The Heckel Firm - Information and History

Official Company History

The company's official history can be found on their company history page.

Factory Location

The factory is located at 7 Stettiner Straße, Wiesbaden Germany. Click here to see a map of the location.

Instrument Production

Listing and Explanations

At different times, the Heckel Company has produced bassoons, contrabassoons, Heckelphones (they invented this instrument), clarinets, clarins, Heckelphon-clarinets, basset horns, saxophones, flutes, oboes, oboe d´amores and English horns. According to the family:

The Heckel-Clarina is similar to a soprano saxophone; it is made from German silver.
The Heckelphone-clarinet is a not a clarinet. It has a large conical bore like the saxophone. Some web sites indicate this instrument as a forerunner to the saxophone.

Model Numbers

Heckel has used model numbers to designate types of instruments. The complete model designation consisted of a numeric model number followed by an optional series of alphabetic modifiers which indicated variations in the basic instrument model. For example, a model 17 was (is?) a Boehm system clarinet, and a model 17es is the same instrument extended to low Eb.

The following is a list of model numbers and instruments listed in their 100th Anniversary Catalog (1931):

Model #	Instrument
1	Piccolo Clarinet (in Ab or G)
2	Clarinet (in Eb, D or C)
5	Clarinet (in Bb or A)
7	Clarinet (in Bb or A)
10	Clarinet (in Bb or A)
11	Clarinet (in Bb or A)
14	Clarinet Part-Boehm (in Bb)
16	Clarinet Boehm (in Bb or A)
17	Clarinet Boehm (in Bb or A)
18	Alto Clarinet (in F), the Heckelphone-Clarinet in Bb and the Bassethorn
19	Bass Clarinet (in Bb)
20	Contrabass Clarinet (in Bb)
21	Flute-German system (long foot joint)
23	Flute-German system (long midjoint)
24	Flute-German system d'amore in A
28	Flute-Boehm
32	Piccolo-German system
33	Piccolo-Boehm
35	Oboe
36	Heckelphone (in Eb, F and C); also the Musette (in F)
37	Oboe d'amore
38	English Horn
41	Bassoon-German system
42	Bassoon-German system with French system left thumb
43	Contrabassoon-German system
44	Contrabassoon-German system with French system left thumb
91	Saxophone-Sopranino in Eb
92	Saxophone-Soprano in Bb
93	Saxophone-Alto in Eb
94	Saxophone-Melody in C
95	Saxophone-Tenor in Bb
96	Saxophone-Baritone in Eb
100	Heckel-Clarina (in Bb and Eb)

Family Tree

Johann Adam Heckel (1812-1877)
Wilhelm Heckel (1856-1909)
Wilhelm Hermann Heckel (1879-1952), August Heckel (1880-1914)
Elsa Auguste Groffy, nee Heckel (1906-1969) [married Franz Groffy (1896-1972)], daughter of Wilhelm H. Heckel
Gisela Gebhard, nee Groffy (1926-1990) [married Adolf Gebhard (1919-)] and Edith Reiter nee Groffy (1937-) [married Karl-Heinz Reiter (1929-)], daughters of Elsa Auguste Groffy
Angelika Gisela Lucchetta, nee Reiter (1965-) [married Moris Lucchetta (1963-)] and Ralf Otto Reiter (1971-), children of Karl-Heinz and Edith Reiter

Company Logo

For many years Heckel has used a logo which shows a line-drawn globe with the inscription HECKEL and BIEBRICH around the globe (Biebrich is the area in Weisbaden where the factory is located). The globe also has a bassoon "laying" across it diagonally, with the boot in the "Southeast" corner and the bell in the "Northwest" corner.

When Angelika (Reiter) Luccetta and Ralf Reiter began controlling some of the company's functions (circa 1993) they decided that changing the bassoon to "lay" from "Southwest" to "Northeast" was a change they wanted to make. The logo now has this new look.

On the company's website there is a company logo with an actual Heckel bassoon "across the globe". Company sources state that they believe that they recall that this instrument's serial number is somewhere around 14300.

View the legal statement.