Documentary Films
Note by Note: The Making of Steinway L1037
Note by Note: The Making of Steinway L1037 is an independent documentary film that follows the construction of a Steinway concert grand piano for more than a year, from the search for wood in Alaska to a display at Manhattan's Steinway Hall. The documentary film received its U.S. theatrical premiere at New York's Film Forum in November, 2007.
In the documentary, the pianists Pierre-Laurent Aimard, Kenny Barron, Bill Charlap, Harry Connick, Jr., Hélène Grimaud, Hank Jones, Lang Lang and Marcus Roberts, are seen testing and talking about Steinway pianos. The Steinway founder's great-grandson, Henry Z. Steinway, talks about the company's history.
Critics gave the documentary mostly positive reviews. As of July 17, 2011 (2011 -07-17), the review aggregator Rotten Tomatoes reported that 90% of critics gave the film positive reviews, based on 20 reviews. The documentary has won 7 awards.
Pianomania
Pianomania is a 2009 German-Austrian documentary film. The film presents Steinway's chief piano tuner and concert technician for the Vienna-area, Stefan Knüpfer, in his work with pianists such as Lang Lang, Alfred Brendel and Pierre-Laurent Aimard.
The collaborative work between Stefan Knüpfer and Pierre-Laurent Aimard is at the center of the film. The Art of Fugue by Johann Sebastian Bach is to be recorded and the film gain insight into Stefan Knüpfer's work on the Steinway piano before and during the recording session. The film begins one year before the recording takes place.
One of Alfred Brendel's last concerts takes place at the Grafenegg Music Festival in Vienna. Stefan Knüpfer prepares the Steinway piano for him while Alfred Brendel gives his directions humorously.
Read more about this topic: Steinway & Sons
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“If you want to tell the untold stories, if you want to give voice to the voiceless, you’ve got to find a language. Which goes for film as well as prose, for documentary as well as autobiography. Use the wrong language, and you’re dumb and blind.”
—Salman Rushdie (b. 1948)
“The cinema is not an art which films life: the cinema is something between art and life. Unlike painting and literature, the cinema both gives to life and takes from it, and I try to render this concept in my films. Literature and painting both exist as art from the very start; the cinema doesn’t.”
—Jean-Luc Godard (b. 1930)