Piano 58

On a recent visit to the church of St. Mary at Ottery St.Mary, we almost missed this one, having been taken in hand by an enthusiastic priestess.

And if I had done my homework, I could have asked her why the piano was no longer the electrical one noticed back in 2019 at reference 3. Which I had thought odd for such a grand church.

This one from Carl Ecke might have been made in Posen, an old Polish city which was part of Prussia for the whole of the 19th century, only reverting to Poland when that country was reinvented after the First World War. Germans were always less than half the population and most of them left at that point - although they came back again during the German occupation of the Second World War. By the end of which old Poznań (as it now is) had been largely destroyed and after which the German population left again. 

It looks as if the ancient Jewish community has more or less vanished, having peaked in the 17th century.

A little puzzled by the picture of the New Synagogue above, which does not look very much what you have now in gmaps.

A photograph turned up by Google images.

Even allowing for the fact that the Germans made the place into a swimming pool - which it remained after the war - eventually being closed and returned to the Jewish community. There seems to be talk of redevelopment - and I suppose the idea is that the community will get enough money from the developer to rebuild. I think, for those who have the Polish, a fuller story is to be found at reference 7.

To return to the piano, there seems to be a second hand market for Carl Ecke pianos, some of which at least were made in Berlin. Bing turns up something rather fancier than this one, made in 1934, which fetched £5,500. So a respectable brand, a number of which are to be found at reference 8.

References

Reference 1: https://psmv5.blogspot.com/2022/05/piano-57.html.

Reference 2: https://www.otterystmary.org.uk/.

Reference 3: https://psmv4.blogspot.com/2019/10/piano-31.html.

Reference 4: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carl_Ecke.

Reference 5: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pozna%C5%84.

Reference 6: https://yivoencyclopedia.org/article.aspx/Poznan.

Reference 7: https://www.whitemad.pl/nowa-synagoga/.

Reference 8: https://www.eshelbypianos.com/piano_gallery/e-g_piano_gallery.

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