Americus Backers (died 1778), sometimes described as the father of the English
grand pianoforte
The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...
style, brought the hammer striking action for keyboard instruments from his master
Gottfried Silbermann
Gottfried Silbermann (January 14, 1683 – August 4, 1753) was a German builder of keyboard instruments. He built harpsichords, clavichords, organs, and fortepianos; his modern reputation rests mainly on the latter two.
Life
Very little is kn ...
's workshop in
Freiburg
Freiburg im Breisgau (; abbreviated as Freiburg i. Br. or Freiburg i. B.; Low Alemannic: ''Friburg im Brisgau''), commonly referred to as Freiburg, is an independent city in Baden-Württemberg, Germany. With a population of about 230,000 (as o ...
to England in the mid-18th century. Unlike the eleven other ex-apprentices of Silbermann who followed him to England and built
square pianos with his action, Backers developed Silbermann's action (copied from
Cristofori
Bartolomeo Cristofori di Francesco (; May 4, 1655 – January 27, 1731) was an Italian maker of musical instruments famous for inventing the piano.
Life
The available source materials on Cristofori's life include his birth and death recor ...
) into a reliable, powerful and responsive form that he built into a grand
harpsichord
A harpsichord ( it, clavicembalo; french: clavecin; german: Cembalo; es, clavecín; pt, cravo; nl, klavecimbel; pl, klawesyn) is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. This activates a row of levers that turn a trigger mechanism ...
case and added two tonal effects –
una corda
The soft pedal (or pedal, ) is one of the standard pedals on a piano, generally placed leftmost among the pedals. On a grand piano this pedal shifts the whole action (including the keyboard) slightly to the right, so that the hammers which no ...
and
damper lift – activated by
pedals
A pedal (from the Latin '' pes'' ''pedis'', "foot") is a lever designed to be operated by foot and may refer to:
Computers and other equipment
* Footmouse, a foot-operated computer mouse
* In medical transcription, a pedal is used to control p ...
built into the dedicated trestle stand, again his original innovation. This new instrument altered the landscape of English music, causing composers and musicians to consign the plucked string harpsichord and its music to history. It is upon Americus's design that the modern grand pianoforte we know today is based.
Life
Contemporary and later sources agree that Americus was of Dutch descent. To date, no chronicler has turned up his record of birth so we can only say that he was born in the early part of the 18th Century. We adduce this because known dates of birth of other apprentices at Silbermann's workshop (such as
Johannes Zumpe
Johannes (Johann Christoph) Zumpe (pronounced ''zumpy''; 14 June 1726 in Fürth, Free Imperial City of Nuremberg, modern Germany – buried 5 December 1790 in London, UK) was a leading maker of early English square pianos, a form of rectangul ...
) are in the 1720s.
Americus migrated to
Freiberg
Freiberg is a university and former mining town in Saxony, Germany. It is a so-called ''Große Kreisstadt'' (large county town) and the administrative centre of Mittelsachsen district.
Its historic town centre has been placed under heritage c ...
, Saxony, apprenticed to organ, harpsichord and piano builder Gottfried Silbermann. The date of Americus's indentures could not be before 1711, the year that Silbermann set up his organ workshop and could equally have been post-1730 by which time the workshop was turning out harpsichords and pianos with Silbermann designed actions in square and in harpsichord cases.
Americus was the first of twelve of Silbermann's apprentices to depart for England. Since we know that Zumpe, next to set up shop in England, arrived in 1756, Americus must have been here before this, yet we have no record of his domicile or trade until 1763 when he took up residence in London's Jermyn Street (with the Anglicized Christian name of Andrew) where, according to the rate books of St. James, Piccadilly, he lived until 1778. A.J. Hipkins in his ''History of the Pianoforte'' reports that Americus died in that year but does not give his age.
His instruments
Americus built both harpsichords and pianofortes. He is described by composer, musician and chronicler
Charles Burney
Charles Burney (7 April 1726 – 12 April 1814) was an English music historian, composer and musician. He was the father of the writers Frances Burney and Sarah Burney, of the explorer James Burney, and of Charles Burney, a classicist a ...
in ''Rees's Cyclopaedia'' for 1772 as "a harpsichord maker of second rank, who constructed several pianofortes, and improved the mechanism in some particulars, but the tone, with all the delicacy of Schroeter's (see below) touch, lost the spirit of the harpsichord and gained nothing in sweetness".
Nevertheless, one of his harpsichords was owned and played by the naturalized English
castrato
A castrato (Italian, plural: ''castrati'') is a type of classical male singing voice equivalent to that of a soprano, mezzo-soprano, or contralto. The voice is produced by castration of the singer before puberty, or it occurs in one who, due to ...
, Giusto Fernando Tenducci, an intimate friend of
Johann Christian Bach
Johann Christian Bach (September 5, 1735 – January 1, 1782) was a German composer of the Classical period (music), Classical era, the eighteenth child of Johann Sebastian Bach, and the youngest of his eleven sons. After living in Italy for ...
and an associate of world-renowned castrato
Gaspare Pacchierotti
Gaspare Pacchierotti (21 May 1740 – 28 October 1821) was a mezzo-soprano castrato, and one of the most famous singers of his time.
Training and first appearances
Details of his early life are scarce. It is possible that he studied with Mario Bi ...
, a regular visitor to London between 1778 and 1791. Tenducci published a set of sonatas for the harpsichord or pianoforte not heard since the 18th century. (A recording of one of these pieces exists on a CD by David Leigh playing the actual restored 1766 Backers harpsichord in question.)
A Covent Garden play bill from 1767 amongst the Broadwood family memorabilia dated 16 May for that year announces "End of Act 1. Miss Brickler will sing a favourite song from Judith, accompanied by Mr Dibdin on a new instrument called Piano Forte." There is some speculation that Backers was the maker of this novelty.
Americus announced the first exhibition of this "new Forte Piano" in February 1771. Subsequent Backers pianos were used by J.C. Bach and his protégé Johann Samuel Schroeter for concerto performances in London and would certainly have been known by
Muzio Clementi
Muzio Filippo Vincenzo Francesco Saverio Clementi (23 January 1752 – 10 March 1832) was an Italian composer, virtuoso pianist, pedagogue, conductor, music publisher, editor, and piano manufacturer, who was mostly active in England.
Encourag ...
. This was played at the Thatched House in St James's Street, London, in 1773.
Cesare Ponsicchi, a 19th-century piano restorer who had himself worked on original Cristofori pianos, found a Backers grand piano at Pistoria, Italy dated 1778, indicating that Americus's pianos were exported abroad. This piano can no longer be traced.
Role in development of the grand piano
We know from the history of the Broadwood family that
John Broadwood
John Broadwood (6 October 1732 – 17 July 1812) was the Scottish founder of the piano manufacturer Broadwood and Sons.
Life
Broadwood was born 6 October 1732 and christened 15 Oct 1732 at St Helens, Cockburnspath in Berwickshire, and grew up in ...
and his fellow Scot
Robert Stodart
The name Robert is an ancient Germanic given name, from Proto-Germanic "fame" and "bright" (''Hrōþiberhtaz''). Compare Old Dutch ''Robrecht'' and Old High German ''Hrodebert'' (a compound of '' Hruod'' ( non, Hróðr) "fame, glory, honou ...
– both apprentices to the harpsichord builder
Burkat Shudi (Anglicized) – would spend evenings at Americus's Jermyn Street home and workshop, helping him to perfect his escapement for his pianoforte action based on, but differing in several important factors, from Silbermann's design that was in turn developed from Cristofori's original.
Americus's innovation was the addition of an "escapement" to Silbermann's realization of a string striking action design. Unlike Cristofori's design (to which of course Americus had no access) which interposed an intermediate
lever
A lever is a simple machine consisting of a beam or rigid rod pivoted at a fixed hinge, or ''fulcrum''. A lever is a rigid body capable of rotating on a point on itself. On the basis of the locations of fulcrum, load and effort, the lever is div ...
between the lever that the
key
Key or The Key may refer to:
Common meanings
* Key (cryptography), a piece of information that controls the operation of a cryptography algorithm
* Key (lock), device used to control access to places or facilities restricted by a lock
* Key (map ...
lifts and the striking
hammer
A hammer is a tool, most often a hand tool, consisting of a weighted "head" fixed to a long handle that is swung to deliver an impact to a small area of an object. This can be, for example, to drive nails into wood, to shape metal (as w ...
, Americus placed an upstanding wooden "
jack
Jack may refer to:
Places
* Jack, Alabama, US, an unincorporated community
* Jack, Missouri, US, an unincorporated community
* Jack County, Texas, a county in Texas, USA
People and fictional characters
* Jack (given name), a male given name, ...
" pivoting from this lever acting directly on a leather clothed notch in the hammer butt. An adjustable screw mounted underneath the hammer
flange
A flange is a protruded ridge, lip or rim (wheel), rim, either external or internal, that serves to increase shear strength, strength (as the flange of an iron beam (structure), beam such as an I-beam or a T-beam); for easy attachment/transfer of ...
support rail, known as a "set-off", impacts upon the jack, disengaging it from the hammer which is thus launched into free flight before it strikes its course of strings.
This 'escapement' allows the hammer to fall away from the strings after striking them allowing them to vibrate freely as long as the key is held down producing a long sustained note until the felt damper depending from a lead weighted wooden block is allowed to fall onto the strings by lifting the finger from the key, stilling them and cutting off the note when desired. The hammer head is caught by a "check" – a felt clothed wooden block mounted on the lever by a solid wire. This check is so placed to catch the hammer in a position where the jack can re-engage with the butt to propel it once again towards the strings before the key is fully released. This allows for rapid note repetition common in the ornamentation of music designed to disguise the short duration of treble notes that is typical of the plucked string harpsichord and the early piano whose light, low tension stringing has not the power we expect from a piano of today. (Despite the power and longevity of treble notes in a modern grand, its finely crafted complex action allows up to twenty note repetitions per second, which performance and skill of execution is tested in works such as those of
Granados and
Albeniz).
Americus fitted his striking action into a harpsichord case whose long bass strings would provide long note duration compared to the square pianos of Zumpe and his contemporaries, showing off a completely new prowess and capability with which musicians and composers could experiment and develop into new forms of keyboard music. (The term Grand Pianoforte for this design was not coined until Robert Stodart patented and used it to adorn the nameplate of a 1777 model bearing his name as manufacturer.)
Americus's other innovation was to mount his instrument on a dedicated three-legged trestle stand. The two front legs of this stand incorporated linkages to the instrument from two pedals. The left pedal when depressed caused the whole keyboard and action to slide to the right against a return spring mounted inside the case. This caused the hammers to strike only one of the strings in its normal trichord and is now generally known as the "una corda". (In Cristofori's original design and in the
Viennese pianos of the 18th Century, the una corda was operated by a knee lever since many pianos, like harpsichords, were not supplied with a dedicated stand and might be mounted on a convenient chest or cupboard).
The right hand pedal operated a mechanism that lifted all the dampers away from the strings, Americus's own original idea that was not copied by the Viennese piano makers until much later.
So, in summary, the Backers piano in harpsichord case was the first of what has come to be known as the 18th Century English grand piano. We do not have an exact date for the very first instrument to be offered for sale. Its earliest appearance in public was in 1770 according to John Paul Williams' ''The Piano, An Inspirational Guide to the Piano and its Place In History''.
Following hot on the heels of the Backers instruments came offerings from John Broadwood, succeeding his master, and from Robert Stodart striking out in business on his own. It is quite clear that these and subsequent models by Clementi and other entrants into English piano building are derived directly from Americus's original. Hence the English Grand Pianoforte tradition comes about as a direct result of the prototype Americus Backers.
Extant instruments
Harpsichord 1766
Two manual harpsichord in the English style, fully restored to near-original condition (repairs to internal bracing and soundboard) by Laurie Leigh Antiques.
Straight tapering piano-style legs were added in 1830. Photographs of this instrument are located at.
David Leigh has made a recording on CD of two Bach works played on this instrument, in the album ''Harpsichords: Historic, Rare and Unique Volume 2 – Tenducci's Harpsichord''.
Pianoforte in harpsichord case 1772 serial number 21
The Russell Collection, St. Cecilia's Hall (
University of Edinburgh
The University of Edinburgh ( sco, University o Edinburgh, gd, Oilthigh Dhùn Èideann; abbreviated as ''Edin.'' in post-nominals) is a public research university based in Edinburgh, Scotland. Granted a royal charter by King James VI in 15 ...
)
There is a photograph of a copy built by Michael Cole in 1960 now in the Cantos Collection at
Michael Cole's website
The instrument shows no evidence of alteration (it was quite common for piano buyers to have their instruments altered, for example to extend their compass with extra notes)
The mahogany case with boxwood cross-banding encloses a wooden frame and soundboard with paper rose. Trichord
In music theory, a trichord () is a group of three different pitch classes found within a larger group. A trichord is a contiguous three-note set from a musical scale or a twelve-tone row.
In musical set theory there are twelve trichords give ...
throughout (there are three strings to each note) Compass is five octaves
In music, an octave ( la, octavus: eighth) or perfect octave (sometimes called the diapason) is the interval between one musical pitch and another with double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been refer ...
(FF-f3). Two pedals – una corda and damper lift.
There is a three-legged trestle stand with pedal mechanism for lifting the dampers. This is the first pedal mechanism seen on any keyboard instrument.
The overall dimensions of the instrument – a case length of around 7 feet - allow for long enough strings to give true bass pitch and tone and long enough keys to allow for a delicacy of leverage that offers the player a wide dynamic range
Dynamic range (abbreviated DR, DNR, or DYR) is the ratio between the largest and smallest values that a certain quantity can assume. It is often used in the context of signals, like sound and light. It is measured either as a ratio or as a base-1 ...
(optimum key and string lengths are the reasons for the great length of modern performance quality grand pianos - 275–301 cm).
The instrument's harpsichord pedigree is evident in the shallow 1/4 in key dip one is used to in the harpsichord action instead of the modern piano's 3/8 in. It has a lightness of tone from the narrow-gauge stringing and the duration of string vibration decreases gradually as you progress up the keyboard so that the treble section notes fade quickly, not having the longevity we expect from later pianos. The Backers escapement gives the keys a feeling of lightness and the action a responsiveness that allows for very rapid playing.
These properties, combined with the smoothness and responsiveness of the escapement, encourage the player to adopt a right hand style that majors on scales
Scale or scales may refer to:
Mathematics
* Scale (descriptive set theory), an object defined on a set of points
* Scale (ratio), the ratio of a linear dimension of a model to the corresponding dimension of the original
* Scale factor, a number w ...
and ornamentation
An ornament is something used for decoration.
Ornament may also refer to:
Decoration
*Ornament (art), any purely decorative element in architecture and the decorative arts
*Biological ornament, a characteristic of animals that appear to serve on ...
overlaying sustained bass notes and chords
Chord may refer to:
* Chord (music), an aggregate of musical pitches sounded simultaneously
** Guitar chord a chord played on a guitar, which has a particular tuning
* Chord (geometry), a line segment joining two points on a curve
* Chord ( ...
since the hammer action gives the tenor and bass register considerable power, duration and harmonic richness and complexity through each note - tones that cannot be achieved by the string plucking action of a harpsichord.
So the instrument is most suited to transitional music written for the early piano by composers such as Haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn ( , ; 31 March 173231 May 1809) was an Austrian composer of the Classical period. He was instrumental in the development of chamber music such as the string quartet and piano trio. His contributions to musical form have led ...
and Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 17565 December 1791), baptised as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period (music), Classical period. Despite his short life, his ra ...
who migrated from the harpsichord to the piano during their careers and compositional development. This music retains the right-hand style of the harpsichord, i.e. fast runs and ornaments because treble notes cannot sustain for very long, but innovates with a left hand style that throws over the standard " grounds" in favour of long sustained bass notes and chords that support and harmonize
In music, harmonization is the chordal accompaniment to a line or melody: "Using chords and melodies together, making harmony by stacking scale tones as triads".
A harmonized scale can be created by using each note of a musical scale as a ...
with the melody
A melody (from Greek language, Greek μελῳδία, ''melōidía'', "singing, chanting"), also tune, voice or line, is a Linearity#Music, linear succession of musical tones that the listener perceives as a single entity. In its most liter ...
. Neither the compass nor the sonic performance would suit later works of the 19th Century composers.
That said, it is possible to play some very modern music most successfully on the instrument. For example, Richard Rodney Bennett
Sir Richard Rodney Bennett (29 March 193624 December 2012) was an English composer of film, TV and concert music, and also a jazz pianist and occasional vocalist. He was based in New York City from 1979 until his death there in 2012.Zachary Woo ...
's book of simple modal pieces ''The Days of the Week'', sounded well on the piano, giving the music the wistful and ethereal quality sought and marked by the composer.
The power of the instrument is incisive enough to fill a large room with an audience. The striking position of the hammers, at around one twelfth of the speaking length of the strings, gives this instrument a thinner and much less harmonically rich sound than a modern piano whose striking point is, for optimum power and tonal richness and complexity, around one seventh of the speaking length. (This optimum striking distance was discovered and standardized by the first John Broadwood before the end of the 18th Century indicating that he possessed an exceptional ear for identifying and eliciting the maximum musical appeal from his instruments bearing in mind that he had no knowledge of, or access to the applied physics and scientific measuring techniques that were more recently used to identify ideals of piano design for the modern era.)
I ??judge that the surprising qualities of an early English grand pianoforte would have persuaded the 18th Century prospective keyboard instrument purchaser to buy it in preference to a traditional harpsichord and to use the new music written for it to show off its capabilities to envious house guests.
Although the piano is not especially loud at full power, it does show an impressive width of dynamic range compared to the plucked string instrument and it is fully capable of satisfying the original demand that Ferdinando di Medici made of Cristofori – to create an instrument that would, in accompanying his voice at home singing from the popular entertainments of the day mimic the gradual rising crescendo
In music, the dynamics of a piece is the variation in loudness between notes or phrases. Dynamics are indicated by specific musical notation, often in some detail. However, dynamics markings still require interpretation by the performer dependi ...
and falling diminuendo
In music, the dynamics of a piece is the variation in loudness between note (music), notes or phrase (music), phrases. Dynamics are indicated by specific musical notation, often in some detail. However, dynamics markings still require interpreta ...
volume as well as the power to surprise an audience with the sudden 'snap' of a loud note or chord to contrast with a quieter preceding passage sforzando of an opera house light orchestra.
Pianoforte in harpsichord case undated
The Benton Fletcher Collection, Fenton House
Fenton House is a 17th-century merchant's house in Hampstead in North London which belongs to the National Trust, bequeathed to them in 1952 by Lady Binning, its last owner and resident. It is a detached house with a walled garden, which is ...
, London (National Trust
The National Trust, formally the National Trust for Places of Historic Interest or Natural Beauty, is a charity and membership organisation for heritage conservation in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. In Scotland, there is a separate and ...
Properties).
The instrument is in the North Attic and, like all the other instruments in the collection it is available for playing to accredited music students by appointment.
I have heard doubts about the authenticity of this instrument. Nevertheless, there is pencilled on the nameboard the legend "AMERICUS BACKERS LONDINI FECIT". There is neither serial number nor date.
The three-legged trestle stand is a reproduction to replace the original (lost in a fire during World War II) and has no pedals. There is a damper lift mechanism within the case.
This piano is similar in many respects of appearance, construction and performance to the instrument in the Russell collection. If it is indeed a Backers it would appear that its maker, having found a winning formula, was not inclined to make changes.
Americus in fiction
In the opinion of expert students of the works of Jane Austen
Jane Austen (; 16 December 1775 – 18 July 1817) was an English novelist known primarily for her six major novels, which interpret, critique, and comment upon the British landed gentry at the end of the 18th century. Austen's plots of ...
, ''Pride and Prejudice
''Pride and Prejudice'' is an 1813 novel of manners by Jane Austen. The novel follows the character development of Elizabeth Bennet, the dynamic protagonist of the book who learns about the repercussions of hasty judgments and comes to appreci ...
'' showcases two brand new Americus Backers pianofortes - one purchased by Mr. Darcy
Fitzwilliam Darcy Esquire, generally referred to as Mr. Darcy, is one of the two central characters in Jane Austen's 1813 novel '' Pride and Prejudice''. He is an archetype of the aloof romantic hero, and a romantic interest of Elizabeth Benn ...
for his sister and the other in the "fine modern house" of his aunt, Lady Catherine. Remember that we see Jane Austen's work as historical fiction but she was writing about the height of modern fashion as she saw it. We are intended to envy and to admire her characters who were fashion leaders in the highest society whose new Palladian residences were commissioned with the sole purpose of impressing house guests, to which end they were filled with the very utmost in furnishings and fittings that London and the British Empire has to offer, including the novelty of a brand new class of musical instrument - the piano.
So a Backers piano is intended to imply the owner is at the cutting edge of fashion with the taste and disposable funds that make them the leaders and most enviable members of high society. (Remember that Austen is writing contemporarily with Backers. By the time she is published in the second decade of the 19th Century, piano design had moved on and the must-have instrument of the day would have been a piano by Thomas Broadwood, much like the one he supplied to Beethoven.)
Bibliography
*"Fenton House Hampstead, the National Trust 1978
*Early keyboard Instruments The Benton Fletcher Collection", National Trust 1976
*Harding, Professor Rosamund J., "The Pianoforte, its history traced to the Great Exhibition of 1851", Hechscher & Company
*Hipkins, Alfred J., "The History of the Pianoforte", Scientific American supplement number 385, New York, 19 May 1883, a paper given before the Society of Arts, London
*Kottisck, Edward L., "Early Keyboard Instruments in European Museums", published by George Lucktenburg pp 217, 232
*The Harpsichord and Fortepiano Magazine 414, October 1987, pp 74–85,
*Palmieri, Robert and Margaret W (editors), "Encyclopedia of Keyboard Instruments Vol. 1: The Piano", Garland Reference, Library of the Humanities,- 1131.) New York: Garland Publishing, 1994 and 2004 (Revised)
*Reece's Cyclopedia 1772
*Wainwright, David "Broadwood: A Family History"
*Williams, John Paul, "The Piano, an Inspirational Guide to the Piano and its Place in History", pp 21
References
{{DEFAULTSORT:Backers, Americus
18th-century births
1778 deaths
Harpsichord makers
Piano makers
Dutch musical instrument makers