American Piano Company

American Piano Company (abbr. Ampico) was an American piano manufacturer located in East Rochester, New York, which was known from the beginning for the production of high quality player pianos. The company was established in 1908 under the aegis of Wm. Knabe & Co. of Baltimore as a merger between Chickering & Sons of Boston, Haines Brothers, Marshall & Wendell, and Foster, Armstrong & Company, all of Rochester, New York.

From 1913 Ampico was one of the leading producers of reproducing pianos, the others being Duo-Art (1913) and Welte-Mignon (1905). The player piano and reproducing mechanism was designed by Charles Fuller Stoddard (1876-1958). A great number of distinguished classical and popular pianists, such as Sergei Rachmaninoff, Leo Ornstein, Winifred MacBride, and Marguerite Volavy, recorded for Ampico, and their rolls are a legacy of 19th and early 20th century aesthetic and musical practice. By 1929 Ampico was in essential economic difficulties and was finally taken over by the Aeolian Company^[1].

References

1. ^ Zeitschrift für Instrumentenbau, Bd.: 50, Leipzig, 1929-30, p 240 and 274

• Larry Givens: Re-enacting the artist: a story of the Ampico reproducing piano. Vestal, N.Y.: Vestal Press, 1970.
• Elaine Obenchain: The complete catalog of Ampico Reproducing Piano rolls. New York: American Piano Co., 1977. ISBN 0-9601172-1-0
• History of Ampico by The Pianola Institute, London, Accessed April 1, 2009

External links

• The Reproducing Piano Roll Foundation Ampico Catalog This catalog will be confusing to the novice researcher as the roll numbers have all been truncated and are not exactly as found on the rolls.