Author’s Note in children’s book about Beethoven and Nannette Streicher by Laurie Lawlor

Back in 2020, I answered an email and then had a long phone conversation with a marvelous award winning children’s book author, Laurie Lawlor answering questions about Nannette Streicher, Beethoven, Nannette’s pianos, my friend Margaret Hood, and Margaret’s last replica of a Streicher piano that I completed..  Much to my surprise, I received an email from Laurie that the book was being published this month and I was in the Author’s Note.  She asked for my address so she could send me an advance copy. I was stunned to find an entire page devoted to Margaret and me! The book itself is fantastic!  Laurie’s research is up to date and thorough.  She amazingly took the wealth of accurate information and made it into a beautifully told book suitable for children with marvelous and period and instrument accurate illustration by Rebecca Statlandler.  What Music! The Fifty-Year Friendship Between Beethoven and Nannette Streicher, Who Built His Pianos, for readers age 6 and up, is being released October 23 by Holiday House.

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Book Review in JAMIS: Piano Playing Revisited: What Modern Players Can Learn from Period Instruments, by David Breitman

Published Book review by Anne Acker in JAMIS (Journal of the American Musical Instrument Society), vol XLVIII (2022), 293-296

of David Breitman: Piano Playing Revisted: What Modern Players Can Learn From Period Instruments. Eastman Studies in Music Series: Rochester, NY: University of Rochester Press, 2021. xxi + 206 pp.; many black and white illus. ISBN:978-1-648-25010-1.

Reviving Nannette Streicher, Part 2: The 1816 piano replica project

The second part of the article about the process of my completing the replica of an 1816 Nannette Streicher fortepiano, begun by my friend and colleague Margaret Hood before her too early passing appeared in the March 22, 2022 issue of The Piano Technicians Journal. 

Reviving Nannette Streicher, Part 1: The 1816 Streicher piano replica project

Published in The Piano Technicians Journal (vol. 65, no. 2, Feb. 2022, pp 15-18):  The first half of an article I wrote about my journey in completing a replica of an 1816 fortepiano by the famed piano builder Nannette Streicher that was begun by a mentor and friend, Margaret Hood, but who sadly passed away too young before its completion.  Interestingly, the veneer of Cuban mahogany comes from a log, gifted to me by a Miami sculptor in my days there, that  I sent to Margaret and that she sawed herself for the veneer.  Now it has come back to me.  The instrument debuted at the Boston Early Music Festival in 2019 and is now part of my personal collection.  

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Book Review in JAMIS: WIlliam Hettrick. The American Piano Industry: Episodes in the History of a Great Enterprise

Book review in  Journal of the American Musical Instrument Society, vol. XLVII, 2021, pp. 199-202 of William Hettrick. The American Piano Industry: Episodes in the History of a Great Enterprise. Hillsdale, NY: Pendragon Press, 2020. American Music and Musicians Series 8. ISBN 2020910304.

mentioned in New York Times Article “The Woman who Built Beethoven’s Pianos

Anne was pleased to consult and be mentioned by notable writer Patricia Morrisroe in her November 6, 2020 New York times article about Nannette Streicher and her pianos.  You can even find a photo of the replica Nannette Streicher piano from 1816 begun by Margaret Hood and completed by Anne.

 

Article in JAMIS special AMIS at Fifty: “The Right Stuff? Material changes for New and Antique Musical Instruments”

Anne was very pleased to be invited to contribute to the special American Musical Instrument Society’s 50th anniversary issue resulting in her article “The Right Stuff? Material changes for New and Antique Musical Instruments”, which considers the issues and changes in the materials that go into and even the redefinition of what constitutes a musical instrument, as well as issues of endangered species and restricted toxic components.

Journal of the American Musical Instrument Society: supplement to Volume XLVI: 2020/21

Anne interviewed in international journal The Diapason

The “In the Wind” regular feature in the February 2021 issue of the  The Diapason (February 2021) features the early 19th century piano maker Nannette Streicher, her pianos and Beethoven, and the women who made a replica of an 1816 Streicher grand, begun by Margaret Hood and completed by Anne Acker.  Anne was interviewed for the article.

Read the article on the Diapason website or as a PDF.

Report in Harpsichord & Fortepiano on the 2019 Westfield Center for Historic Keyboard Studies 40th Anniversary Conference

“Collections and Collectors: a report on the 40th Anniversary meeting of the Westfield Center for Historic Keyboard Studies at Oberlin Conservatory of Music on 23-26 October 2019” published in  Harpsichord & Fortepiano, vol. 25, no.  (Autumn 2020), Peacock Press, West Yorkshire, UK, pp. 38-39.

Book Review: Hydraulic Musical Automata in Italian Villas and other Ingenia 1400-2000

Book Review published in the Journal of the American Musical Instrument Society, vol. XLVI (2020), 228-232.

Patricio Barbieri. Hydraulic Musical Automata in Italian Villas and other Ingenia 1400-2000. Rome: Gangemi International, 2019, 544 pp. ISBN: 978-88-492-3813-6.