Analysis: While Lindner pianos were disliked by many professionals, these innovative mass-produced instruments are due more credit than they've received to date
By Anika Babel, UCD
The marketing claim was that Lindner pianos were so light that they could "be carried by two girls". This was achieved by replacing the heavy cast-iron frame with welded tubular steel, marking the most significant material development in piano making since the iron frame's introduction in 1825. With such a reduction in weight, these pianos could be distributed en masse via airfreight.
Built in the Rippen piano factory in Shannon, Co Clare from 1961, thousands of Lindner pianos rolled straight off the production line to the runway at Shannon Airport, a mere 100 meters away. The keyboards were collapsed inwards during transportation, allowing two pianos to take up the footprint - and weight - of one conventional upright piano. Not only did this streamline logistics for Lindner, it also circumnavigated prohibitive import taxes in countries like New Zealand, since the instruments required a degree of "assembly" upon arrival (simply untucking the keyboards).
We need your consent to load this rte-player contentWe use rte-player to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
From RTÉ Archives, Arthur Quinlan reports for RTÉ News in 1966 on the busy workforce at Shannon's piano factory
At peak production, Lindner were Europe's largest manufacturers and exporters of pianos. The convenience of importing and transporting Lindners appealed to musical instrument retailers around the world, but the Rippen family, the Dutch piano-making dynasty behind Lindner, kept the needs of musicians at the core of their endeavours. Lindner was a piano for the people: an instrument that did not comply with elite notions of craft (being mass-produced), exclusivity (as relatively affordable), or high-performance (as a small instrument for the home).
Lindner's biggest disruption to the norm was their use of plastics at a time when synthetic polymers were tentatively becoming part of everyday life. The keys and action (the inner mechanism) were made entirely of novel plastics like Delrin and Teflon that were injection-moulded on site. These materials promised a resilience against all climates. Demonstrating this, Lindner marketed their instruments in extreme conditions: submerged in the Shannon, shrouded in flames, and covered in ice blocks — all while being played by daring pianists.
We need your consent to load this rte-player contentWe use rte-player to manage extra content that can set cookies on your device and collect data about your activity. Please review their details and accept them to load the content.Manage Preferences
From RTÉ Archives, Dermot Mullane reports for RTÉ News on the Garristown Festival in north Dublin in 1976, which included a piano smashing competition watched by a large crowd (including future Taoiseach Charlie Haughey)
Throughout the early and mid-20th century, the biggest threat to pianos were not, as widely held, new forms of home entertainment such as radio, records and TV, but central heating. Fluctuating temperatures cause irreparable cracks in soundboards (the resonant wooden backboard that give pianos their idiosyncratic qualities). Landfills became overwhelmed by ruined pianos, giving rise to a new trend that put the craic back into these instruments: piano smashing competitions.
With laminate soundboards and plastic components, Lindner's innovations tackled vulnerabilities to humidity and climatic changes. Sticking keys, tuning instability, maintenance, and cracked soundboards could be a thing of the past. These attributes appealed to the specific needs of ABBA, whose tiny songwriting cabin was in the exposed Swedish Archipelago. It was upon the keys of a compact Lindner Continental 110 that Dancing Queen, Mamma Mia, Fernando and over half of the songs on ABBA Gold came to life.
Lindner’s innovations in design, manufacturing and distribution had the propensity to transform the industry. But piano building was and largely remains a conservative affair. Lindner’s space-age pianos attempted to become to music what the Bic pen was to literacy or what the Honda Super Cub (AKA the Honda 50, the best-selling motor vehicle of all time) was to mobility: an affordable, reliable, and accessible avenue to music.
Lindner’s vision exceeded the means of the time. Their choice of plastics mired their ambitions; these components became brittle and shattered after a few short years. As the plastic crumbled, so too did Lindner’s reputation.
The funeral of a Lindner piano
Despite the odds and the vehement opinions of many tuners and technicians, Lindners are still heard across continents today. However, spare parts have been unavailable since the factory ceased production around 1970. Furthermore, Lindner's radical designs rendered orthodox tools, parts and approaches redundant, much to the frustration of those tasked with servicing these instruments. Indeed, many tuners and technicians flatly refuse to work with Lindners, declaring the following sentiments on various online forums:
"Lindner, it’s not a piano, it’s a diagnosis"
"They are, without a doubt, the worst ever piano in the world, ever."
"We have here probably one of the worst cases of piano-shaped objects ever made"
"Never tell a customer their piano is crap, even if it is (unless it’s a Lindner)"
"Lindner is a well-known euphemism for: nightmare!! You may tell your client I say so"
"'The only piano you can play underwater’. Good idea — throw 'em in"
"Long ago we threw one off a pier expecting it to sink and it floated"
"Try dynamite"
The aftershock of Lindner’s experimentation with plastics is still tangible. Despite innumerable advances in production techniques and material technologies since 1961, plastic remains a highly suspect material within the piano industry. Makers like Kawai feature some carbon fibre components, but most innovations are found in exclusive instruments; the Porsches and Ferraris of the piano world, rather than the Nissan Micras or Ford Fiestas, so to speak.
The curious case of the condemned piano has not deterred everyone. Alain Felix Denis and his son Matthieu have restored a Continental 110 using 3D printing, fostering Lindner projects among the DIY community. "We have succeeded in repairing this Linder piano, more for the heritage and in tribute to these engineers and technicians of that time, they helped to democratise the learning of music for all."
A fate far worse than Rippen's own misadventure with Lindner is the shadow that this misfortune cast upon the industry. Lindner remains the ultimate cautionary tale against new materials. Had more enduring plastics been selected, who knows the impact that these Irish pianos would have made? Lindner’s ambition to produce a piano for the people has yet to be realised by makers reluctant to break from notions of prestige, ostensibly tied to tradition.
Follow RTÉ Brainstorm on WhatsApp and Instagram for more stories and updates
Dr Anika Babel is an occasional lecturer at the UCD School of Music and Creative Futures Academy
The views expressed here are those of the author and do not represent or reflect the views of RTÉ
