Wilhelm Heckel (instrument maker)

Wilhelm Heckel, oil painting by Franz Groffy 1932

Wilhelm Heckel (born January 25, 1856 in Biebrich ; † January 13, 1909 there ) was a German musical instrument maker .

He was the son of Johann Adam Heckel (1812–1877) and Elisabeth Heckel geb. Steinhauer (1815–72). Wilhelm Heckel renamed the company founded by his father to Wilhelm Heckel Biebrich .

Heckel learned his trade in his father's company . After his death in 1877 he took over the management of the business. He succeeded in decisively improving the reduced sound quality of the adopted Heckel-Almenräder bassoon compared to older instruments. The new contrabassoon developed by Heckel but registered for a patent by his employee Friedrich Stritter in 1877 impressed Richard Wagner so much that he suggested the construction of the Heckelphone . In addition to this new development, Heckel continued to manufacture all types of woodwind instruments.

His marriage to Emma du Fais (1859–1921), the daughter of the railway secretary Karl du Fais, had three sons and two daughters, including Wilhelm Hermann Heckel (1879–1952), his successor as an instrument maker, and August Heckel (1880– 1914).

literature

• Heinz Becker:  Heckel, Wilhelm. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 8, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1969, ISBN 3-428-00189-3 , p. 178 ( digitized version ).

Individual evidence

1. ^ Family tree of the Heckel family, manuscript
2. ↑ Company history on www.heckel.de ( Memento of the original from January 11, 2017 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. 
3. ↑ Edith Reiter: Wilhelm Heckel, Six Generations in the Service of Music . Kramer, Wiesbaden 2014, ISBN 9783737404549 .