Jean Louis Boisselot

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Jean Baptiste Louis Boisselot (* 1782 in Montpellier ; † 1847 in Marseille ) was the founder of the piano manufacturing company Boisselot & Fils, Marseille.

biography

Boisselot comes from a family of violin makers based in Montpellier since around 1770.

At first he began trading in sheet music and musical instruments, and from 1809 on, he started selling table pianos and harps . After opening a branch in Marseille in 1820, he finally settled there in 1823 and dedicated himself to what has become the most important part of his business, the sale of pianos from manufacturers such as Pape , Érard and Pleyel .

From 1826 to 1827 he sent his son Louis Constantin (1809–1850) to apprenticeship with piano makers in Paris and Nîmes, and in 1834 he let him expand his knowledge again in England.

Boisselot & Fils

From 1830 to 1831 he built up his own piano manufacture together with his son in Marseille. The rapid increase in the production output of the factory with 70 workers to 100 pianos per year from 1834 shows that father and son had carefully prepared their cause. Right from the start, Boisselot employed an experienced foreman as well as German and English skilled workers. The constant expansion led to the production of around 400 pianos per year with 150 workers in 1848. The highlight of the awards accompanying this success was the gold medal at the Paris Exposition nationale 1844 (the 10th Paris industrial exhibition).

In addition to other innovations, Boisselot presented a mechanism for the first time at this exhibition, with the help of which individual tones and sounds could be recorded and which is known today as the tone-holding or sostenuto pedal .

The choice of Marseille as the location for such a factory had proven wise: Boisselot & Fils became one of the largest piano factories in France in the 1840s. The geographical location offered advantages: lower labor costs, inexpensive availability of exotic woods via the port, easier access to the export markets in Spain, Italy and the French colonies.

When Jean Louis Boisselot died in 1847, he left his two sons Louis Constantin and Xavier with a flourishing company that sold his pianos to a discerning clientele. This was also captivated by Franz Liszt , who himself preferred to play the instruments of his friend and patron Boisselot and who opened the Boisselot concert hall with a concert in Marseille in 1846 - following the example of the Parisian rivals. Liszt used a Boisselot grand piano built in the same year at his Weimar residence, the Altenburg, where most of his piano works were composed.

In 1847 or 1848 the company opened a branch in Barcelona .

After the death of his father, Louis Constantin continued to run the company alone, but only survived his father for three years. His death obliged his brother Xavier to break off his career as a composer in Paris and to take over the management of the company in 1850. In 1865 Xavier ceded the management of the company to his nephew Franz, the son of Louis Constantin, named after his godfather Liszt. Franz managed the company Boisselot & Fils, which became the Manufacture Marseillaise de pianos in 1893 , until his death in 1908. The First World War brought the company to an end.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Information ( memento of November 2, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) on the 10th Paris Industrial Exhibition in 1844 on wiki.hammerfluegel.net, as of June 13, 2012.
  2. ^ Stanley Sadie (ed.): The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians. 2nd edition, Macmillan, London 2001, keyword “Sostenuto pedal”.
  3. ^ "Liszts Piano" - A film by Ute Gebhardt. Retrieved October 8, 2011 from the 3sat website .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Boisselot, Jean Louis
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Boisselot, Jean Baptiste Louis (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION French entrepreneur and founder of the piano manufacturing company Boisselot & Fils, Marseille
DATE OF BIRTH 1782
PLACE OF BIRTH Montpellier
DATE OF DEATH 1847
Place of death Marseille