Pleyel et Cie. ("Pleyel and Company") was a French piano manufacturing firm founded by the composer

Ignace Pleyel Ignace Joseph Pleyel (; ; 18 June 1757 – 14 November 1831) was an Austrian-born French composer, music publisher and piano builder of the Classical period. Life Early years He was born in in Lower Austria, the son of a schoolmaster named Ma ...

in 1807. In 1815, Pleyel's son Camille joined him as a business partner. The firm provided pianos to

Frédéric Chopin Frédéric François Chopin (born Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin; 1 March 181017 October 1849) was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist of the Romantic period, who wrote primarily for solo piano. He has maintained worldwide renown as a leadin ...

, who considered Pleyel pianos to be "non plus ultra". Pleyel et Cie. also operated a concert hall, the

Salle Pleyel The Salle Pleyel (, meaning "Pleyel Hall") is a concert hall in the 8th arrondissement of Paris, France, designed by acoustician Gustave Lyon together with architect Jacques Marcel Auburtin, who died in 1926, and the work was completed in 1927 by ...

, where Chopin performed his first – and last – Paris concerts. Pleyel's major contribution to piano development was the first use of a metal frame in a piano. Pleyel pianos were the choice of composers such as Chopin,

Debussy (Achille) Claude Debussy (; 22 August 1862 – 25 March 1918) was a French composer. He is sometimes seen as the first Impressionist composer, although he vigorously rejected the term. He was among the most influential composers of the ...

, Saint-Saëns,

Ravel Joseph Maurice Ravel (7 March 1875 – 28 December 1937) was a French composer, pianist and conductor. He is often associated with Impressionism along with his elder contemporary Claude Debussy, although both composers rejected the term. In ...

, de Falla and

Stravinsky Igor Fyodorovich Stravinsky (6 April 1971) was a Russian composer, pianist and conductor, later of French (from 1934) and American (from 1945) citizenship. He is widely considered one of the most important and influential 20th-century clas ...

and of pianists and teachers

Alfred Cortot Alfred Denis Cortot (; 26 September 187715 June 1962) was a French pianist, conductor, and teacher who was one of the most renowned classical musicians of the 20th century. A pianist of massive repertory, he was especially valued for his poeti ...

Philip Manuel Philip Manuel (1893–October 6, 1959) was an American pianist, organist, harpsichordist and music educator. With pianist, organist and harpsichordist Gavin Williamson, he formed a duo in 1922, known as Manuel and Williamson, that helped prom ...

and

Gavin Williamson Sir Gavin Alexander Williamson (born 25 June 1976) is a British politician who most recently served as Minister of State without Portfolio from 25 October to 8 November 2022. He has been the Member of Parliament (MP) for South Staffordshire s ...

. Nineteenth-century musicians involved in the company's management included

Joseph O'Kelly Joseph O'Kelly (29 January 1828 – 9 January 1885), composer, pianist and choral conductor, was the most prominent member of a family of Irish musicians in 19th- and early 20th-century France. He wrote nine operas, four cantatas, numerous piano ...

and

Georges Pfeiffer Georges Jean Pfeiffer (12 December 1835 – 14 February 1908) was a French composer, pianist, and music critic. He was a much sought-after chamber music partner in the second half of the nineteenth century in Paris. Life Pfeiffer was born in Ver ...

History

Around 1815, Pleyel was the first to introduce the short, vertically strung cottage

upright piano 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 ...

, or "pianino" to France, adapting the design made popular in Britain by Robert Wornum. Their pianos were such a success that in 1834 the company employed 250 workers and produced 1000 pianos annually. The company's success led them to invest in experiments, resulting in the double piano in 1890, invented by Hungarian composer

Emánuel Moór Emánuel Moór (; 19 February 1863 – 20 October 1931) was a Hungarian composer, pianist, and inventor of musical instruments. Moór was born in Kecskemét, Hungary, and studied in Prague, Vienna and Budapest. Between 1885 and 1897 he to ...

. Although not the first company to experiment with building two pianos into the same frame, Pleyel's instrument, patented as the "Duo-Clave", was by far the most successful and produced the largest instruments. The company manufactured a very small number of double pianos in the 1890s and continued to make them until the 1920s. CDs can be bought today of performances on some of these pianos. In 1913, Pleyel built the "Jungle Piano" for use by

Albert Schweitzer Ludwig Philipp Albert Schweitzer (; 14 January 1875 – 4 September 1965) was an Alsatian-German/French polymath. He was a theologian, organist, musicologist, writer, humanitarian, philosopher, and physician. A Lutheran minister, Schweit ...

in his hospital in Lambaréné (French Equatorial Africa – now

Gabon Gabon (; ; snq, Ngabu), officially the Gabonese Republic (french: République gabonaise), is a country on the west coast of Central Africa. Located on the equator, it is bordered by Equatorial Guinea to the northwest, Cameroon to the north ...

). It was fitted with pedal attachments (to operate like an organ pedal-keyboard) and built with tropical woods that would acclimate to conditions there. Towards the end of the 19th century, the Pleyel firm produced the first

chromatic harp Diatonic and chromatic are terms in music theory that are most often used to characterize Scale (music), scales, and are also applied to musical instruments, Interval (music), intervals, Chord (music), chords, Musical note, notes, musical sty ...

. In the early 20th century, at the behest of

Wanda Landowska Wanda Aleksandra Landowska (5 July 1879 – 16 August 1959) was a Polish harpsichordist and pianist whose performances, teaching, writings and especially her many recordings played a large role in reviving the popularity of the harpsichord in ...

, it helped to revive the

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 ...

. Pleyel also pioneered the

player piano A player piano (also known as a pianola) is a self-playing piano containing a pneumatic or electro-mechanical mechanism, that operates the piano action via programmed music recorded on perforated paper or metallic rolls, with more modern i ...

with the Pleyela line of pianos. These were often small pianos of an unusual design.

Today

Pleyel continued to manufacture pianos through 2013, under the corporate auspices of the French Piano Manufacturing Company ("Manufacture Française de Pianos, Cie."). In the 1980s, the Pleyel company bought out the

Erard Erard may refer to: * St. Erard or Erhard of Regensburg, bishop of Regensburg in the 7th century * Erard I, Count of Brienne (1060 - 1114) * Sébastien Érard (1752 - 1831), French instrument maker of German origin who specialised in the production ...

and

Gaveau Gaveau of Paris was a French piano manufacturer. The company was established by Joseph Gabriel Gaveau in 1847 in Paris and was one of the three largest piano makers in France (after Érard and Pleyel). Its factory was located at Fontenay-sous-Bois ...

piano companies which also manufactured pianos in France. The Pleyel pianos of today incorporated improvements of these companies and others. In the last two decades, the company was bought by the same family which had bought the Salle Pleyel concert hall in order to revive the name Pleyel. They built a new factory in the south of France and started making a line of newly designed and improved pianos. Then, in 2008, they decided to downsize the factory and lines of pianos. They moved the factory back to Paris and opened a new factory where they began introducing new pianos designed by famous designers. The

red spruce ''Picea rubens'', commonly known as red spruce, is a species of spruce native to eastern North America, ranging from eastern Quebec and Nova Scotia, west to the Adirondack Mountains and south through New England along the Appalachians to western ...

used by Pleyel came from the

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Trentino Trentino ( lld, Trentin), officially the Autonomous Province of Trento, is an autonomous province of Italy, in the country's far north. The Trentino and South Tyrol constitute the region of Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol, an autonomous region ...

, Italy. After full assembly of a piano, the instrument received a further 30–40 hours of fine-tuning. At the end of 2013, the company announced it would cease manufacturing pianos.

2009 replica

In September 2009, the company produced a replica of the Pleyel piano, produced in 1830, that was used by

Fryderyk Chopin The Fryderyk is the annual award in Polish music. Its name refers to the original Polish spelling variant of Polish composer Frédéric Chopin's first name. Its status in the Polish public can be compared to the American Grammy and the UK's B ...

. The original, which is now in the collection of the Fryderyk Chopin Institute in

Warsaw Warsaw ( pl, Warszawa, ), officially the Capital City of Warsaw,, abbreviation: ''m.st. Warszawa'' is the capital and largest city of Poland. The metropolis stands on the River Vistula in east-central Poland, and its population is officia ...

, was used as the source for the plans for this replica. This replica was used in The 1st International Chopin Competition on Period Instruments in September 2018.

Recordings made with originals and replicas of Pleyel et Cie pianos

* Yuan Sheng. Frederic Chopin. ''Ballades Nos 1-4/Impromptus Nos 1-4''. Played on the 1845 Pleyel piano. Label: Piano Classics *

Ronald Brautigam Ronald Brautigam (born 1954) is a Dutch concert pianist, best known for his performances of Beethoven's piano works on the fortepiano. Born in Amsterdam, Brautigam studied there with Jan Wijn (1971-79), then he left to study in London with John B ...

. Felix Mendelssohn. ''Piano Concertos.'' Played on a copy of the 1830 Pleyel piano made by

Paul McNulty Paul Joseph McNulty (born January 31, 1958) is an American attorney and university administrator who is currently the ninth president of Grove City College. He served as the Deputy Attorney General of the United States from March 17, 2006, to Jul ...

. Label: Bis *

Janusz Olejniczak Janusz Olejniczak (; born 2 October 1952 in Wrocław) is a Polish classical pianist and actor. Career Olejniczak began playing piano at the age of six. He studied under Luiza Walewska, Ryszard Bakst and Zbigniew Drzewiecki in Warsaw and Łód ...

. Chopin evening around 1831 Pleyel. *

Alexei Lubimov Alexei Lubimov (born 1944 as Алексе́й Бори́сович Люби́мов, Alexey Borisovich Lyubimov) is a Russian pianist, fortepianist and harpsichordist. Lubimov studied at the Moscow Conservatory with Heinrich Neuhaus and Lev Nau ...

. Chopin, Bach, Mozart, Beethoven: ''at Chopin’s home piano''. Played on the original 1843 upright Pleyel piano. Label: NIFCCD * Dina Yoffe. Fryderyk Chopin. ''Piano Concertos No 1 & 2. Version for one piano.'' Played on the 1848 Pleyel and the 1838

pianos. Label: Fryderyk Chopin Institute *

Viviana Sofronitsky Viviana Sofronitsky (russian: Вивиана Владимировна Софроницкая) is a Russian and Canadian classical pianist. Born in Moscow, her father was the Soviet-Russian pianist Vladimir Sofronitsky. Life and career She star ...

Sergei Istomin Sergei Istomin (russian: Сергей Хохлов, or Истомин, Сергей Николаевич) is a cellist and a viola da gamba player. He began his violoncello studies at the age of six at the Gnessin School for gifted children in Mo ...

. Frederyk Chopin. ''Complete works for cello and piano''. Played on a replica of the 1830 Pleyel piano made in 2010 by Paul McNulty. Label: Passacaille *

Kevin Kenner Kevin Kenner (born May 19, 1963 in Coronado, California) is an American concert pianist. Biography At the age of 17, Kenner was a finalist at the X International Chopin Piano Competition in Warsaw. Ten years later, in 1990 he returned to Warsaw ...

. Fryderyk Chopin. ''4 Impromptus''. Played on the 1848 Pleyel piano. Label: Fryderyk Chopin Institute * Tomasz Ritter. Fryderyk Chopin. ''Sonata in B Minor, Ballade in F minor, Polonaises, Mazurkas''. Karol Kurpinski. ''Polonaise in D minor.'' Played on the 1842 Pleyel piano, the 1837 Erard piano and a copy of Buchholtz piano from ca 1825-1826 made by Paul McNulty. Label: Fryderyk Chopin Institute *

Kimiko Douglass-Ishizaka Kimiko Douglass-Ishizaka (born 4 December 1976) is a German Japanese composer, pianist, and former Olympic weightlifting, Olympic weightlifter and powerlifter. Music Born in Bonn, Germany, Douglass-Ishizaka (known as Ishizaka) started playing ...

. Frederic Chopin. ''24 Preludes''. Played on the 1842 Pleyel piano. Released under a

Creative Commons Creative Commons (CC) is an American non-profit organization and international network devoted to educational access and expanding the range of creative works available for others to build upon legally and to share. The organization has release ...

license.

References

External links

Official Pleyel pianos website

Pleyel of Paris newsletter

Salle Pleyel
a Paris concert hall built in the late 1920s

by Stephen Birkett of the University of Waterloo; includes pictures of Pleyel and of historical Pleyel pianos
Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians
2001 s.v., Pleyel (ii), pp. 923–924

History of Pleyel
and their pianos with many pictures and details
International Chopin Competition on Period Instruments website

Rachel Donadio, "Storied French Piano Manufacturer to Close". ''New York Times'' "ArtsBeat" blog, 14 November 2013

Pleyel Pianos – ''The Piano in Polish Collections''

Chopin's last piano (Pleyel 14810)
*
Official McNulty pianos website
link to Pleyel 1830 copy by Paul McNulty built for Chopin Institute Warsaw
Pleyel replica to make its concert debut

Fryderyk Chopin Institute website
{{Authority control Piano manufacturing companies Musical instrument manufacturing companies of France