“Jan Ladislav Dussek and Sophia Giustina Corri” As soon as the pianist and composer Jan Ladislav Dussek (1760-1812) left his native Bohemia for Paris, his fortunes increased manifold. He performed for Marie Antoinette and was a regular guest at the

The Alex Cobbe Collection of composer’s pianos is a collection that can give us a feeling for how pianos developed, often in response to the demands of composers. The square piano, called that despite the fact that they’re actually rectangles,

For Erik Satie, dance, theatre and cabaret music run as virtually continuous threads throughout his life. And every single composition adheres to the virtues of his musical craft; simplicity, brevity and precision. Many of Satie’s early compositional efforts rely on

Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart was the undisputed pop star of the 18th century! Numerous composers and musicians arranged his music, and profited handsomely from this indirect association with a superstar. But Mozart himself was also a rather active arranger of works

The Alex Cobbe Collection at Hatchlands, near Guilford, Surry, holds an interesting variety of pianos, most with composer connections. When we look at a composer’s piano, for the most part, we can only imagine what works were created on it.

The Alex Cobbe collection in England is the largest collection of composers’ piano in the world. Three of the most important pieces of the collection are the pianos owned by Chopin, each of which was used during the final year

The Alex Cobbe collection outside Guildford, England, holds a unique piano created for a unique performer. During Franz Liszt’s trips to Florence after 1873, he was loaned a piano by its maker, Carlo Ducci. This isn’t a multi-foot grand piano

The Alec Cobbe collection, housed at Hatchlands Park, near Guildford, Surrey, England, holds pianos owned by a number of different composers, such as Haydn’s Longman & Brodrip piano; Mahler’s 1836 Graf piano; Elgar’s 1844 Broadwood piano; Chopin’s 1848 Pleyel, used