Jeffrey Dane recounts the history of pianos and their evolution during the time of Beethoven and Mozart.

by Jeffrey Dane (Copyright 2001)

BACKGROUND OF THE PIANO

In the 18th century the instrument now known as the piano was a relatively recent invention. Not too many people were taking piano lessons. There were a number of people who experimented with the mechanism and who produced functioning instruments, but it was Bartolomeo Cristofori of Padua, Italy, who built an important prototype and who is traditionally recognized as the inventor of the piano essentially as we know it today. He was the keeper of instruments at the court of Ferdinand de' Medici in Florence.

Only three of Cristofori's pianos are known to have survived. His 1720 instrument (by now greatly modified but still playable) has a 54-note compass (from C-F), and is now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York; his 1722 instrument, having only a 4-octave compass, is at the Museo degli Strumenti Musicali in Rome; and his 1726 piano, also with a 4-octave (49-note) compass, is at the Musikinstrumenten Museum at Karl Marx University in Leipzig, Germany. None of the instruments has pedals, which came later.

Cynthia Adams Hoover, Curator of Musical Instruments at the Smithsonian's National Museum of American History, says, "The one at the National Museum of Musical Instruments in Rome has been the least modified through the ages." The late Roland Loest, Curator of Antique Instruments at the Museum of the American Piano in New York, made the perceptive observation that Cristofori's position in history may have more to do with the survival of these instruments than with historical primacy.

In Bach's time, the German word klavier (Italian, cembalo) was usually used as a generic term to signify all keyboard instruments (except the organ, in most cases). In Germany today, however, the word refers only to the upright piano, to distinguish it from the Fl�gel (literally, "wing"), the instrument in the grand-piano shape.

Cristofori called his new instrument Clavicembalo col Piano e Forte (literally, keyboard-instrument with soft and loud). It could produce both soft and loud tones, with gradations in between, depending upon the force with which the keys were struck with the fingers. His instrument was at first considered a novel type of harpsichord (not surprisingly, because of its harpsichord-like appearance) which was capable of gradations of volume. These gradations were effected by a hammer (rather than plectrum-type) action, in which hammers, activated by the touch of the keys, struck the strings. The mechanism was not immediately accepted by other keyboard instrument makers - but all of the basic, essential mechanical elements in our modern pianos are found, in embryonic form, in these Cristofori instruments.

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Although the piano, clavichord and harpsichord are all keyboard instruments, of course, they differ in the sounds they produce by reason of their very different sound-producing mechanisms. The piano's ability to sustain tone, and various gradations of it, eventually invested the instrument with particular appeal, and ultimately inspired a new (and by now, vast) musical literature for it.

The strings of a clavichord (the earliest type of stringed keyboard instrument) are struck by the heads of small metal hammers, called tangents, and the instrument produces a sweet but very soft tone, unsuitable for "concert" performance. The harpsichord, however, differs markedly in that its strings are not struck but rather are plucked (which accounts for the instrument's somewhat metallic and glittering sound), usually by crow or turkey quills (in the antique instruments), or by metal, plastic, or hollow bamboo quills (in the modern pieces). The harpsichord is not a tone-sustaining instrument, so during its heyday it was generally used to best advantage in music of a rapid and sparkling nature, as exemplified in the keyboard works of Domenico Scarlatti, in some ways the Franz Liszt of his day. Many authentic Baroque harpsichords had small drawers built into the instruments, to contain spare quills for those that had worn down, and it's said that Bach could re-quill a plectrum in record time.

In his own early pianos (several of which he sold to Frederick the Great for his Potsdam palaces), the German organ and clavichord maker, Gottfried Silbermann (1683-1753), utilized a mechanism essentially the same as Cristofori's. Silbermann had the distinction of having had some of his pianos played (and later, praised) by Bach himself, although the composer never actually owned one. Bach is said to have told Silbermann, with characteristic candor, that although his earlier instruments were somewhat feeble and dull of tone, his later pianos were much improved and had a pleasant touch and were wide of dynamics. Besides being one of the great organists of his day, Bach was also a master of the clavichord, and because of its intimate, sensitive responsiveness to touch, he favored it over the harpsichord. (It was not primarily as a composer but as an organist that he was mourned throughout Europe when he died in 1750).

One of the first known uses of a piano as a solo instrument in concert was at a June, 1768 performance by one of Bach's own sons (and one of the first of the Bachs to show an interest in the piano), Johann Christian Bach. He performed on an English square piano made by the German craftsman Johannes Cristoph Zumpe of London. The piano's ability to sustain tone, and various gradations of it, eventually invested the instrument with particular appeal, and ultimately inspired a new (and by now, vast) musical literature for it.

An early work composed specifically for the piano (in 1770) was Three Sonatas, Op.2, by Muzio Clementi. Because of the understanding he showed of the piano's possibilities even at that relatively early stage, Clementi is considered one of the founders of modern piano-playing. An important composer and pianist in his own right (as well as an instrument manufacturer), he was held in high regard by Beethoven himself.

BEETHOVEN'S PERSONALITY

We live in an era where some amazing things are often taken quite for granted. In the United States, the mention of George Washington's name, for example, will more often than not produce only an indifferent shrug of the shoulders. This is not the case, however, in Vienna when Beethoven's name is spoken, and where even now, incredibly, some remnants of his personality still remain - remnants as distinctive as some of the garments (i.e., "remnants") he was known to have sometimes worn. So deep was the mark he left during his life there, that despite the passage and changes of time, residual effects of his presence still exist in parts of the city (as well as in the outlying areas he frequented, now suburbs of Vienna, such as Heiligenstadt, Baden, and M�dling). The very mention of his name in these places even today can prompt a certain intangible yet unmistakable posture, even from store-owners and postal clerks, which bespeaks an astounding degree of reverence. The atmosphere may be difficult to define but it's easy to recognize. Such is the regard in which he's still held in his own adopted city well over a century and a half after his death. The obvious, by its nature, often escapes our attention, so it may be worth noting that Beethoven was as alive then as we are today.

Beethoven's personality was as powerful as his piano-playing, and just as unique in his day. It was he, through his free and frequently fierce nature, who almost single-handedly wrenched music out of the 18th century and into the next, making him if not the last of the Classicists (to which Brahms might claim title) then perhaps the first of the real Romantics. Beethoven's adventures in disregarding prescribed 18th-century stricture, structure, requirements and protocol marked not only his music but also his personal behavior, which, at times, could be very embarrassing (it's said he once returned to a ballroom still buttoning up his trousers after a lavatory visit)--and in both areas he achieved a virtually complete freedom of expression.

In one's personal relations with him, an honest and straightforward approach was the only feasible one, as he could often be an extremely difficult man to deal with on a personal basis. One never knew what he'd be like at any given time, because of his notorious, momentary swings of mood, and his deafness later in life did nothing to improve his frequently volatile disposition. The only thing consistently predictable about Beethoven was his consistent unpredictability. It must be remembered, though, that just because he was so far above us in his art doesn't mean he had to be far above us in general daily virtue. In the right historical context, the reason is clear. Like us, he had a full set of human weaknesses, and the personal frailties to which he was subject make him more, not less, of a human being.

By way of comparison, what Mozart's nature was to Beethoven's is in some ways equivalent to what Beethoven's early keyboard instruments were to his Broadwood and Graf pianos. In a figurative sense, where Mozart knocked vainly at the door, Beethoven simply kicked it down, triumphantly marched right in, and defiantly made himself comfortable. (And Heaven help those who objected, be they paupers in poverty or princes in palaces).

PIANOS FOR BEETHOVEN

"Beethoven research is a field that has been plowed so often, each furrow having been turned so many times, that expecting to make a major 'discovery' about him would be comparable to finding an ancient Greek vase lying loose somewhere in the Parthenon." --George Marek, in his book, "Beethoven: Biography of a Genius."

As archaeologist Howard Carter peered into the tomb of Tutankhamun for the first time in 1922, he was asked what he saw. "Wonderful things," he replied. We can say the same thing when we hear Beethoven's music played on his own piano.

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During the fifty-seven years of his life, Beethoven played different kinds of keyboard instruments: in his youth, the clavichord, harpsichord, and organ; and as an adult, various fortepianos including those made by Stein, B�hm, Erard, Schantz, and Streicher (he was friendly with the Streicher Family). In his last decade, he had the good fortune of owning two exceptional instruments: pianos made by Broadwood of London, and by Graf of Vienna.

According to Mary Louise Boehm, a pianist who specializes in historic instruments (and a descendant of Joseph B�hm), in Beethoven's day there were operatively two types of pianos: the English and the Viennese, each with its own characteristics. The Viennese pianos were characterized by a light and speedy keyboard action that permitted a rapid execution of notes while producing clear, sharp tones. Their English counterparts had a more powerful sonority and afforded a solid, robust, and rich resonance. Beethoven and Haydn (his sometime-teacher) were well familiar with both types. She further says that a knowledgeable and sensitive pianist might determine which type of piano the composer may have had in mind for the composition of his various pieces.

By today's standards, certainly, most of the late 18th-century and early 19th-century Viennese pianos Beethoven played were relatively delicate instruments. By his own standards, i.e., by the way he played, they were rather flimsy. Even his finest pianos didn't have the advantage of metal bracing, a necessary feature of today's instruments, introduced into the somewhat stronger English pianos in 1820 (only after Beethoven's receipt of his Broadwood), and into the Viennese instruments in 1831 (four years after the composer's death).

Beethoven is said to have played the piano in a manner never before heard or conceived. The very spirit of his work seems to bear this out. His conceptions and his music demanded a new nobility and breadth of utterance, for which he called into existence new elements of vitality and dramatic emphasis - not only in his playing but in much of what he did. His playing was described as having a nearly-orchestral conception (foreshadowing by decades the playing of Franz Liszt). This description was of a Beethoven performance on one of the standard Viennese pianos, so it wouldn't be hard to imagine what his playing must have sounded like on the Broadwood or Graf instruments - or what it would have been like, had he been graced with a modern concert grand. Conjecture is fascinating but fruitless.

Although Beethoven didn't actually mistreat his pianos, they were nevertheless subjected to some abuse literally under his own hands, simply because of his manner of playing - a manner that was often as powerful as his personality. Most of the pianos he used throughout his life simply could not stand up to the elemental force with which he played. Piano-playing of such unprecedented power and brilliance during his day could scarcely have been imagined before he appeared - and it was not as a composer but as a pianist (and especially as an improvisor) that he first made his mark.

We know that he snapped the strings and splintered the hammers of his Viennese pianos, as much from the strength of his playing as from the relative weaknesses of the instruments.

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Because of the technology, materials and mechanics of their construction, the pianos of Beethoven's era had a different sound - that is, a different instrumental timbre and variant resonance - from those of today. The differences are subtle but appreciable. The instruments had hammers covered with layers of leather, not pads of felt, introduced for the first time only in 1826 by Jean-Henry Pape, into the pianos made by Erard of Paris. Due to their action and workings, the keys of the 18th-century pianos had a different, lighter touch to the fingers, the keybeds were shallower than those of today's pianos, and the instruments themselves produced a different kind of tone - a tone which, for obvious reasons, is more in keeping with the nature and nuances of sound which Beethoven and his contemporaries heard. Those who have heard such instruments (and those even more fortunate, who have played them) can corroborate this.

Generally, period instruments like these fortepianos form a tangible sonic link with the past in a chain of composers and keyboard artists reaching as far back as Haydn (born the same year, 1732, as George Washington). Specifically, Beethoven's own pianos form an even more material link with the composer himself: the sounds produced by these very instruments are the very sounds he expected to hear. Beethoven himself used the words Hammerklavier (or Hammerfl�gel, the "grand" piano) to describe the instruments, emphasizing that very principle of the hammer-action mechanism which is not only what distinguishes it from that of the harpsichord, but which is what makes possible on the piano the variations in volume between soft and loud. Beethoven's own opus 106 was written specifically for the instrument and is, in fact, actually subtitled Hammerklavier Sonata, the clear implication being that it was intended for performance on just such an instrument.

For Beethoven, his better pianos were at least improvements over the harpsichords of the generations of artists and instruments that had preceded him relatively recently, and to which his own pianos were heir, but even his better pianos were a far cry (that is, until the year 1818) from the massive grands we know today. He had complaints about their tone (lamenting that some of the them sound like harps) as well as their physical weaknesses and other limitations. His complaints in these respects were largely justified.

As early as 1802 a number of the nearly 150 piano-makers in and around Vienna at the time were more than eager to make a piano for Beethoven (without charge), but he was entirely willing to pay for one - provided it met his needs, and that it be made of mahogany. The manufacturers were willing - but when the time came, only Broadwood and Graf "delivered."

THE BROADWOOD PIANO

It was not only in Vienna that Beethoven was so revered even in his own day. The regard in which he was held in England, too (a place he never saw), is exemplified by a gesture of some magnitude. In 1817, a magnificent, English-action piano, a then state-of-the-art piece made by the London firm of John Broadwood & Sons, was sent to Beethoven as a gift. Founded in 1728, Broadwood had made significant strides in the development of keyboard instruments; the firm built its first grand piano in 1781, and within two years had patented and introduced the damper pedal to the instrument. This 2-pedal, 6-octave Broadwood piano took about a year to reach Beethoven, and he composed for several years within the range of its capabilities.

When he was able to hear it, he was pleased with its penetrating sound and its full, broad tone, both of which surpassed that of the comparatively feeble Viennese instruments he had had to use until then. He was a German living in Austria, playing Viennese pianos. Da Vinci never had his camera - but Beethoven had his Broadwood.

On Dec. 27, 1817, the following entry was made in the Broadwood records: "Taken today from our London warehouse, a 6-octave grande pianoforte, number 7362, tin and deal case. Beneficiary: Mr. Ludwig van Beethoven, master composer of music in Vienna. To be shipped to his current residence at M�dling, near Vienna Austria, via Trieste."

It was the intention of the head of the firm, Thomas Broadwood (who had visited Beethoven in Vienna earlier that year) that the composer be spared all expenses, including import duties, for which purpose Broadwood (with the aid of Beethoven's friends) even went so far as to enlist the help of the director of Austrian customs.

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The assistance and advice of some of Beethoven's colleagues was also sought in this matter before steps were taken for the delivery of the instrument. One of them, Ignaz Moscheles (a great admirer and friend of the composer and who may in fact have been largely responsible for initiating the gift), stated quite openly that the Broadwood's tone was beautiful - but he felt privately, and as a point of comparison, that the action (the "touch" of the keys) was somewhat stiff and heavy. Moscheles was a professional pianist and had lived for some years in England, so his opinion had merit.

When Beethoven learned of the intended gift, Thomas Broadwood received the following letter: "My very dear friend Broadwood - I have never felt a greater pleasure than your honour's intimation of the arrival of this piano, with which you are honouring me as a present. I shall look upon it as an altar upon which I shall place the most beautiful offerings of my spirit to the divine Apollo. As soon as I receive your excellent instrument, I shall immediately send you the fruits of the first moments of inspiration I spend at it, as a souvenir for you from me, my very dear Broadwood; and I hope that they will be worthy of your instrument. My dear sir, accept my warmest consideration, from your friend and very humble servant - Ludwig van Beethoven, Vienna, 7th February 1818." Though the composer evidently meant to dedicate a piece of music to Broadwood, this never came to fruition.

The very anticipation of the Broadwood's arrival brought the composer some pleasure and excitement, offsetting some of his difficulties in a life riddled with misfortune and malady and, during this period, an extended court-battle for the guardianship of his nephew, Karl. The litigation took years and made such inroads into Beethoven's time and efforts that it may have robbed posterity of at least several sonatas, a string quartet, and perhaps even the tenth symphony, some sketches for which the composer actually made.

Beethoven's 32 pianos sonatas were somewhat experimental. His 16 string quartets have been described as "autobiographical," considering the intrinsically intimate nature of this ensemble and the character of the music he composed for it. In his nine symphonies, it's been said he was largely philosophical. His greatest achievements are manifested in these three musical forms, and each of those works all represent in microcosm the essence of his life and art. If posterity was indeed robbed, it was a theft of immeasurable proportions, equivalent to the irretrievable loss of so much of Bach's music (conservatively estimated by some scholars at thirty percent) at the hands of those who sold his manuscripts for their own weight in paper, and of the schoolboys who used them to wrap their lunches.

The Broadwood's case was of mahogany, and was simply and very tastefully designed. Its appearance, of solidity and strength combined with grace caused no little surprise in Vienna at the time among those who saw it. Thomas Broadwood had arranged to have the name BEETHOVEN inlaid in ebony on the nameboard above the keys, directly under the music rack. The composer held this instrument in very high regard and refused to let anyone tune it, except Stumpff of London, who came with the right credentials: a letter of introduction from Broadwood himself. Beethoven kept the instrument as long as he lived.

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While the Viennese pianos had an action which was light, speedy, sharp, and clear, the English instruments were built more solidly and were quite robust by comparison, and they had a richly resonant tone - characteristics perhaps more suitable for Beethoven in view of his manner of piano-playing.

The Broadwood piano's tone was characterized by a transparent bass, an almost chime-like treble, and a greater sound-volume, and it afforded Beethoven some wider, more extended musical possibilities because of its greater keyboard-range. While this instrument may not have actually stimulated the composition of his late sonatas (including the Hammerklavier Sonata of 1818, his 29th work in that form), these high-water marks of 19th-century piano literature were in fact composed while Beethoven had this piano.

The Broadwood pianos evolved naturally from the company's excellent harpsichords (which they stopped manufacturing in 1793), hence the somewhat metallic but very fluid and silvery sound of their pianos. The instrument given to Beethoven had a divided pedal: the bass and treble registers could therefore be pedalled separately, giving greater clarity and brilliance to the music played on it.

Beethoven's Broadwood piano is among the most well-known of those the composer used. It was an outstanding example of an excellent piano and it may have been the finest he had ever had - that is, until 1823, when he came into possession of yet another exceptional piano.

Beethoven was quite deaf toward the end of his life, when the Broadwood was available to him. There were, however, occasions when he could hear tolerably well - and on such days, he might have spent more time than usual at the piano, for reasons very obvious. (It wasn't just musically that Beethoven lived before his time: some specialists now believe that his deafness, at least in its early stages, could today be corrected by a relatively simple operation).

Beethoven's secretary and general factotum for several years from 1815 was Anton Schindler, a young man who so venerated the master that he proudly printed, "L' Ami de Beethoven" (Friend of Beethoven) on his own visiting cards. In his book, "Beethoven As I Knew Him," Schindler wrote, "Beethoven liked to extemporize during the evening twilight. To those outside it was less audible and consequently of great charm, otherwise it made a discordant and deafening impression".

After Beethoven's death, the music publisher Spina bought the Broadwood (for 181 florins) at the sale of the composer's effects. Spina later gave the instrument to Franz Liszt - a fitting recipient, for it was very likely the Broadwood that Liszt had played for Beethoven when taken to see him as a child-prodigy. Liszt kept the Broadwood when he lived in Weimar, where it remained until his death in 1886. The following year his estate donated it to the Magyar Nemzeti Muzeum (Hungarian National Museum) in Budapest, where it remains today.

OTHER INSTRUMENTS
(Beethoven's Streicher, Liszt's Bechstein and Ibach, Mahler's Bl�thner, Brahms' B�sendorfer and J.B.Streicher, and others).

The author has seen several of Beethoven's pianos, and as a very young man even played the 5-pedal instrument made by Johann Andreas Streicher, the son-in-law of (and professional successor to) Johann Andreas Stein, who had made some of Mozart's pianos. This Streicher piano is still in Beethoven's apartment (now Memorial Rooms) on the top floor at M�lkerbastei 8 in Vienna, where he lived, intermittently, from 1804-1815. At the time the author played it, the instrument was believed to have have been one of Beethoven's own, but according to Prof. Dr. Gerhard Stradner, Curator Emeritus of the Sammlung Alter Musikinstrumente (Collection of Historic Musical Instruments) at the Kunsthistorisches Museum at the Neue Burg in Vienna, this instrument, though certainly representative of those of the composer's era, was not among Beethoven's own possessions.

The unique experience had its own problems, but which were rendered worthwhile, by compensation. Though the configuration of the keyboard itself is of course identical with those of today, the physical scale of the keys is somewhat different: the ebonies are in fact longer and thinner, while the ivories are actually thinner and shorter. The author's playing can frankly be characterized more accurately by intent than by virtuosity, but the logistical difficulty in merely playing this piano was compounded by the mechanical difficulty even in coaxing music out of it. "Es ist wirklich nicht spielbar" ("It is really not playable," the author recalls the curator saying). Although the piano's exterior was kept highly polished and had a brilliant sheen, the curator opened the lid to reveal a veritable thorn-bush of broken strings, splintered hammers and Heaven-knows-what-else, which rendered mute some of the notes. In short, getting accustomed to this keyboard took some practice, in the very literal sense.

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Playing a composer's own piano can be a most unusual, singular experience, personally as well as musically. Fortunate musicians can verify it. Among them: Leonard Bernstein, who played Tchaikovsky's piano (housed at the Rimsky-Korsakov Conservatory in Leningrad) during a New York Philharmonic tour in the late 1950s; pianist Byron Janis, who played Chopin's piano during a visit to Mallorca, where the composer had spent some time with George Sand; Vladimir Horowitz, who played Alexander Scriabin's piano during his first return to the Soviet Union in many years; composer Elmer Bernstein (who scored such films as To Kill a Mockingbird, The Ten Commandments, and The Magnificent Seven) who, after entering the London showrooms of John Broadwood & Sons, was escorted to the very piano (a Broadwood, of course) on which Chopin had given his last public performance; and composer Miklos Rozsa (perhaps best known for his film scores but who composed over 40 major works for the concert and recital hall), who was permitted to play Franz Liszt's Ibach piano at the composer's house in Weimar in 1926. Dr. Rozsa personally told the author that the ancient care-taker, Frau Appel, who showed the then 19-year-old student Rozsa around the house and let him play Liszt's own piano had, herself, been Liszt's own housekeeper.

Beethoven's are not the only instruments to have met a fortunate fate at the hands of posterity. The Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna can boast the current ownership of the keyboard instruments that were actually owned (or, in the case of literally poor Schubert, only used) by composers from Haydn through Mahler. According to Frau Jutta Ross of D�lmen, Germany, the Kunsthistorisches Museum reports that the Haydn instruments are now only attributed to his ownership, in light of more current findings.

Among those items in the Kunsthistorisches Museum's collection are a French instrument given to Beethoven by the piano manufacturer S�bastian Erard of Paris in 1803 (when the composer was working on the Eroica symphony and the Triple Concerto); a Viennese Walter & Sohn Tafel-Klavier ("table-piano," so-called because of its appearance), made ca.1820-25 and often played by Schubert; and a gigantic, two-manual harmonium ("organ-piano"), now restored, made by Erard in Paris in 1850, and owned for many years by Franz Liszt, who used it when he lived in Weimar.

The 2-pedal, jet-black grand piano owned by Gustav Mahler was made in 1902 by Julius Bl�thner of Leipzig (whose firm had produced more than 3000 instruments yearly even before the Second World War). This imposing piano, its size befitting the magnitude of Mahler's symphonies, has a surprisingly smooth and mellow tone, and was donated to the Museum in 1948 by Anna Mahler, the composer's daughter, a sculptress who specialized in the human figure in massive form.

The kindness of the collection's then-curator, Prof. Dr. Gerhard Stradner, in having permitted the author to play this piano made that occasion not only both musically and personally fulfilling, but also a special highlight of the author's visit to the Museum on that day - certainly as much for his extraordinary love of Mahler's music as for his own extraordinary circumstances in Vienna.

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The position in the history of music held by Franz Liszt is in many ways comparable to that of Leonard Bernstein today. Both men are figures of gargantuan musical importance, and by reason of their versatility they excelled in virtually any musical undertaking in which they engaged, with usually superlative results. Liszt and Bernstein shared numerous professional traits (as composer, conductor, pianist, educator), and it seems as inevitable as tomorrow morning that the latter, through his work, will ultimately reach the same destination in musical history as did the former through his.

A legendary (and documented) characteristic of Liszt's piano-playing was a tone of distinctive and peculiarly effective carrying quality. Today at his house (now a museum) on Marienstrasse in Weimar, Germany, one finds two pianos in the music room, the keyboards nearly facing each other, with a piano stool between them: a huge seven and a half octave, Berlin-made Bechstein concert grand, (acquired by Liszt in 1869) which dominates the room, and, against a wall behind it, an upright piano made in Cologne by Rudolf Ibach & Sohn (now located in Schwelm), a gift to Liszt in 1885. At one point during the years he lived in Weimar, Liszt had his own personal "collection" of pianos: in addition to the two now on display, he had a concert Erard, Beethoven's Broadwood, and a piano once owned by Mozart. It may have been the enormous Bechstein which Liszt used when composing his last piano works (such as Nuages Gris), some of the harmonies of which belong to the dawn of 20th-century music.

Despite Brahms' lack of "higher formal education" (he attended no university and studied with no "great masters"), but because of his insatiable appetite for literature as well as a driving curiosity about all kinds of music, especially that of former periods (the books and scores in his library were practically worn out from assiduous reading), in his maturity Brahms was a composer of towering musical intellect and profound depth of feeling in his work. In keeping with these standards was the J.B. Streicher concert-grand he kept in his Vienna apartment until he died there in 1897. The instrument was for many years in private hands and is now displayed at the Brahms Museum in M�rzzuschlag, in the Styria region of Austria, where the composer spent the summers of 1884-85 composing his fourth symphony.

During his twelve intermittent summers in Bad Ischl, Austria, where he also spent the last creative holiday of his life (in a house which still stands), Brahms used a smaller grand piano, a B�sendorfer, owned at that time by the Gruber family, the upper floor of whose home Brahms rented during his stays there. This instrument is now in the Brahms Collection at the Kammerhof Museum in Gmunden, Austria. The then-curator of the Collection, Frau Prof. Dr. Elfriede Prillinger, was kind enough to let the author play it. It's most likely this piano Brahms used when he composed his final (and only posthumously published) work, the Eleven Chorale Preludes for organ, Op. 122.

Those who walk into the main entrance of New York's Waldorf-Astoria Hotel at midday are often pleasantly surprised to hear live music coming from a large, ornately-decorated, brown Steinway grand located on the small balcony, facing Park Avenue, directly above and behind the lobby. The instrument had belonged to a longtime resident of the Waldorf Towers, Cole Porter.

Many of those who visit New York City take a special 3-hour tour, on a boat that circles Manhattan. As the vessel passes a certain large apartment house on the Upper West Side, the tour guides make a point of mentioning that George Gershwin's piano is still in the building's penthouse apartment, where the composer lived.

The fate of Pietro Mascagni's instrument, however, was not so fortunate: the piano he used during the 1880's when composing Cavaleria Rusticana perished in a fire only within the last three decades.

There are those who would allege that the piano is more noble an instrument than others. Though this is debatable and would in any event depend upon what's played, how it's played and who is playing, an important instrument is still an important instrument. For many years, Jascha Heifetz owned and played the "David" Stradivarius, the violin once owned by the colleague and friend of Mendelssohn, Ferdinand David (pronounced Da-VEED), concertmaster of the Leipzig Gewandhaus Orchestra and the artist for whom the composer's own Violin Concerto was in fact written, and who gave its premi�re.

The clarinetist Richard M�hlfeld, via his instrument, literally played an admittedly somewhat obscure but nonetheless very important role in the creation of some of the greatest chamber music of the late 19th century - specifically, the clarinet works of Johannes Brahms. M�hlfeld was originally a cellist, but also a virtuoso clarinetist and virtually self-taught on that instrument. Essentially it was this man who, because of his playing, was responsible for bringing Brahms out of "retirement" in the twilight of the composer's life. The sweetness and beauty of M�hlfeld's tone stimulated in Brahms the composition of such "trifles" (as the composer modestly called them) of no less than the ethereal Clarinet Quintet, the Clarinet Trio, and the two Clarinet Sonatas. One wonders what became of M�hlfeld's instrument

An important string instrument (such as an Amati violin or a Guarnerius cello) is far less likely to go astray than a "mere" clarinet. Beethoven's own quartet of string instruments is well accounted for and has long resided in the collection of the Verein Beethoven-Haus in Bonn. This quartet is composed of an Amati violin (1667-90); another by Guarnerius, c.1718; a viola by Rugero, c.1690; and a Guarnerius cello, made between 1675-1712. These instruments were given to the composer as a gift in 1800 by his patron, Prince Carl Lichnowsky, at the behest of the violinist Ignaz Schuppanzig, Beethoven's friend and an early champion of his music.

THE PIANOS OF MOZART & SCHUBERT

It was during Mozart's lifetime that the piano began to gain wide general acceptance. He lived, worked and played in an age when the piano was to some extent in an evolutionary twilight-zone - certainly not a harpsichord but not yet the full-blooded "grand piano" as we see it today, but in either case it was certainly adequate for his purposes. Trained initially on the harpsichord, Mozart developed, from all accounts, into a first-class pianist, and he and Haydn composed music for both the harpsichord and the piano.

It's been suggested that Mozart's earlier keyboard works and piano concerti, among his more than two dozen works in that form, may actually have been conceived for the harpsichord. This is possible, in view of the then-transitional period of the piano. Others, however, discount the notion, claiming that most of Mozart's keyboard music was written specifically for the fortepiano. This, too, is a possibility, because it was, after all, during his era that the piano had begun to interest more and more composers and performers as a self-sufficient instrument. Both views may have merit.

Some may find it disturbing but the fact is that we simply can't be sure what the answer is. Inquiries of ten different music historians may net twelve different opinions - and even more findings and conclusions. Logically it would be na�ve at best - and at worst, ludicrous and even dangerous - to believe that the information in every source we consult would be totally consistent. Who's to say which information is correct when sources differ and the evidence is clearly in conflict? (discounting, of course, those of the know-it-all mentality). Additionally, to offer evidence is not "to prove" - and evidence can be contradictory. In such cases, from the existent possibilities, considered conclusions must sometimes be drawn - and herein seem to be the underlying reasons for most historical disagreement. Since evidence and proof are not synonymous, for one to make a "definite" claim in either direction would be comparable to tampering with the lid on Pandora's box. The point therefore remains moot: while harpsichord works can be fully effective when played on a piano, the converse is usually not so, and many of Mozart's keyboard pieces, particularly the early ones, would be quite musical when performed on either type of instrument.

This is not the case, though, with most of Beethoven's keyboard works. By 1802 he was composing his keyboard music exclusively for the hammerklavier: his later such works are, to say the least, so specifically written for the piano, with their expressive sonorities and pedal possibilities, that they are totally unsuitable for performance on the harpsichord.

During his lifetime Mozart played a variety of pianos, including those made by Andreas Stein, whose workshop the composer visited in 1777; and by Anton Walter (whose instruments Mozart seems to have held in high regard, one of which is at the Birthplace Museum in Salzburg, and several examples of which are in New York's Metropolitan Museum of Art). It was Stein who perfected an escapement mechanism which not only promoted a smooth legato playing but which also made it possible for a player to execute notes rapidly on his pianos. This feature became known as the Viennese action, and Mozart is said to have taken full advantage of it in his playing. It was also a Stein piano on which the 9-year-old Clara Wieck, later Clara Schumann, performed at her first concert at the Gewandhaus in Leipzig on October 20, 1828; the instrument is now at the Schumann Birthplace-Museum in Zwickau, Germany.

In 1790, the year before the cadence of his 35-year life, Mozart acquired an instrument made by Ferdinand Hoffmann of Vienna. This piano was, for its time, an excellent one (Hoffmann eventually became president of Vienna's Civic Keyboard Association, in 1808). Mozart's Hoffmann piano had the advantage of knee-levers (as did some of the pianos of his friend and teacher, Haydn): they were devices which, when activated by the knees of the player during performance, served the damper and sustaining functions of the foot pedals on the later pianos.

Regarding his brief life and early death, it's entirely possible that Mozart's pauper's funeral was due more to bad advice given to his wife, Constanze, than to a lack of funds; and although Mozart spent money and enjoyed comforts just like everyone, he was far from being a pauper in the usual sense - as indeed were most of the great (and even the not-so-great) composers. Schubert and, in our own time, perhaps Bartok, might be exceptions.

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The traditionally accepted (but often false) image of "the starving composer" may be best illustrated by the case of Schubert. His professional life was not marked by total obscurity - his music was in fact given performances, and his idol, Beethoven, was familiar with some of his work, and remarked that Schubert had a divine spark. It may be hard to believe, in view of his current place in the history of music, but it's a matter of record that Schubert (known about Vienna as "the town vagabond" because of his rather Bohemian lifestyle) was never in the best financial shape. "You will quote the lowest possible fee." - Thus wrote a publisher to the man who composed some of the most exquisite and glorious music in the entire history of the literature. Although Schubert's death was not of starvation per se, he was in fact sustained in his day-to-day existence primarily through the generosity of his friends during much of his adult life. In his last years, he was aided by his brother, who provided the composer not only with a place to live (in his own apartment), but also with the use of a piano.

Although Schubert had access to various pianos during his short, 31-year life (including one by Joseph B�hm made c.1820, and reputedly another by Johann Alois Graf of Vienna, an instrument now at the Schubert Birthplace Museum at Nussdorferstrasse 54 in Vienna), there's no evidence that he ever owned his own piano. There are also conflicting stories about whether he ever actually met Beethoven, notwithstanding the legend that he visited the dying master at the eleventh hour. Schubert was known to be shy in the extreme with those he didn't know, and it's reported that the closest he ever came to personally making Beethoven's acquaintance was at a tavern (which might have been the Griechenbeisl, still a popular restaurant in Vienna and which Beethoven and Schubert were said to have frequented), where Schubert simply pointed out the great man to a friend - and then fled the place as though its patrons had the pox.

The 4-pedal piano presumably used by Schubert during the last year of his life was owned by his brother, Ferdinand, in whose Vienna apartment the composer died in 1828, at Kettenbr�ckengasse 6, and where the instrument remains today. Made by Heinrich Elwerkember of Vienna, the year of origin is unknown but the instrument is consistent with the sound and styling of other pianos contemporary with Schubert's time. Restored in 1829 by Joseph B�hm, it was overhauled several times throughout the years, most recently by Alfred Watzek in 1979.

GRAF'S PIANOS

By the year 1823, Beethoven's Broadwood was a tangle of broken wires, cracked hammer-posts, and mute keys, and was a virtual wreck. This may have made little difference to Beethoven, whose deafness had caused a change not only in his lifestyle but also in his criteria for judging a piano. He (usually) couldn't hear his own playing, but he retained his Broadwood.

At this point, Conrad Graf entered the picture. His timing could not have been more opportune, considering the condition of Beethoven's Broadwood at this stage. Graf had begun the manufacture of his pianos in Vienna in 1804 and was soon appointed Imperial Vienna's official court piano-maker. By reputation as well as by deed, he was, after 1815, considered the foremost maker of concert grands in Vienna.

The caliber of Graf's pianos is illustrated by some of the names on the roster of composers who used them: among them, Schubert, Mendelssohn, and the young Liszt. This in itself gives testimony to the quality of the instruments. They sang with a cantabile tone under the hands of Schubert in Vienna, gave clarity to the velocity of Mendelssohn's playing in Leipzig, and it thundered in the bravura passagework of Liszt during his whirlwind concert tours. Graf's pianos seem to form an important link between Classical and Romantic keyboard instruments.

Chopin, who also played French pianos by Erard and by Pleyel (the instrument he eventually favored) as well as those by Broadwood, praised the Graf instruments on his first visit to Vienna in 1829 - and was soon provided with a Graf piano. His concert Erard was a gift from publisher Moritz Schlesinger, and his Pleyel grand is now in the German National Museum in N�rnberg. Chopin, "the poet of the piano," is said to have had such control at the keyboard that there were two dozen different degrees of shading between piano and pianissimo, but this was due certainly more to his pianistic skill than to the quality of the instruments he played.

Conrad Graf also offered a piano as a wedding gift to Clara Wieck on her marriage to Robert Schumann in 1840, an instrument which they used throughout their lives together, and which is now at exhibited at the Kunsthistorisches Museum in Vienna. This 4-pedal grand piano, built in 1839, was with the Schumanns when they moved to their first home at Inselstrasse 18 in Leipzig, and it later stood in Schumann's workroom at Bilkerstrasse 15 in D�sseldorf until his death in 1856. It was undoubtedly this very Graf piano on which a painfully shy, 20-year-old composer named Johannes Brahms played for the Schumanns when he visited them for the first time in 1853 at their D�sseldorf home. That meeting was fateful in that it began not only the friendship between the young Brahms and Schumann (which ended only with the latter's death three years later), but also Brahms' lifelong devotion to Clara (who was fourteen years his senior), with whom he eventually developed a singular interaction and who remained an altogether unique phenomenon in his life until the end of his days - but this is another story for another time (told elsewhere on this site). Through Clara, Schumann's piano later came into Brahms' own possession.

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The English and Viennese pianos each had their own intrinsic advantages, but the 3-pedal Graf piano that was given to Beethoven in 1823 may have combined some of the best features of both, and perhaps for this reason the composer nearly discarded his Broadwood for it. (Fortunately for posterity, he didn't).

Beethoven was pleased with the Graf piano's power and brilliance, its lightness and brightness of tone-color, and perhaps most importantly, with its conspicuously louder sound (more about which, presently). The instrument had a greater keyboard-range (more than six octaves) than the Broadwood, and a fine cantabile tone. One of the Graf's distinguishing features, which it shared with some other early pianos, was a noticeably different sound-character to each of the registers: the bass was sonorous and powerful, the middle register cool and clear, and the upper register and higher treble was crisp and almost bell-like. Today our own ears are not accustomed to such a timbre, but more to the uniformity of sound in each of the registers of our modern pianos.

Firstly, the concept of having four-string notes (i.e., unisons) rather than three (or sometimes three rather than two, as the case may have been) for each tone in the upper reaches of a keyboard instrument had originated as early as 1715 with Christoph Gottlieb Schr�ter of Dresden. Theoretically the purpose was greater amplification, and this feature gave fuller volume to the treble registers in harpsichords. Conrad Graf used this four-string unison feature in some of his instruments, including the piano meant for a deaf composer who might benefit from it.

Secondly, at the suggestion of Johann M�lzel, in theory the inventor of the metronome but in fact the designer of Beethoven's "hearing-aids" (i.e., the ear-trumpets), Graf made a significant modification to this piano for the deaf Beethoven. He arranged to have constructed over the strings and mechanism of Beethoven's piano a canopy of thin plywood, similar in appearance to a wide prompter's box, across the entire width of the piano, which was intended to amplify the sound even more. It was thoughtful of M�lzel to have had this consideration in mind for Beethoven, and it was while the composer had this Graf instrument that he penned his last piano works.

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Beethoven is said to have died as he had lived: dramatically. After an argument (which he himself may have precipitated) with his brother Johann, at the latter's estate at Gneixendorf, Beethoven stormed out in a blind rage. Leaving in a huff, and possibly too proud to use his brother's coach, he started back toward Vienna, then a 2-day journey, on a crude, open milk-cart. The 57-year-old man spent the night at an inn which was as cold as the argument must have been heated. It was December of 1826, wintertime.

By the time Beethoven arrived in Vienna he was suffering from a severe inflammation of the lungs. Soon he had almost recovered, but a sudden outburst of rage brought on a relapse with a terrifying combination of symptoms. Surgeons (such as they were in those days) were called in for a series of "operations" (four, to be exact, including abdominal taps - all performed without anesthesia, the advent of which was still two decades away). While he felt his strength ebbing away, the sick man suffered with a patience that was untypical of him. The illness lasted four months.

On the evening of Monday, March 26, 1827, a violent thunderstorm arose in Vienna. (Goethe happened to record this event in his diary). According to the eyewitnesses, the room in which the composer lay dying was suddenly illuminated by a flash of lightning. Beethoven, in a characteristic gesture, was said to have opened his eyes and raised his clenched fist in defiance. As the thunder subsided, he sank back and died.

After Beethoven's death, the instrument was returned to Graf, and was then acquired by the imperial court-librarian and bookdealer Wimmer. It later found its way to the Bern home of the Swiss poet and friend of Brahms, Pastor Joseph Widmann, whose son, Joseph, Jr., sold the instrument in 1889 to the newly-organized Verein Beethoven-Haus in Bonn - just in time to prevent its impending sale to America.

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The consequences of neglecting a piano can be as far-reaching as those of abuse - and by this time, those consequences of years-long neglect had taken their toll. The amplifying canopy had long since disappeared; the more than seven tons of tractive pull had caused an unusually heavy deformation of the entire casing and sounding board, creating many bad cracks; the leather which covered the hammers, tightened over them in seven layers and for almost as many decades, had disintegrated and was reduced to powder. All of these factors rendered the instrument virtually unplayable.

In 1963 the N�rnburg firm of J.C. Neupert, famous for their harpsichords and also restorers of period keyboard instruments, was engaged by the Verein Beethoven-Haus to restore this Graf piano and rectify its problems. A primary stipulation was that Neupert preserve and rebuild, rather than "replace," as many of the original components as possible, for reasons very obvious: this had been Beethoven's piano. In restoration, the case was subjected to a new bending process, and the hammers were rebuilt and recovered with new layers of leather.

The keys, however - the worn ebonies and the ivories yellowed with age - remained intact and exactly as they had been: just as Beethoven had played upon them.

In 1970, the Broadwood was brought from Budapest to Bonn and was reunited with the Graf for the Beethoven bicentennial, and a special Beethoven recital, performed on both instruments (and recorded), was given by the Austrian pianist J�rg Demus at the Beethovenhalle in Bonn.

That this Graf instrument was Beethoven's last piano makes it effectively priceless. It's still in the possession of the Beethoven-Haus in Bonn, and it remains an exquisite keyboard instrument of the composer's era.

The Broadwood and Graf pianos used by Beethoven might be, in a comparative sense, the Steinways and B�sendorfers of their day. They were among the finest pianos that Beethoven ever played and he was fortunate in having owned these instruments, which are as magnificent now, tonally as well as visually, as they were then.

By the 1850s, the evolution of the concert grand had reached the stage, figuratively as well as literally, where it had the capabilities and dimensions that made it a fully mature and self-sufficient solo concert instrument, and by the end of the century the piano essentially as we know it today had for the most part assumed its modern form, in appearance as well as in its sound.

REFLECTIONS

Today's pianos are often featured in our homes as pieces of furniture as much as (and often even more than) a musical instrument. Sonically, because of thicker strings, iron frames, and a more even and forceful volume, they may also correspond to a tonal ideal - i.e., sometimes a somewhat percussive quality - crystallized in the minds of composers like Stravinsky, Bartok and Prokofiev, and exemplified in their piano music. A price, however, has been paid for this kind of "progress." Modern pianos can lack the bell-like transparency of a Mozart piano, the greater softness and yet power of the basses of a Beethoven piano, or the dreamy tenderness of a Parisian salon Chopin piano.

To compare Beethoven's Broadwood and Graf pianos with each other for quality purposes would be futile, just as such a comparison of each of them with today's concert grands would be unfair. What comes into play in either case isn't a matter of "quality" but rather of difference. The inherent distinctions among these instruments simply preclude equitable quality comparisons. (Can one compare the "quality" of a fine Stradivarius with that of a fine Guarnerius or Amati?). It would of course be possible to compare such instruments in certain ways, but not in others - it could be done, by the knowledgeable specialist in period pianos, for the purpose of identifying and studying some of their differences.

If the standards of comparison were to be physical ones (the sheer size of the pianos, and the more modern materials and technology of manufacture of the newer instruments), rather than musical considerations (such as touch, and tone-production), the comparisons would be unjust in the extreme - but if they must be made, suffice it to say that Beethoven's Broadwood and Graf pianos, in comparable historical perspective, would stand up against today's concert grands in much the same way as the piano technique of Franz Liszt would now very likely rival that of today's virtuosi.

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We can't have the experience of hearing Beethoven play his own music. This is obvious. We can, however, hear his own music played on his own pianos. This is a blessing which raises some questions, the answers to which, alas, aren't so obvious. Would one prefer to listen to the composer's music performed by an acknowledged Beethoven exponent like Rudolf Serkin on a modern concert grand? - or, to hear a rendition of the same pieces by a musician even of less renown, but played on fortepianos that are contemporary with the composer's own era (ideally, Beethoven's own Broadwood and Graf Hammerklaviere)?

Additionally, would such a decision be based on musical and historical criteria, or, just as validly, on personal preferences? In this regard, both can carry weight and should be equally considered: the once-available recorded performances (on a modern piano) of some of Beethoven's late piano sonatas by a now deceased but well-known European composer and pianist are a head-shaking disappointment, and are as embarrassingly anemic as some of Beethoven's own early sketches are embarrassingly crude.

Today we're lucky. Through commercial recordings (though many are out of print), we can hear virtually definitive performances of Bernstein conducting Bernstein; Dmitri Shostakovich (winner of the Chopin Piano Competition at age 21) playing his own Preludes and Fugues, as soloist in performances of each of his two piano concerti, and performing his Concertino for Two Pianos (with his son Maxim as the second soloist); we can hear Maurice Ravel at the piano playing his own music, as well as conducting his Bolero with the Lamoureux Orchestra (on an historic recording made by Polydor ca. 1932). We can also hear much older recordings of some much older composers performing their own music - Ralph Vaughan Williams and Edward Elgar conducting their works, and, thanks to the International Piano Archive, we can hear Edvard Grieg, Claude Debussy, Gabriel Faur�, Camille Saint-Sa�ns, and even Brahms, playing their own piano music. (The Brahms recording, from a cylinder made in December, 1889 possibly at the home of his friend, Dr. Richard Fellinger, is unique in that the composer actually announces himself, partly in English, before rendering his Hungarian Dance Nr.l in g-minor, although his playing can hardly be heard).

We're lucky in still other respects. Through the early music movement, the increased interest in period instruments, keyboard and otherwise, has made performances on them more common today than before. Recordings, too, of music played on fortepianos have become fairly popular: Paul Badura-Skoda, Malcolm Frager and others have recorded works on instruments contemporary with the eras of composers from Schubert through Chopin, Melvin Tan performs the five Beethoven concerti on a period piano, and Ernst Gr�schel has recorded, in addition to Beethoven's "Moonlight" Sonata and other works on the Graf instrument, some of Chopin's piano works on the composer's own concert Erard at the German National Museum in N�rnberg, where the piano is located.

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Historically most special of all, in this respect, are particular instruments the sounds of which are documented literally on record: the composers' own pianos. For the liberal, open-minded listener, the experience of hearing such a performance or recording can be nothing short of a wonder.

Outstanding among such Beethoven recordings are those made by the Austrian pianist J�rg Demus, a musician if not of international "celebrity" then surely of international caliber, on which he performs Beethoven's piano works on the composer's own Broadwood and Graf pianos. It can be a hair-raising experience to hear these recordings, if not an outright revelation.

While performances today on period instruments raise some questions among scholars and historians (and others), a performance on Beethoven's own pianos raises a question that is more specific - a question not of musical authenticity (how he played), but of sound authenticity (what he heard). From the musicological viewpoint of performance practice per se, the plain, simple fact is that we actually know as much about Beethoven's playing as he knew about ours. What is documented, though, is the impression he made on his listeners.

Because of the nature and elements of their construction, the sounds of his pianos are not the same as those we hear coming from today's instruments. These subtle differences in timbre, discreet but distinct, may not be what our modern ears expect to hear; but in terms of their actual sound they are historically far closer to what Beethoven himself would have heard, than what we hear today on the modern concert grand at the hands of Vladimir Horowitz, or even on the recordings of a Beethoven specialist like Artur Schnabel. The bottom line is that at least from a purely historical (not a musicological) perspective, the closest we'll ever get to hearing Beethoven play his own music is to hear his music played by someone else, but on Beethoven's own piano.

In hearing the sounds of these instruments, the casual listener is welcome, if he or she chooses, to close his eyes and simply enter a figurative time-machine. The astute listener, however, will realize that while the fortepianos of Beethoven's day produced the kind of sounds he heard, his own Broadwood and Graf pianos produced the very sounds he heard.

"Wonderful things," to be sure.

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JEFFREY DANE is a historian, researcher and essayist whose writing on various subjects appears in the USA and abroad in several languages, and in both print and online publications. He's a contributor to several volumes, including "Leonard Bernstein - A Life" by Meryle Secrest (Alfred Knopf, New York, 1994), and "The Musical Performance Journal - Reflections 97" by Basil Tchaikov and Jon Tolansky (Hardwood Academic Publishers, London, 1997). He was asked to write the Foreword for "The Alamo Story: From Early History to Current Conflicts" by J.R. Edmondson (Rep. of TX Press, February, 2000) and has contributed to two books by artist and author Rod Timanus. He's been called by some a real idealist and by others an ideal realist. Both views have merit.

He favors the following human attributes: good sense and logic, and those who subscribe to it in concept and practice; people who admit when they're wrong about something, and those who accept - graciously, not grudgingly - his own apology when he acknowledges an error of his own; those who consider and weigh their options, make a decision, and stay with it; circumstances that promote a clear vision, where we can see something for its own intrinsic worth and gauge it on its own merits, viewing it (and hopefully accepting it) for what it is.

His dislikes are: screaming children; pomposity, attitude and arrogance in any form; those of the "know-it-all" mentality, and whose personal dissatisfaction and venting masquerades as "constructive criticism"; people who have a genius for making simple things needlessly complicated; men & women who are intolerant of another person's viewpoint and who fix only upon what suits them; the person who takes the easy way out by focusing on what something is not, and who first polls others to decide what his or her own opinion will be.

If you enjoyed this article, you can find several other of Jeffrey Dane's articles at frugalfun.com: