Search

The diffusion of pianos with a tangent action can be traced throughout the whole eighteenth century and even later. Sometimes these instruments are primitive harpsichord-to-piano conversions but in other cases they are refined pianos with a Stoßmechanik with non-pivoting vertical hammers. Apart from the first simple models of Jean Marius around 1716, Christoph Gottlieb Schröter before 1739 was probably the first to design a more sophisticated action with non-pivoting hammers propelled by intermediate levers. However, the most refined tangent pianos made during the eighteenth century are the instruments known as Tangentenflügel, build by Franz Jacob Spath and Christoph Friederich Schmahl from Regensburg and by their followers (such as Johann Wilhelm Berner). Tangent pianos were possibly exported from Germany to other countries. The pianos of this type made in England and Italy during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries might be traceable to the German tradition, but are probably not directly related to the school of Spath and Schmahl. In Italy, the pianos with a tangent action were made until the mid-nineteenth century. But in the rest of Europe, this type of action was made only until the beginning of the nineteenth century. The dissertation comprises detailed descriptions and a scientific catalogue of a wide number of pianos with a tangent action, including the Tangentenflügel of Spath and Schmahl, kept in public and private collections in Europe, the United States of America and Japan.