Letter to the Editor: Zimmerman Company Made Old 7-String Guitars

by Gerhard J. Oldiges

Originally published in American Lutherie #78, 2004

Tim,

I enjoyed reading Fred Casey’s article about the 7-string “Russian Guitar” and would like to add some information about “Jul. Heinr. Zimmermann, RIGA.”

Zimmermann is originally a German wholesale company from Leipzig specializing in dealing with Russia and Eastern Europe. A reprint of a pre-1900 catalog (published 1984) mentions offices in St. Petersburg, Moscow, Riga, and London, and shows all kinds of instruments, including harps from Lyon & Healy, orchestra instruments, lots of plucked instruments, and “7-string guitars, Russian tuning” (p. 34). The guitar shown in this chapter is quite exactly the instrument Fred Casey is writing about.

I am not sure if Zimmermann had their own production in Leipzig. Paul de Wit’s World Directory of the Musical Instrument Industry from 1925/26 lists Jul. Heinr. Zimmermann as wholesaler and exporter in Leipzig and a Zimmerman factory in Markneukirchen/Saxony (founded 1919). Although the catalog also shows two photographs of a violin workshop and a brass workshop it also might be possible that Zimmermann bought other instruments like guitars from the makers in Saxony.

Anyway, I think that Fred Casey’s guitar was not made in Russia. After reading the Zimmermann catalog and knowing the style of guitars made in Saxony around the turn of the century, it seems obvious to me that this guitar was also, like the other 7-string guitar (with a Zimmermann label), made somewhere in Germany (Leipzig or Markneukirchen) and brought to Russia by Jul. Heinr. Zimmermann. ◆