A few years ago I inherited the family C. Bechstein model B grand piano, built in 1921 in Berlin.

I’m pleased to say, financially it’s not worth that much. Old grand pianos are surprisingly cheap and plentiful in the UK because it’s hard to fit them in many houses. And pianos have been popular for a long time now.

What marks this out for me is its family history. It was a wedding present for my grandmother Edith Nathan, an aspiring pianist. She grew up in England and trained at the Guildhall School of Music in London with fellow pianist Myra Hess. Surprisingly soon after the First World War, she was visiting family in Germany, met my grandfather and the 1921 marriage ensued.

The 4th or even 5th generation playing the Bechstein

Shopping for the Bechstein appears to have taken place with my grandmother’s mother, Anna Rothschild. Whilst not professional, she too was a keen pianist and the family rumour is that she took lessons with Clara Schumann, widely revered for her innovation in piano teaching as well as the wife (and keen promoter) of composer Robert Schumann. This is not improbable: Anna lived near Frankfurt, her relation Florence Rothschild was definitely Clara’s pupil and later continued to teach at the Hoch Konservatorium (which continues to this day).

So it is fun to imagine piano shopping around 1921 for the upcoming nuptials. From music that’s been handed down, it’s clear that Chopin and Beethoven became well known to the Bechstein, along with a smattering of Mozart, Haydn and Bach. For 4 years I imagine it had many hours of intense exercise every day.

Roll forward to 1925. Tragedy stuck. My father was born but his mother Edith picked up an infection—perhaps puerperal fever—from the doctor who delivered him, and died. Sadly an all too common occurrence, pre-antibiotic.

From a centre of attention, the piano was rarely used, certainly until my father was old enough to play it and before he was sent away to school in England in 1933.

It remained in Germany until at least 1938. Even though my grandfather was briefly imprisoned, he managed to escape to England. Stranger still, of the few possession of his that made it out too, the Bechstein was one of them. How this was organised by his partner, exactly when, and that it made it to London undamaged are pretty remarkable.

There it remained until my grandfather’s death in 1962, when it moved into my parents’ rather strange cedar bungalow near Henley in the Oxfordshire countryside. It was there that I got to know it as a child. I had piano lessons on it. I learnt to hear the mellow Bechstein tone in recordings. I was pushed to play (rather badly and with much embarrassment) to various visitors, including Sigmund Freud’s physician Josephine Stross on one of her visits and the “discoverer” of novelist Iris Murdoch, Gwenda David.

Then I inherited the piano 5 or so years ago. It had a sympathetic spruce-up at local Bechstein specialists Courtney Pianos in Oxford, restringing, redamping and tuning up to modern concert pitch. Throughout my childhood, I remember the slight difference in pitch with other pianos, because “normal” pitch was lower in 1921 Germany by about 1/4 tone. (It’s funny how pitches tend to go up over time before crashing, a bit like stock markets!).

One of the stranger purposes for which the Bechstein has served so far with me is to feature on a new wax disc recording to celebrate 100 years of The City of London Phonograph and Gramophone Society. Musicologist Simon Heighes phoned me to ask if I’d mind a couple of sopranos (who proved to be Sarah Tenant-Flowers and Abi Turner of the vocal group Papagena), the paraphernalia of wax recording (with its very own specialist Duncan Miller and phonograph for sampling results) and himself on the piano to record Rossini’s “Cat Duet”. The process was fascinating to watch… A nicely eccentric activity of an English village.

Professional recordings aside, my daughter Sophia is the most active and skilful player of the Bechstein in its centenary year. It’s rather fun; the 4th (or maybe even 5th) generation of Wolfram enjoying it! I even managed to negotiate inclusion of a couple of short clips!

My piano has turned 100...with a few adventures along the way