Projected: A history of celebrated Canadian piano manufacturer Heintzman & Company.
Vintage Heintzman decal, c. 1900.
Part of the mythology of North American piano manufacturers is the idea that Heintzman & Co. founder, Theodor Heintzman, and Steinway and Sons founder, Henry Steinway, may have crossed the Atlantic on the same ship when they emigrated from Germany in 1860. Steinway settled in NYC, Heintzman in Toronto. Both brands are legendary, at this point Steinway more universally known. That said, Queen Victoria praised a Heintzman grand in the Royal Albert Hall, and the world's most expensive piano, the Chinese-made Heintzman Crystal Piano, was auctioned to a private bidder in 2009 for twenty-two million yuan (US$3.22 million, CDN$4.28 million).
On the topic of pianos, this is, in my view, the best piano version of the Beatles' Now and Then (this one performed on a Steinway grand):
https://youtu.be/xCUad-j6XfI
The Pianos of Wimpole Street
Actress Jane Asher. Hair by Titian. Muse to Paul McCartney for songs such as “Here, There, and Everywhere” (Macca’s favourite of his compositions), “And I Love Her,” and “All My Loving,” the lead song of the set that introduced the Beatles to America on the Ed Sullivan Show in 1964.
McCartney lived in the Ashers’ home at 57 Wimpole Street, London, from 1964 to 1966, where he wrote the above classics and more.
I am interested to know the maker of the piano(s) on which the songs were written.
I’ve read that McCartney had an upright in the garret and that the Ashers owned a grand downstairs.
Wimpole Street (No. 50) was also home to the poet Elizabeth Barrett (from 1838 to 1846). She met the poet (and later husband, Robert Browning) there in 1845. Barrett wrote Sonnets from the Portuguese, addressed to Browning, from 1845 to 1846.
⸺Glen Ellis, Publisher, Quick Red Fox Press
McCartney lived in the Ashers’ home at 57 Wimpole Street, London, from 1964 to 1966, where he wrote the above classics and more.
I am interested to know the maker of the piano(s) on which the songs were written.
I’ve read that McCartney had an upright in the garret and that the Ashers owned a grand downstairs.
Wimpole Street (No. 50) was also home to the poet Elizabeth Barrett (from 1838 to 1846). She met the poet (and later husband, Robert Browning) there in 1845. Barrett wrote Sonnets from the Portuguese, addressed to Browning, from 1845 to 1846.
⸺Glen Ellis, Publisher, Quick Red Fox Press