Framus
Dr. Susanne Schnitzer shares her memories growing up in the Kirschnek family. Grandfather Franz Krischnek, founder of Kirschnek String Instruments, was a businessman with worldwide connections (many of them to the United States) while his daughter Ilse Fischer managed the rest. She took the...
Norman Treitl’s grandfather was Otto Josef Klier, who established the Klira company to be the third largest music instrument production during Bubenreuth’s boom years. Norman Treitl can tell how Klira started out producing violins, soon thereafter adding guitars and electric guitars to their...
Karl Hoyer was born in Schönbach/Luby in the Czech Republic to a family of violin makers. As a child, he helped in his father’s workshop, and in 1944, went to the school of violin making in Schönbach where music lessons were part of the curriculum. When the family moved to Bubenreuth, Karl worked...
EZ Wajcman was fascinated by the need for specialized sounding guitar pickups. Together with Bill Lawrence, EZ opened their pickup company in 1965 and produced a well-respected product that was the talk of the NAMM Show in the mid-1960s. Over the years, EZ developed processes to ensure the...
Marcus Spangler cut his teeth in the furniture business, working with his hands, seeing products to completion and adding his own ideas to the design and function of each piece. When he was hired by HP Wilfer to work at Warwick, Marcus found many of those same skills came in handy. As a product...
Florence Wilfer was born in France and was working for a musical distribution company when she met HP Wilfer, her future husband. The two have been working together at HP's Warwick Company since getting married in 1991. Florence has been critical in the operations, marketing and book keeping side...
Joe Marinic played in several rock bands while in school and became fascinated with the electric guitar. As a teenager he began building his own amplifiers and pickups for his guitar. After working for the Framus Guitar Company for several years, Joe had the opportunity to form his own company,...
H. P. Wilfer inherited the passion and drive of his father who formed the Framus Guitar Company. After hard times and his father’s retirement, H. P. bought back the company to bring the many innovative and popular products back to market. H. P. did so through the success of his Warwick Bass Company...
Bill Lawrence was known for his pick-up design and his long career as a German based guitarist. In fact, when visiting the Framus Museum in Markneukirchen Germany, you can learn of his influential musical career when he was known as Billy Lorento. Always interested in electronics, he applied his...