upright piano

Classification: 3 Chordophones / 31 Simple chordophones or zithers / 314 Board zithers / 314.1 True board zithers / 314.1-4-8 True board zithers sounded by hammers or beaters, with keyboard

Piano maker: Arnold Fibiger

Date: ca. 1933

Village / Town: Kalisz

Country: Poland

Owner: Museum of Industrial History, Opatówek, ul. Kościelna 1. Gifted in 2012 by Zbigniew Kamieński from Gdynia

Inventory number: MHP 76/I

Description: modernistic casing, black lacquer with craquelure. Cross-, single-, double-, triple-strung. Full metal frame with hitch pin block’s armour. English repetition action with underdampers (by Schwander)

Inscriptions: ARNOLD FIBIGER inlaid in brass on the keyboard cover; Sie... [?] 18274 N^o 27 penciled on its back; Grands Prix Paris London Kalisz Grande Medaille d’Or. Paris London Stavropol (Cauc.) Rostoff s/Don Varsovie / Czenstochovienne e. c. t. cast on the hitch pin block’s armour; on the soundboard, a transfer feat. the factory's image, list of exhibition medals, and the serial number N^o 18274; in the middle, a factory logo with an eagle against the background of the lyre reads: ARNOLD FIBIGER / ARNOLD FIBIGER / MARQUE DE FABRIQUE; on the action frame a square metal tablet states: Mécanique de SCHWANDER /a repetition / J. HERRBURGER – Paris; at the back of the soundboard, a square paper label with the number 18274 and a red oval stamp saying Fabryka Fortepianów / Arnolda Fibiger / Kalisz

Measurements: height 1300, width 1490, depth 360 (650) mm

Materials: wood, metal, ivory

Keyboard compass, stops: A₂-a⁴ – 7 octaves, two pedals – piano and dampers

Catalog card by: Benjamin Vogel

Bibliography: B. Vogel, Fortepian polski. Budownictwo fortepianów na ziemiach polskich od poł. XVIII w. do II wojny światowej, (Warszawa, 1995), pp. 214-17; K. Rottermund, Budownictwo instrumentów muzycznych na terenie Wielkopolski w XIX i 1. połowie XX wieku, (Poznań, 2002), p. 104

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