[CAUT] question for history buffs

[tnrwim at aol.com]

Majorca is an island in the Mediterranean off the coast of Spain.

gary

I stand corrected. I had it confused with Madiera, which in the Atlantic. Majorca and Manorca are both much larger islands, and, as you said, there probably were pianos tuners on the islands. 

Wim






-----Original Message-----
From: Gary H. <escapement at comcast.net>
To: caut <caut at ptg.org>
Sent: Sun, Sep 12, 2010 5:06 am
Subject: Re: [CAUT] question for history buffs



Majorca is an island in the Mediterranean off the coast of Spain.  It was part of Spain at that time for many centuries and along with its neighbor  Minorca, integral to British shipping during the Napoleonic Wars—Port Mahon, on Minorca, was British held for many years.  It’s mentioned often enough in the Patrick O’Brian “Master and Commander” series of books—highly recommended reading for anyone—and the classical music scene on Minorca was well established in that period.
 
Anyway, I imagine there were at least a few competent piano tuners on the island and more than a few pianos—and even more, possibly, on Minorca, just a short boat trip away.
 
Gary
 

From: caut-bounces at ptg.org [mailto:caut-bounces at ptg.org] On Behalf Of tnrwim at aol.com
Sent: Saturday, September 11, 2010 11:46 PM
To: caut at ptg.org
Subject: [CAUT] question for history buffs

 

Last night I saw "A Song To Remember", on AMC, the story of Frederick Chopin. According to Tom Osborne, a lot of liberties were taken with the movie, including that he never went on a concert tour at the end of his life. But the story does have him go to the island of Majorca, off the West Africa coast. When he gets to the villa, he gets to play on a nice Pleyel grand piano. Of course, in typical movie style, the piano is perfectly in tune, (if was that piano in the first place). But this is the question I want to ask.

 

Back in teh 1800's, Majorca probably wasn't exactly a place where a piano tuner could make a living. So did Chopin tune his own pianos, or did Pleyel send a piano tuner along with the piano to the island? 

 

Wim 


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