Re: Meinl's Distinguished


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Posted by Lee Stofer on April 01, 2003 at 09:45:51:

In Reply to: Meinl's Distinguished posted by Sam on March 31, 2003 at 19:13:20:

As alluded to by JS and Klaus, the Meinl name is not uncommon in the Sudetenland, where the city of Graslitz is. Graslitz, up until WW II, was the largest center of brass instrument manufacturing in Europe, and virtually all traditional European instruments are based on the Graslitz patterns. The Rudolf Meinl family traces its roots to Silberbach, a suburb of Graslitz. After WW II, there were many refugees from those areas that fled to the West. One group settled in Waldkraiburg in eastern Bavaria, and built the company that became Mirafone. Young Rudolf Meinl's family settled in Diespeck, a suburb of Neustadt/Aisch, just west of Nurenburg in Bavaria. In that same area is Roland Meinl who deals in percussion instruments, Wurlitzer who makes world-class clarinets, and Bruno Tilz who has made mouthpieces under his name, and made the Perantucci, Rudolf Meinl and Hirsbrunner mouthpieces. Just south of Munich, Wenzel Meinl started his own company, of which the export instruments to the US were labeled, Meinl-Weston (Meinl-Western), and the exports for England were labeled W. Meinl-Weston. As I understand it, Walter Nirschl, a top engineer at Boehm & Meinl, bought that company from the Meinls and is related to Wenzel's son Gerhard by marriage. Although they are probably distant relatives, Rudolf Meinl and Gerhard Meinl do not claim any close kinship. As you can see, most of Germany's instrument makers came from Bohemia, which gives creedence to the saying, "If you are Bohemian, you are musical".

Lee Stofer


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