Conrad Graf
Conrad Graf (17 November 1782 in Riedlingen, Further Austria – 18 March 1851 in Vienna) was an Austrian-German piano maker.
Graf began his career as a cabinet maker, studying the craft in his native Riedlingen in south Germany, in what was then Further Austria.
In 1800 he served briefly in an all-volunteer military unit, the Jäger Freikorps, then became apprenticed to a piano maker named Jakob Schelkle, who worked in Währing, then a suburb of Vienna.
As Wythe says, "Graf's style appears to have emerged fully developed out of an apprenticeship with an obscure provincial maker.
"[2] The early 19th century was a period of ferment in piano building; Wythe describes the work of contemporary builders as "a volatile blend of traditional craftsmanship and new technology, carried out in an atmosphere of intense competition.
[6] By 1826, the increasing demand for his pianos had led Graf to adopt methods of mass production, an area in which he was a pioneer.
He purchased the "Mondscheinhaus",[a] a formerly fashionable dance hall at 102 auf der Wieden, and converted it into a piano factory, removing the chandeliers and other accoutrements.
[9] As the Grove Dictionary notes, the instruments "show a remarkable degree of consistency and may be categorized as a series of models", presumably as a consequence of Graf's mass production methods.
[13] The sturdy construction prevented warping, which was a common problem of pianos in Graf's day, when both number and tension of strings was increasing.
The exteriors of Graf's pianos were largely undecorated, emphasizing instead the beauty of bookmatched veneers in walnut and mahogany.
The exception is a notable one, an 1829 pyramid piano (a kind of upright) built on commission and extravagantly decorated with caryatids, an ornamental urn, and other sculptures.
His technical innovations included the strengthened interior bracing mentioned above, a new method of leathering hammers, and quadruple stringing.
wide,[14] and created a device intended to help deaf persons (one in particular; see below) hear the sound of the piano.
According to Good, "the only work he wrote for piano after getting it was the four-hand transcription of the Grosse Fugue ... and the indications are that he was playing very little even for himself in the last three years of his life.
Chopin, who was familiar with foreign pianos, unhesitatingly selected the Graf, and his Vienna concerts were a success.
"[24] Wieck described another concert on the same visit in which Liszt "destroyed" two Grafs, as well as an Erard piano lent to him by Sigismond Thalberg.
[28] Other musicians who owned or played Graf pianos included Friedrich Kalkbrenner and Camille Pleyel.
[29] Of Graf's instruments, Wythe says they "represent the culmination of Viennese classical piano building in the style of J.
A. Stein and Anton Walter: they are uncorrupted by modern 'advances' such as the steel frame and the repeat action, and show none of the unwieldiness that eventually led to the decline of the Viennese piano.
