This program takes a 1790 Kirkman piano as its point of departure for considering England as one of the great centers of piano culture at the end of the eighteenth century. If portraiture often presented the piano as a graceful emblem of feminine accomplishment, the musical world around it was far more expansive: animated by print culture, compilations and keepsakes, public concerts, and the circulation of international virtuosi, among them the blind pianist Maria Theresia von Paradis. Against that backdrop, the Kirkman firm stands as an ideal lens. Rising to prominence first as harpsichord makers and then as major builders of pianos, the Kirkmans helped shape the instrument’s passage from drawing-room symbol to a vehicle of fashion, sociability, and cultural agency.
The 1790 Kirkman fortepiano has been graciously provided by the Hill family.
