The
Kirkman family (variants:
Kirckman, Kirchmann) were
EnglishEngland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the North Sea to the east, with the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
harpsichordA harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...
and later
pianoThe piano is a musical instrument which is played by means of a keyboard. Widely used in Western music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music, and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
makers of
AlsatianAlsace is the fourth-smallest of the 26 regions of France in land area , and the smallest in metropolitan France. It is also the sixth-most densely populated region in France , with 222 inhabitants per km²...
origin.
Jacob Kirkman (4 March 1710 - 9 June 1792) was born in
BischwillerBischwiller is a commune in the Bas-Rhin department in Alsace in north-eastern France just west of the Moder River.The city is located southeast of Haguenau, west-northwest from the German border and the Rhine River , and lies north-northeast of Strasbourg.-Notable people:* Henri Baumer, master...
,
AlsaceAlsace is the fourth-smallest of the 26 regions of France in land area , and the smallest in metropolitan France. It is also the sixth-most densely populated region in France , with 222 inhabitants per km²...
and moved to England in the early 1730s. He worked for Hermann Tabel, and married his widow in 1738. He became a British subject in 1755. He died in
GreenwichGreenwich is a district in south-east London, England, on the south bank of the River Thames in the London Borough of Greenwich. It is best known for its maritime history and as giving its name to the Greenwich Meridian and Greenwich Mean Time.The town became the site of a Royal palace, the...
and is buried in St Alfege Church in Greenwich.
Abraham Kirkman (1737 - 16 April 1794), also born in Bischwiller, was Jacob Kirkman's nephew.
The
Kirkman family (variants:
Kirckman, Kirchmann) were
EnglishEngland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the North Sea to the east, with the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
harpsichordA harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...
and later
pianoThe piano is a musical instrument which is played by means of a keyboard. Widely used in Western music for solo performances, ensemble use, chamber music, and accompaniment, the piano is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal...
makers of
AlsatianAlsace is the fourth-smallest of the 26 regions of France in land area , and the smallest in metropolitan France. It is also the sixth-most densely populated region in France , with 222 inhabitants per km²...
origin.
Members of the Kirkman family
Jacob Kirkman (4 March 1710 - 9 June 1792) was born in
BischwillerBischwiller is a commune in the Bas-Rhin department in Alsace in north-eastern France just west of the Moder River.The city is located southeast of Haguenau, west-northwest from the German border and the Rhine River , and lies north-northeast of Strasbourg.-Notable people:* Henri Baumer, master...
,
AlsaceAlsace is the fourth-smallest of the 26 regions of France in land area , and the smallest in metropolitan France. It is also the sixth-most densely populated region in France , with 222 inhabitants per km²...
and moved to England in the early 1730s. He worked for Hermann Tabel, and married his widow in 1738. He became a British subject in 1755. He died in
GreenwichGreenwich is a district in south-east London, England, on the south bank of the River Thames in the London Borough of Greenwich. It is best known for its maritime history and as giving its name to the Greenwich Meridian and Greenwich Mean Time.The town became the site of a Royal palace, the...
and is buried in St Alfege Church in Greenwich.
Abraham Kirkman (1737 - 16 April 1794), also born in Bischwiller, was Jacob Kirkman's nephew. In 1772 they formed a partnership. He died in
HammersmithHammersmith is an urban centre in the London Borough of Hammersmith and Fulham in west London approximately 5 miles west of Charing Cross on the north bank of the River Thames...
.
Joseph Kirkman I was the son of Abraham Kirkman, and followed his father in his craft, eventually going into partnership with him.
Joseph Kirkman II (c.1790 – 1877) was the son of Joseph Kirkman I and like him became an instrument maker, helping his father with the last harpsichord they made in 1809 (though the latest surviving today is dated 1800).
Kirkman harpsichords
Charles BurneyCharles Burney FRS was an English music historian and father of author Frances Burney.-Biography:Charles Burney was born at Shrewsbury, and educated at Shrewsbury School. He was later sent to the public school at Chester, where his first music master was Edmund Baker, organist of the cathedral,...
wrote a good deal about Jacob Kirkman, and
Fanny BurneyFrances Burney , also known as Fanny Burney and, after her marriage, as Madame d’Arblay, was an English novelist, diarist and playwright. She was born in King’s Lynn, England, on 13 June 1752, to musical historian Dr Charles Burney and Mrs Esther Sleepe Burney...
described him as 'the first
harpsichordA harpsichord is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. It produces sound by plucking a string when a key is pressed.In the narrow sense, "harpsichord" designates only the large wing-shaped instruments in which the strings are perpendicular to the keyboard...
maker of the times; he and
Burkat ShudiBurkat Shudi was an English harpsichord maker of Swiss origin.-Biography:...
dominated the production of English harpsichords in the second half of the 18th century, and many of their instruments survive today, though more than twice as many Kirkmans remain, leading
Frank HubbardFrank Twombly Hubbard was an American harpsichord maker, a pioneer in the revival of historical methods of harpsichord building.-Student days:...
to describe them as being 'almost mass produced'.
Like Shudi, Kirkman built three models of harpsichord: single manual instruments with disposition 8' 8' or 8' 8' 4' and double manual instruments with disposition 8' 8' 4' and lute stop. The inner construction of Kirkman harpsichords was based on the
RuckersThe Ruckers family were Flemish harpsichord and virginal makers based in Antwerp in the 16th and 17th century whose influence stretched well into the 18th and to the harpsichord revival of the 20th.The Ruckers family contributed immeasurably to the harpsichord's technical development,...
-type 17th-century
FlemishFlanders is the community of the Flemings but also one of the institutions in Belgium, and a geographical region located in parts of present-day Belgium, France, and the Netherlands...
harpsichord, though a distinctive outward appearance had been developed by English makers by the
1720sThis article lists the most significant events and works of the year 1720 in music.- Events :*Royal Academy of Music opens in London.*Giovanni Battista Bononcini arrives in London, his home until 1732, and becomes one of Handel's most notable rivals....
, featuring
veneerA veneer is a thin covering over another surface. More specifically, it may refer to:*Wood veneer, a term used in architecture and woodworking*Veneer, a single wythe of brick*Veneer , a thin layer of dental restorative material...
ing inside and outside, detailed
inlayInlay is a decorative technique of inserting pieces of contrasting, often coloured materials into depressions in a base object to form patterns or pictures that normally are flush with the matrix. In a wood matrix, inlays commonly use wood veneers, but other materials like shells, mother-of-pearl,...
and
marquetryMarquetry is the craft of covering a structural carcass with pieces of veneer forming decorative patterns, designs or pictures. The technique may be applied to case furniture or even seat furniture, to decorative small objects with smooth, veneerable surfaces or to free-standing pictorial panels...
in the keywell. Key dip was stopped at the by a rail at the far end, which has led to English harpsichords having a reputation for the worst touch of any school of harpsichord building.
Further innovations were made in later years; the buff stop was introduced c.1760, and was sometimes activated by a pedal on single manual instruments. The machine stop, dating from after 1765, was a mechanism worked by a hand stop and a foot pedal which caused various changes in registration, rather like the arrangements on an
organThe pipe organ is a musical instrument that produces sound by driving pressurized air through pipes selected via a keyboard. Because each organ pipe produces a single pitch, the pipes are provided in sets called ranks, each of which has a common timbre and loudness throughout the keyboard compass...
. The 'nag's head swell' was a segment of the top lid shaped like an elongated
horseThe horse is a hoofed mammal, a subspecies of one of seven extant species of the family Equidae. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million years from a small multi-toed creature into the large, single-toed animal of today...
's head, which opened along the bentside when a foot pedal was pressed; this was later superseded by Schudi's Venetian swell, which worked similarly but was more like a modern organ swell mechanism (and named after its similarity in appearance to a Venetian blind). Extensions in range were also made, as high as
c', with reversed colour sharps and naturals from g upwards; this was perhaps due to musical demands or rivalry with Shudi, who had extended his harpsichords down to CC. Jacob Kirkman made an experimental
enharmonicIn modern music and notation, an enharmonic equivalent is a note , interval , or key signature which is equivalent to some other note, interval, or key signature, but "spelled", or named, differently...
harpsichord for Robert Smith of
Trinity College, CambridgeTrinity College is a constituent college of the University of Cambridge. Trinity has more members than any other college in Cambridge or Oxford, with around 700 undergraduates, 430 graduates, and over 160 Fellows ....
, around 1757.
It was
Frank HubbardFrank Twombly Hubbard was an American harpsichord maker, a pioneer in the revival of historical methods of harpsichord building.-Student days:...
's opinion that English harpsichords such as Kirkman and
Burkat ShudiBurkat Shudi was an English harpsichord maker of Swiss origin.-Biography:...
's 'are too good. The tone [...] almost interferes with the music', though he didn't think the native repertoire was significant enough to warrant making copies. Others have pointed out that an English harpsichord player of around 1770 might well have had an exceptionally wide musical taste incorporating
ScarlattiGiuseppe Domenico Scarlatti was an Italian composer who spent much of his life in the service of the Portuguese and Spanish royal families. He is classified as a Baroque composer chronologically, although his music was influential in the development of the Classical style...
, Rameau,
HandelHANDEL was the code-name for the UK's National Attack Warning System in the Cold War. It consisted of a small console consisting of two microphones, lights and gauges. The reason behind this was to provide a back-up if anything failed....
, C. P. E. Bach, J. C. Bach, Mozart, Arne,
PurcellHenry Purcell , was an English Baroque composer. Purcell incorporated Italian and French stylistic elements but devised a peculiarly English style of Baroque music.-Early life and career:...
, and
SammartiniSammartini is a surname, and may refer to:*Giovanni Battista Sammartini, an Italian composer.*Giuseppe Sammartini, an Italian composer and oboist....
.
The Kirkmans began building
fortepianoFortepiano designates the early version of the piano, from its invention by the Italian instrument maker Bartolomeo Cristofori around 1700 up to the early 19th century.-Construction:...
s as they became more popular in the 2nd half of the 18th century; apparently Jacob Kirkman had encountered a piano as early as 1770 but the earliest he is known to have made is a
square pianoThe square piano is a piano that has horizontal strings arranged diagonally across the rectangular case above the hammers and with the keyboard set in the long side. It is variously attributed to Silbermann and Frederici and was improved by Petzold and Babcock...
dated 1775. The Kirkman firm continued to make grand and square pianos throughout the 19th century and were taken over by Collard in 1896.
Further reading
- Donald Howard Boalch: Makers of the Harpsichord and Clavichord, 1440–1840 (London, 1956)
- Raymond Russell: The Harpsichord and Clavichord (London, 1959)
- Frank Hubbard
Frank Twombly Hubbard was an American harpsichord maker, a pioneer in the revival of historical methods of harpsichord building.-Student days:...
: Three Centuries of Harpsichord Making (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1965)
- Charles Mould: The Development of the English Harpsichord, with Particular Reference to the Work of Kirkman (dissertation, Oxford University, 1976)
See also
FinchcocksFinchcocks is an early Georgian manor house in Goudhurst, Kent, which houses a large collection of historical keyboard instruments: harpsichords, clavichords, fortepianos, square pianos, organs and other musical instruments...
, who own many surviving Kirkman instruments.
Sources
- Donald Howard Boalch, Peter Williams, Charles Mould: 'Kirkman [Kirckman, Kirchmann]', Grove Music Online ed. L. Macy (Accessed 2007-05-21), http://www.grovemusic.com/
External links
- Harpsichord by Joseph Kirckman, London, 1798 - in the collection of the National Music Museum
The National Music Museum: America's Shrine to Music & Center for Study of the History of Musical Instruments is a musical instrument museum in Vermillion, South Dakota, USA. It was founded in 1973 on the campus of the University of South Dakota...