Gottfried Silbermann was born 14 January 1683 in Kleinbobritzsch. He was the youngest son of Michael Silbermann, a carpenter. They moved to Frauenstein in 1685. He became a builder of keyboard instruments - harpsichords, clavichords, organs and fortepianos in Germany.
In 1723 he was given the title Honorary Court and State Organ Builder to the King of Poland and Elector of Saxony. As well as building organs, from about 1728 he began building pianos using Shroter actions. The Schroter actions were very basic, inexpensive, and didn’t work too well.
Silbermann showed a couple of his pianos to J. S. Bach, who was very critical, saying that the tone was weak in the treble and the keys were hard to play even though the tone was pleasant. Initially annoyed by the negative comment, Silbermann overcame the snub and set about to improve his pianos. The improvements paid off and when Bach sampled the later pianos, he responded with positive approval!
King Frederick the Great of Prussia became acquainted with Silbermann's pianos and bought a number of them in about 1747. In these pianos, he used actions that were almost identical to the Cristofori models.
For a while, both action types: the ‘Cristofori’ and the ‘Schroter’ were used by Silbermann in his pianos even though they were so different. In the decades to follow, the development of each action-type separated the piano-construction world, becoming known as the ‘English’ School and the ‘German’ or ‘Viennese’ School. It is significant that for a while, Silbermann provided the space for both these action-types to evolve a little before they became very distinct schools of approach.
Silbermann’s nephew and pupil Johann Andreas Silbermann taught Johann Andreas Stein, who went on to perfect the ‘Viennese’ action.
The so-called ‘twelve apostles’ were a group of Silbermann’s pupils who, from about 1756, fled Germany and migrated to England. Among the twelve, was Johannes Zumpe, who popularised the square piano, and, Americas Backers who remodelled the Cristofori action to become the ‘English’ action.
The action used today in modern pianos is the direct descendant of the ‘English’ action. It was significantly reworked and perfected some 50 years later by the likes of Sebastien Erard and, later still, by Henri Herz.
Silbermann died in 1753, possibly from tin-lead poisoning while working on an organ in Dresden.
© Steve Burden
