1819 Seuffert's address was “Auf der Wieden in Favoritengasse zum golden Hirschen”. In 1827 he associated himself with the piano maker Johann Seidler and ran the company under the name Seuffert and Seidler . In 1836 he had his improvements to the "Piano Droit" privileged. In 1845 he received a gold medal for his work at the Viennese commercial products exhibition.

In 1845 his son Eduard Seuffert (1819–1855) also entered the business, so that the instruments were signed in 1845/46 with “Seuffert Sohn und Seidler”. After Martin Seuffert's death in 1847, his son took over the business as the sole owner. When Eduard Seuffert died just eight years later, his widow Friedrich Ehrbar married , under whose name the company achieved a high reputation and existed until the 1980s.

Instruments

Three fortepiano by Martin Seuffert are known. The oldest (according to Beethoven's letter approx. 1815, or maybe earlier) is in the Pooya Radbon collection for historical pianos. The second is in the Friedrick Collection and the third in the private collection of Robert Brown in Austria.

There are several upright grand pianos in private collections as well as in the Hogwood Collection (UK). A giraffe wing by Martin Seuffert is now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum Vienna , another in the Federal Collection of Old Style Furniture in Vienna.

An unrestored fortepiano by "Seuffert & Seidler" is in the Pooya Radbon collection for historical fortepianos. In the same collection is a pianino made by Seuffert Sohn & Seidler.

An upright harp-shaped forte piano, a Rosalie Falks foundation owned by Johannes Daniel Falks , was taken over by the Weimar City Museum in the Kirms-Krackow-Haus in 1916 , where it can still be viewed today.

literature

  • Catalog of the collection of old musical instruments, Part I: String pianos, Vienna: Kunsthistorisches Museum 1966
  • Hermann Fischer: The organ builder Johann Philipp Seuffert and his descendants in Würzburg, Kirrweiler and Vienna . Commission publisher Ferdinand Schöningh, Würzburg 2015, ISBN 978-3-87717-077-9 , p. 79-82 .

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ [1]
  2. ^ Salon: The Kirms-Krackow-Haus in Weimar, the building history, the history of the garden, the residents, friends and guests. Hanser, Munich / Vienna, ISBN 3-446-19725-7
personal data
SURNAME Seuffert, Franz Martin
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German-Austrian organ and piano builder
DATE OF BIRTH around 1772
PLACE OF BIRTH Wurzburg
DATE OF DEATH July 3, 1847
Place of death Vienna