The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a
keyboard
Keyboard may refer to:
Text input
* Keyboard, part of a typewriter
* Computer keyboard
** Keyboard layout, the software control of computer keyboards and their mapping
** Keyboard technology, computer keyboard hardware and firmware
Music
* Musi ...
, which is a row of keys (small levers) that the performer presses down or strikes with the fingers and thumbs of both hands to cause the hammers to strike the strings. It was invented in Italy by
Bartolomeo Cristofori
Bartolomeo Cristofori di Francesco (; May 4, 1655 – January 27, 1731) was an Italian maker of musical instruments famous for inventing the piano.
Life
The available source materials on Cristofori's life include his birth and death recor ...
around the year 1700.
Description
The word "piano" is a shortened form of ''pianoforte'', the Italian term for the early 1700s versions of the instrument, which in turn derives from ''clavicembalo col piano e forte'' (key
cimbalom
The cimbalom (; ) or concert cimbalom is a type of chordophone composed of a large, trapezoidal box on legs with metal strings stretched across its top and a damping pedal underneath. It was designed and created by V. Josef Schunda in 1874 in ...
with quiet and loud)
[Pollens (1995, 238)] and ''
fortepiano
A fortepiano , sometimes referred to as a pianoforte, is an early piano. In principle, the word "fortepiano" can designate any piano dating from the invention of the instrument by Bartolomeo Cristofori in 1698 up to the early 19th century. Mo ...
''. The Italian musical terms ''piano'' and ''forte'' indicate "soft" and "loud" respectively, in this context referring to the variations in volume (i.e., loudness) produced in response to a pianist's touch or pressure on the keys: the greater the velocity of a key press, the greater the force of the hammer hitting the strings, and the louder the sound of the note produced and the stronger the attack. The first fortepianos in the 1700s allowed for a quieter sound and greater dynamic range than the
harpsichord
A harpsichord ( it, clavicembalo; french: clavecin; german: Cembalo; es, clavecín; pt, cravo; nl, klavecimbel; pl, klawesyn) is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. This activates a row of levers that turn a trigger mechanism ...
.
A piano usually has a protective wooden case surrounding the
soundboard and metal
strings
String or strings may refer to:
*String (structure), a long flexible structure made from threads twisted together, which is used to tie, bind, or hang other objects
Arts, entertainment, and media Films
* ''Strings'' (1991 film), a Canadian anim ...
, which are strung under great tension on a heavy metal frame. Pressing one or more keys on the piano's keyboard causes a wooden or plastic hammer (typically padded with firm felt) to strike the strings. The hammer rebounds from the strings, and the strings continue to vibrate at their
resonant frequency
Resonance describes the phenomenon of increased amplitude that occurs when the frequency of an applied periodic force (or a Fourier component of it) is equal or close to a natural frequency of the system on which it acts. When an oscillatin ...
. These vibrations are transmitted through a
bridge
A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somethi ...
to a
soundboard that amplifies by more efficiently
coupling
A coupling is a device used to connect two shafts together at their ends for the purpose of transmitting power. The primary purpose of couplings is to join two pieces of rotating equipment while permitting some degree of misalignment or end mov ...
the acoustic energy to the air. When the key is released, a damper stops the strings' vibration, ending the sound. Notes can be sustained, even when the keys are released by the fingers and thumbs, by the use of
pedals
A pedal (from the Latin '' pes'' ''pedis'', "foot") is a lever designed to be operated by foot and may refer to:
Computers and other equipment
* Footmouse, a foot-operated computer mouse
* In medical transcription, a pedal is used to control p ...
at the base of the instrument. The sustain pedal enables pianists to play musical passages that would otherwise be impossible, such as sounding a 10-note chord in the lower register and then, while this chord is being continued with the sustain pedal, shifting both hands to the treble range to play a melody and arpeggios over the top of this sustained chord. Unlike the
pipe organ
The pipe organ is a musical instrument that produces sound by driving pressurized air (called ''wind'') through the organ pipes selected from a keyboard. Because each pipe produces a single pitch, the pipes are provided in sets called ''ranks ...
and harpsichord, two major
keyboard instrument
A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument played using a keyboard, a row of levers which are pressed by the fingers. The most common of these are the piano, organ, and various electronic keyboards, including synthesizers and digital piano ...
s widely used before the piano, the piano allows gradations of volume and tone according to how forcefully or softly a performer presses or strikes the keys.
Most modern pianos have a row of 88 black and white keys, 52 white keys for the
notes
Note, notes, or NOTE may refer to:
Music and entertainment
* Musical note, a pitched sound (or a symbol for a sound) in music
* Notes (album), ''Notes'' (album), a 1987 album by Paul Bley and Paul Motian
* ''Notes'', a common (yet unofficial) sho ...
of the
C major
C major (or the key of C) is a major scale based on C, consisting of the pitches C, D, E, F, G, A, and B. C major is one of the most common keys used in music. Its key signature has no flats or sharps. Its relative minor is A minor and ...
scale (C, D, E, F, G, A and B) and 36 shorter black keys, which are raised above the white keys, and set further back on the keyboard. This means that the piano can play 88 different pitches (or "notes"), spanning a
range
Range may refer to:
Geography
* Range (geographic), a chain of hills or mountains; a somewhat linear, complex mountainous or hilly area (cordillera, sierra)
** Mountain range, a group of mountains bordered by lowlands
* Range, a term used to i ...
of a bit over seven octaves. The black keys are for the "
accidentals
In music, an accidental is a note of a pitch (or pitch class) that is not a member of the scale or mode indicated by the most recently applied key signature. In musical notation, the sharp (), flat (), and natural () symbols, among others, ma ...
" (F/G, G/A, A/B, C/D, and D/E), which are needed to play in all twelve keys. More rarely, some pianos have additional keys (which require additional strings), an example of which is the
Bösendorfer
Bösendorfer (L. Bösendorfer Klavierfabrik GmbH) is an Austrian piano manufacturer and, since 2008, a wholly owned subsidiary of Yamaha Corporation. Bösendorfer is unusual in that it produces 97- and 92-key models in addition to instrument ...
Concert Grand 290 Imperial, which has 97 keys. Most notes have three strings, except for the bass, which graduates from one to two. The strings are sounded when keys are pressed or struck, and silenced by dampers when the hands are lifted from the keyboard. Although an acoustic piano has strings, it is usually classified as a
percussion instrument
A percussion instrument is a musical instrument that is sounded by being struck or scraped by a beater including attached or enclosed beaters or rattles struck, scraped or rubbed by hand or struck against another similar instrument. Exc ...
rather than as a stringed instrument, because the strings are struck rather than plucked (as with a harpsichord or
spinet
A spinet is a smaller type of harpsichord or other keyboard instrument, such as a piano or organ.
Harpsichords
When the term ''spinet'' is used to designate a harpsichord, typically what is meant is the ''bentside spinet'', described in this ...
); in the
Hornbostel–Sachs
Hornbostel–Sachs or Sachs–Hornbostel is a system of musical instrument classification devised by Erich Moritz von Hornbostel and Curt Sachs, and first published in the in 1914. An English translation was published in the '' Galpin Society Jo ...
system of instrument classification, pianos are considered
chordophone
String instruments, stringed instruments, or chordophones are musical instruments that produce sound from vibrating strings when a performer plays or sounds the strings in some manner.
Musicians play some string instruments by plucking the st ...
s. There are two main types of piano: the
grand piano
The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...
and the
upright piano
The piano is a stringed keyboard instrument in which the strings are struck by wooden hammers that are coated with a softer material (modern hammers are covered with dense wool felt; some early pianos used leather). It is played using a keyboa ...
. The grand piano has a better sound and gives the player a more precise control of the keys, and is therefore the preferred choice for every situation in which the available floor-space and the budget will allow, as well as often being considered a requirement in venues where skilled pianists will frequently give public performances. The upright piano, which necessarily involves some compromise in both tone and key action compared to a grand piano of equivalent quality, is nevertheless much more widely used, because it occupies less space (allowing it to fit comfortably in a room where a grand piano would be too large) and is significantly less expensive.
During the 1800s, influenced by the musical trends of the
Romantic music era
Romantic music is a stylistic movement in Western Classical music associated with the period of the 19th century commonly referred to as the Romantic era (or Romantic period). It is closely related to the broader concept of Romanticism—the ...
, innovations such as the
cast iron
Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content more than 2%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloy constituents affect its color when fractured: white cast iron has carbide impuriti ...
frame (which allowed much greater string tensions) and
aliquot stringing Aliquot stringing is the use of extra, un-struck strings in the piano for the purpose of enriching the tone. Aliquot systems use an additional (hence fourth) string in each note of the top three piano octaves. This string is positioned slightly abov ...
gave grand pianos a more powerful sound, with a longer
sustain
In sound and music, an envelope describes how a sound changes over time. It may relate to elements such as amplitude (volume), frequencies (with the use of filters) or pitch. For example, a piano key, when struck and held, creates a near-immedi ...
and richer tone. In the nineteenth century, a family's piano played the same role that a radio or phonograph played in the twentieth century; when a nineteenth-century family wanted to hear a newly published musical piece or
symphony
A symphony is an extended musical composition in Western classical music, most often for orchestra. Although the term has had many meanings from its origins in the ancient Greek era, by the late 18th century the word had taken on the meaning com ...
, they could hear it by having a family member play a
simplified version on the piano. During the nineteenth century,
music publisher
A music publisher is a type of publisher that specializes in distributing music. Music publishers originally published sheet music. When copyright became legally protected, music publishers started to play a role in the management of the intellect ...
s produced many types of musical works (symphonies, opera overtures, waltzes, etc.) in arrangements for piano, so that music lovers could play and hear the popular pieces of the day in their home. The piano is widely employed in
classical,
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...
,
traditional
A tradition is a belief or behavior (folk custom) passed down within a group or society with symbolic meaning or special significance with origins in the past. A component of cultural expressions and folklore, common examples include holidays or ...
and
popular
Popularity or social status is the quality of being well liked, admired or well known to a particular group.
Popular may also refer to:
In sociology
* Popular culture
* Popular fiction
* Popular music
* Popular science
* Populace, the total ...
music for
solo
Solo or SOLO may refer to:
Arts and entertainment Comics
* ''Solo'' (DC Comics), a DC comics series
* Solo, a 1996 mini-series from Dark Horse Comics
Characters
* Han Solo, a ''Star Wars'' character
* Jacen Solo, a Jedi in the non-canonical ''S ...
and
ensemble
Ensemble may refer to:
Art
* Architectural ensemble
* ''Ensemble'' (album), Kendji Girac 2015 album
* Ensemble (band), a project of Olivier Alary
* Ensemble cast (drama, comedy)
* Ensemble (musical theatre), also known as the chorus
* ''En ...
performances, accompaniment, and for
composing,
songwriting
A songwriter is a musician who professionally composes musical compositions or writes lyrics for songs, or both. The writer of the music for a song can be called a composer, although this term tends to be used mainly in the classical music gen ...
and rehearsals. Although the piano is very heavy and thus not portable and is expensive, its musical versatility, the large number of musicians –both amateurs and professionals– trained in it, and its wide availability in performance venues, schools and rehearsal spaces have made it one of the Western world's most familiar musical instruments.
History
![FortepianoByMcNultyAfterWalter1805](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/4e/FortepianoByMcNultyAfterWalter1805.jpg)
The piano was founded on earlier technological innovations in
keyboard instrument
A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument played using a keyboard, a row of levers which are pressed by the fingers. The most common of these are the piano, organ, and various electronic keyboards, including synthesizers and digital piano ...
s.
Pipe organ
The pipe organ is a musical instrument that produces sound by driving pressurized air (called ''wind'') through the organ pipes selected from a keyboard. Because each pipe produces a single pitch, the pipes are provided in sets called ''ranks ...
s have been used since antiquity, and as such, the development of pipe organs enabled instrument builders to learn about creating keyboard mechanisms for sounding pitches. The first
string instrument
String instruments, stringed instruments, or chordophones are musical instruments that produce sound from vibrating strings when a performer plays or sounds the strings in some manner.
Musicians play some string instruments by plucking the ...
s with struck strings were the
hammered dulcimer
The hammered dulcimer (also called the hammer dulcimer) is a percussion-stringed instrument which consists of strings typically stretched over a trapezoidal resonant sound board. The hammered dulcimer is set before the musician, who in more trad ...
s, which were used since the
Middle Ages
In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the late 5th to the late 15th centuries, similar to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire a ...
in Europe. During the Middle Ages, there were several attempts at creating stringed
keyboard instrument
A keyboard instrument is a musical instrument played using a keyboard, a row of levers which are pressed by the fingers. The most common of these are the piano, organ, and various electronic keyboards, including synthesizers and digital piano ...
s with struck strings. By the 17th century, the mechanisms of keyboard instruments such as the
clavichord
The clavichord is a stringed rectangular keyboard instrument that was used largely in the Late Middle Ages, through the Renaissance, Baroque and Classical eras.
Historically, it was mostly used as a practice instrument and as an aid to compositi ...
and the
harpsichord
A harpsichord ( it, clavicembalo; french: clavecin; german: Cembalo; es, clavecín; pt, cravo; nl, klavecimbel; pl, klawesyn) is a musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. This activates a row of levers that turn a trigger mechanism ...
were well developed. In a clavichord, the strings are struck by tangents, while in a harpsichord, they are mechanically plucked by quills when the performer depresses the key. Centuries of work on the mechanism of the harpsichord in particular had shown instrument builders the most effective ways to construct the case, soundboard, bridge, and mechanical action for a keyboard intended to sound strings.
Invention
![CristoforiPiano1726LeipzigKeyboardView](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/c6/CristoforiPiano1726LeipzigKeyboardView.jpg)
The invention of the piano is credited to
Bartolomeo Cristofori
Bartolomeo Cristofori di Francesco (; May 4, 1655 – January 27, 1731) was an Italian maker of musical instruments famous for inventing the piano.
Life
The available source materials on Cristofori's life include his birth and death recor ...
(1655–1731) of
Padua
Padua ( ; it, Padova ; vec, Pàdova) is a city and ''comune'' in Veneto, northern Italy. Padua is on the river Bacchiglione, west of Venice. It is the capital of the province of Padua. It is also the economic and communications hub of the ...
, Italy, who was employed by
Ferdinando de' Medici, Grand Prince of Tuscany
Ferdinando de' Medici (9 August 1663 – 31 October 1713) was the eldest son of Cosimo III de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, and Marguerite Louise d'Orléans. Ferdinando was heir to the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, with the title Grand Prince, fro ...
, as the Keeper of the Instruments. Cristofori was an expert harpsichord maker, and was well acquainted with the body of knowledge on stringed keyboard instruments; this knowledge of keyboard mechanisms and actions helped him to develop the first pianos. It is not known exactly when Cristofori first built a piano. An inventory made by his employers, the
Medici
The House of Medici ( , ) was an Italian banking family and political dynasty that first began to gather prominence under Cosimo de' Medici, in the Republic of Florence during the first half of the 15th century. The family originated in the Muge ...
family, indicates the existence of a piano by the year 1700. The three Cristofori pianos that survive today date from the 1720s.
Cristofori named the instrument ''un cimbalo di cipresso di piano e forte'' ("a keyboard of
cypress
Cypress is a common name for various coniferous trees or shrubs of northern temperate regions that belong to the family Cupressaceae. The word ''cypress'' is derived from Old French ''cipres'', which was imported from Latin ''cypressus'', the ...
with soft and loud"), abbreviated over time as ''pianoforte'', ''fortepiano'', and later, simply, piano.
Cristofori's great success was designing a stringed keyboard instrument in which the notes are struck by a hammer. The hammer must strike the string, but not remain in contact with it, because continued contact would
damp the sound and stop the string from vibrating and making sound. This means that after striking the string, the hammer must quickly fall from (or rebound from) the strings. Moreover, the hammer must return to its rest position without bouncing violently (thus preventing notes from being re-played by accidental rebound), and it must return to a position in which it is ready to play again almost immediately after its key is depressed, so the player can repeat the same note rapidly when desired. Cristofori's piano
action
Action may refer to:
* Action (narrative), a literary mode
* Action fiction, a type of genre fiction
* Action game, a genre of video game
Film
* Action film, a genre of film
* ''Action'' (1921 film), a film by John Ford
* ''Action'' (1980 fil ...
was a model for the many approaches to piano actions that followed in the next century.
Cristofori's early instruments were made with thin strings, and were much quieter than the modern piano, but they were much louder and with more
sustain
In sound and music, an envelope describes how a sound changes over time. It may relate to elements such as amplitude (volume), frequencies (with the use of filters) or pitch. For example, a piano key, when struck and held, creates a near-immedi ...
in comparison to the clavichord—the only previous keyboard instrument capable of dynamic nuance responding to the player's touch, the velocity with which the keys are pressed. While the clavichord allows expressive control of volume and sustain, it is relatively quiet even at its loudest. The harpsichord produces a sufficiently loud sound, especially when a coupler joins each key to both manuals of a two-manual harpsichord, but it offers no dynamic or expressive control over individual notes. The piano in some sense offers the best of both of the older instruments, combining the ability to play at least as loudly as a harpsichord with the ability to continuously vary dynamics by touch.
Early fortepiano
Cristofori's new instrument remained relatively unknown until an Italian writer,
Scipione Maffei
Francesco Scipione Maffei (; 1 June 1675 – 11 February 1755) was a Italian writer and art critic, author of many articles and plays. An antiquarian with a humanist education whose publications on Etruscan antiquities stand as incunables of ...
, wrote an enthusiastic article about it in 1711, including a diagram of the mechanism, that was translated into German and widely distributed.
Most of the next generation of piano builders started their work based on reading this article. One of these builders was
Gottfried Silbermann
Gottfried Silbermann (January 14, 1683 – August 4, 1753) was a German builder of keyboard instruments. He built harpsichords, clavichords, organs, and fortepianos; his modern reputation rests mainly on the latter two.
Life
Very little is know ...
, better known as an
organ
Organ may refer to:
Biology
* Organ (biology), a part of an organism
Musical instruments
* Organ (music), a family of keyboard musical instruments characterized by sustained tone
** Electronic organ, an electronic keyboard instrument
** Hammond ...
builder. Silbermann's pianos were virtually direct copies of Cristofori's, with one important addition: Silbermann invented the forerunner of the modern
sustain pedal
A sustain pedal or sustaining pedal (also called damper pedal, loud pedal, or open pedal) is the most commonly used pedal in a modern piano. It is typically the rightmost of two or three pedals. When pressed, the sustain pedal "sustains" all ...
, which lifts all the dampers from the strings simultaneously.
This innovation allows the pianist to sustain the notes that they have depressed even after their fingers are no longer pressing down the keys. As such, by holding a chord with the sustain pedal, pianists can relocate their hands to a different register of the keyboard in preparation for a subsequent section.
![Grand Piano 1781 France - Louis Bas](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/aa/Grand_Piano_1781_France_-_Louis_Bas.jpg)
Silbermann showed
Johann Sebastian Bach
Johann Sebastian Bach (28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the late Baroque period. He is known for his orchestral music such as the '' Brandenburg Concertos''; instrumental compositions such as the Cello Suites; keyboard w ...
one of his early instruments in the 1730s, but Bach did not like the instrument at that time, saying that the higher notes were too soft to allow a full dynamic range. Although this earned him some animosity from Silbermann, the criticism was apparently heeded.
Bach did approve of a later instrument he saw in 1747, and even served as an agent in selling Silbermann's pianos. "Instrument: piano et forte genandt"—a reference to the instrument's ability to play soft and loud—was an expression that Bach used to help sell the instrument when he was acting as Silbermann's agent in 1749.
[. "Instrument: piano et forte genandt" asan expression Bach also used when acting as Silbermann's agent in 1749."]
Piano making flourished during the late 18th century in the
Viennese school, which included
Johann Andreas Stein
Johann (Georg) Andreas Stein (16 May 1728 in Heidelsheim – 29 February 1792 in Augsburg) was an outstanding German maker of keyboard instruments, a central figure in the history of the piano. He was primarily responsible for the design of the ...
(who worked in
Augsburg
Augsburg (; bar , Augschburg , links=https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Swabian_German , label=Swabian German, , ) is a city in Swabia, Bavaria, Germany, around west of Bavarian capital Munich. It is a university town and regional seat of the ' ...
, Germany) and the Viennese makers
Nannette Streicher
Nannette Streicher (née Anna-Maria Stein; 2 January 1769, Augsburg – 16 January 1833, Vienna) was a German piano maker, composer, music educator, writer and a close friend of Ludwig van Beethoven.
Life
Nannette Streicher was the sixth child o ...
(daughter of Stein) and
Anton Walter
Gabriel Anton Walter (5 February 1752 – 11 April 1826) was a builder of pianos. The ''Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'' describes him as "the most famous Viennese piano maker of his time".Latcham (2009)
Life
Walter was born in Neuhaus ...
. Viennese-style pianos were built with wood frames, two strings per note, and leather-covered hammers. Some of these Viennese pianos had the opposite coloring of modern-day pianos; the natural keys were black and the accidental keys white.
It was for such instruments that
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (27 January 17565 December 1791), baptised as Joannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart, was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical period. Despite his short life, his rapid pace of composition r ...
composed his
concertos
A concerto (; plural ''concertos'', or ''concerti'' from the Italian plural) is, from the late Baroque era, mostly understood as an instrumental composition, written for one or more soloists accompanied by an orchestra or other ensemble. The typi ...
and
sonatas
Sonata (; Italian: , pl. ''sonate''; from Latin and Italian: ''sonare'' rchaic Italian; replaced in the modern language by ''suonare'' "to sound"), in music, literally means a piece ''played'' as opposed to a cantata (Latin and Italian ''canta ...
, and replicas of them are built in the 21st century for use in
authentic-instrument performance of his music. The pianos of Mozart's day had a softer tone than 21st century pianos or English pianos, with less sustaining power. The term ''
fortepiano
A fortepiano , sometimes referred to as a pianoforte, is an early piano. In principle, the word "fortepiano" can designate any piano dating from the invention of the instrument by Bartolomeo Cristofori in 1698 up to the early 19th century. Mo ...
'' now distinguishes these early instruments (and modern re-creations) from later pianos.
Modern piano
In the period from about 1790 to 1860, the Mozart-era piano underwent tremendous changes that led to the modern structure of the instrument. This revolution was in response to a preference by composers and pianists for a more powerful, sustained piano sound, and made possible by the ongoing
Industrial Revolution
The Industrial Revolution was the transition to new manufacturing processes in Great Britain, continental Europe, and the United States, that occurred during the period from around 1760 to about 1820–1840. This transition included going f ...
with resources such as high-quality
piano wire
Piano wire, or "music wire", is a specialized type of wire made for use in piano strings but also in other applications as springs. It is made from tempered high-carbon steel, also known as spring steel, which replaced iron as the material st ...
for
strings
String or strings may refer to:
*String (structure), a long flexible structure made from threads twisted together, which is used to tie, bind, or hang other objects
Arts, entertainment, and media Films
* ''Strings'' (1991 film), a Canadian anim ...
, and precision
casting
Casting is a manufacturing process in which a liquid material is usually poured into a mold, which contains a hollow cavity of the desired shape, and then allowed to solidify. The solidified part is also known as a ''casting'', which is ejected ...
for the production of massive
iron frames that could withstand the tremendous tension of the strings. Over time, the tonal range of the piano was also increased from the five
octave
In music, an octave ( la, octavus: eighth) or perfect octave (sometimes called the diapason) is the interval between one musical pitch and another with double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been refer ...
s of Mozart's day to the seven octave (or more) range found on today's pianos.
![Broadwood grand square action](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/26/Broadwood_grand_square_action.svg)
Early technological progress in the late 1700s owed much to the firm of
Broadwood.
John Broadwood
John Broadwood (6 October 1732 – 17 July 1812) was the Scottish founder of the piano manufacturer Broadwood and Sons.
Life
Broadwood was born 6 October 1732 and christened 15 Oct 1732 at St Helens, Cockburnspath in Berwickshire, and grew up in ...
joined with another Scot, Robert Stodart, and a Dutchman,
Americus Backers
Americus Backers (died 1778), sometimes described as the father of the English grand pianoforte style, brought the hammer striking action for keyboard instruments from his master Gottfried Silbermann's workshop in Freiburg to England in the mid-18t ...
, to design a piano in the harpsichord case—the origin of the "grand". This was achieved by about 1777. They quickly gained a reputation for the splendour and powerful tone of their instruments, with Broadwood constructing pianos that were progressively larger, louder, and more robustly constructed. They sent pianos to both
Joseph Haydn
Franz Joseph Haydn ( , ; 31 March 173231 May 1809) was an Austrian composer of the Classical period (music), Classical period. He was instrumental in the development of chamber music such as the string quartet and piano trio. His contributions ...
and
Ludwig van Beethoven
Ludwig van Beethoven (baptised 17 December 177026 March 1827) was a German composer and pianist. Beethoven remains one of the most admired composers in the history of Western music; his works rank amongst the most performed of the classical ...
, and were the first firm to build pianos with a range of more than five octaves: five octaves and a
fifth during the 1790s, six octaves by 1810 (Beethoven used the extra notes in his later works), and seven octaves by 1820. The
Viennese Viennese may refer to:
* Vienna, the capital of Austria
* Viennese people, List of people from Vienna
* Viennese German, the German dialect spoken in Vienna
* Music of Vienna, musical styles in the city
* Viennese Waltz, genre of ballroom dance
* V ...
makers similarly followed these trends; however the two schools used different piano actions: Broadwoods used a more robust action, whereas Viennese instruments were more sensitive.
![Erard double pilot action](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/8a/Erard_double_pilot_action.svg)
By the 1820s, the center of piano innovation had shifted to Paris, where the
Pleyel
Ignace Joseph Pleyel (; ; 18 June 1757 – 14 November 1831) was an Austrian-born French composer, music publisher and piano builder of the Classical period.
Life Early years
He was born in in Lower Austria, the son of a schoolmaster named Ma ...
firm manufactured pianos used by
Frédéric Chopin
Frédéric François Chopin (born Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin; 1 March 181017 October 1849) was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist of the Romantic period, who wrote primarily for solo piano. He has maintained worldwide renown as a leadin ...
and the Érard firm manufactured those used by
Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt, in modern usage ''Liszt Ferenc'' . Liszt's Hungarian passport spelled his given name as "Ferencz". An orthographic reform of the Hungarian language in 1922 (which was 36 years after Liszt's death) changed the letter "cz" to simpl ...
. In 1821,
Sébastien Érard
Sébastien Érard (born Sebastian Erhard, 5 April 1752 – 5 August 1831) was a French instrument maker of German origin who specialised in the production of pianos and harps, developing the capacities of both instruments and pioneering the mode ...
invented the double escapement
action
Action may refer to:
* Action (narrative), a literary mode
* Action fiction, a type of genre fiction
* Action game, a genre of video game
Film
* Action film, a genre of film
* ''Action'' (1921 film), a film by John Ford
* ''Action'' (1980 fil ...
, which incorporated a ''repetition lever'' (also called the ''balancier'') that permitted repeating a note even if the key had not yet risen to its maximum vertical position. This facilitated rapid playing of repeated notes, a musical device exploited by Liszt. When the invention became public, as revised by
Henri Herz
Henri Herz (6 January 1803 – 5 January 1888) was a virtuoso pianist, composer and piano manufacturer, Austrian by birth and French by nationality and domicile. He was a professor in the Paris Conservatoire for more than thirty years. Among his ...
, the double escapement action gradually became standard in grand pianos, and is still incorporated into all grand pianos currently produced in the 2000s. Other improvements of the mechanism included the use of firm felt hammer coverings instead of layered leather or cotton. Felt, which
Jean-Henri Pape
Jean-Henri Pape, born as Johann Heinrich Pape and also known as Henry Pape (1 July 1789 – 2 February 1875), was a distinguished French maker of pianos and harps in the early 19th century.
Pape was born in Sarstedt, Germany, in 1789. He arri ...
was the first to use in pianos in 1826, was a more consistent material, permitting wider dynamic ranges as hammer weights and string tension increased. The
sostenuto pedal
Piano pedals are foot-operated levers at the base of a piano that change the instrument's sound in various ways. Modern pianos usually have three pedals, from left to right, the soft pedal (or una corda), the sostenuto pedal, and the sustaining ...
(
see below), invented in 1844 by
Jean-Louis Boisselot
Jean-Baptiste-Louis Boisselot (18 August 1782 – 21 May 1847) was the founder of the piano company Boisselot & Fils. Coming from a family of violin makers based in Montpellier around 1770, he started his business by selling scores and musical ins ...
and copied by the
Steinway
Steinway & Sons, also known as Steinway (), is a German-American piano company, founded in 1853 in Manhattan by German piano builder Heinrich Engelhard Steinweg (later known as Henry E. Steinway). The company's growth led to the opening of a ...
firm in 1874, allowed a wider range of effects.
One innovation that helped create the powerful sound of the modern piano was the use of a massive, strong,
cast iron
Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content more than 2%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloy constituents affect its color when fractured: white cast iron has carbide impuriti ...
frame. Also called the "plate", the iron frame sits atop the
soundboard, and serves as the primary bulwark against the force of string
tension
Tension may refer to:
Science
* Psychological stress
* Tension (physics), a force related to the stretching of an object (the opposite of compression)
* Tension (geology), a stress which stretches rocks in two opposite directions
* Voltage or el ...
that can exceed 20 tons () in a modern grand piano. The single piece cast iron frame was patented in 1825 in
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
by
Alpheus Babcock
Alpheus Babcock (September 11, 1785 – April 3, 1842) was a piano and musical instrument maker in Boston, Massachusetts and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during the early 19th century. Babcock is best known for patenting a complete iron frame in a ...
,
[Isacoff (2012, 74)] combining the metal hitch pin plate (1821, claimed by Broadwood on behalf of Samuel Hervé) and resisting bars (Thom and Allen, 1820, but also claimed by Broadwood and Érard). Babcock later worked for the
Chickering & Mackays firm who patented the first full iron frame for grand pianos in 1843. Composite forged metal frames were preferred by many European makers until the American system was fully adopted by the early 20th century. The increased structural integrity of the iron frame allowed the use of thicker, tenser, and more numerous strings. In 1834, the Webster & Horsfal firm of
Birmingham
Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...
brought out a form of piano wire made from
cast steel
Steel casting is a specialized form of casting involving various types of steel cast to either final/net or near-net shape. Steel castings are used when iron castings cannot deliver enough strength or shock resistance.Oberg, p. 1332
Examples ...
; it was "so superior to the iron wire that the English firm soon had a monopoly."
[Dolge (1911, 124)] But a better steel wire was soon created in 1840 by the
Viennese Viennese may refer to:
* Vienna, the capital of Austria
* Viennese people, List of people from Vienna
* Viennese German, the German dialect spoken in Vienna
* Music of Vienna, musical styles in the city
* Viennese Waltz, genre of ballroom dance
* V ...
firm of Martin Miller,
and a period of innovation and intense competition ensued, with rival brands of piano wire being tested against one another at international competitions, leading ultimately to the modern form of piano wire.
Several important advances included changes to the way the piano was strung. The use of a "choir" of three strings, rather than two for all but the lowest notes, enhanced the richness and complexity of the treble. The use of a Capo d’Astro bar instead of agraffes in the uppermost treble allowed the hammers to strike the strings in their optimal position, greatly increasing that area's power. The implementation of over-stringing (also called
cross-stringing), in which the strings are placed in two separate planes, each with its own
bridge
A bridge is a structure built to span a physical obstacle (such as a body of water, valley, road, or rail) without blocking the way underneath. It is constructed for the purpose of providing passage over the obstacle, which is usually somethi ...
height, allowed greater length to the bass strings and optimized the transition from unwound tenor strings to the iron or copper-wound bass strings. Over-stringing was invented by Pape during the 1820s, and first patented for use in grand pianos in the United States by Henry Steinway Jr. in 1859.
![DuplexScale](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/1b/DuplexScale.JPG)
Some piano makers added variations to enhance the tone of each note, such as
Pascal Taskin
Pascal-Joseph Taskin (27 July 1723 – 9 February 1793) was a Belgium-born French harpsichord and piano maker.
Biography
Pascal Taskin, born in Theux near Liège, but worked in Paris for most of his life. Upon his arrival in Paris, he apprentice ...
(1788),
Collard & Collard (1821), and
Julius Blüthner
Julius Ferdinand Blüthner (11 March 1824 - 13 April 1910) was a German piano maker and founder of the Blüthner piano factory.
Biography
Blüthner was born in Falkenhain (now Meuselwitz), Thuringia. In 1853 he founded a piano-manufacturing ...
, who developed
Aliquot stringing Aliquot stringing is the use of extra, un-struck strings in the piano for the purpose of enriching the tone. Aliquot systems use an additional (hence fourth) string in each note of the top three piano octaves. This string is positioned slightly abov ...
in 1893. These systems were used to strengthen the tone of the highest register of notes on the piano, which up until this time were viewed as being too weak-sounding. Each used more distinctly ringing, undamped vibrations of sympathetically vibrating strings to add to the tone, except the Blüthner
Aliquot stringing Aliquot stringing is the use of extra, un-struck strings in the piano for the purpose of enriching the tone. Aliquot systems use an additional (hence fourth) string in each note of the top three piano octaves. This string is positioned slightly abov ...
, which uses an additional fourth string in the upper two treble sections. While the hitchpins of these separately suspended Aliquot strings are raised slightly above the level of the usual tri-choir strings, they are not struck by the hammers but rather are damped by attachments of the usual dampers. Eager to copy these effects, Theodore Steinway invented ''duplex scaling'', which used short lengths of non-speaking wire bridged by the "aliquot" throughout much of the upper range of the piano, always in locations that caused them to vibrate sympathetically in conformity with their respective overtones—typically in doubled octaves and twelfths.
Variations in shape and design
Some early pianos had shapes and designs that are no longer in use. The
square piano
The square piano is a type of piano that has horizontal strings arranged diagonally across the rectangular case above the hammers and with the keyboard set in the long side, with the sounding board above a cavity in the short side. It is variously ...
(not truly square, but rectangular) was cross strung at an extremely acute angle above the hammers, with the keyboard set along the long side. This design is attributed to Christian Ernst Friderici, a pupil of Gottfried Silbermann, in Germany, and
Johannes Zumpe
Johannes (Johann Christoph) Zumpe (pronounced ''zumpy''; 14 June 1726 in Fürth, Free Imperial City of Nuremberg, modern Germany – buried 5 December 1790 in London, UK) was a leading maker of early English square pianos, a form of rectangula ...
in England, and it was improved by changes first introduced by
Guillaume-Lebrecht Petzold Guillaume-Lebrecht Petzold was a piano maker in Paris in the early 19th century.
Petzold was born 2 July 1794 in Lichtenhayn, a village in Saxony near Meißen. His father, a Protestant minister, wanted him to learn an artistic trade and in April 17 ...
in France and
Alpheus Babcock
Alpheus Babcock (September 11, 1785 – April 3, 1842) was a piano and musical instrument maker in Boston, Massachusetts and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during the early 19th century. Babcock is best known for patenting a complete iron frame in a ...
in the United States. Square pianos were built in great numbers through the 1840s in Europe and the 1890s in the United States, and saw the most visible change of any type of piano: the iron-framed, over-strung squares manufactured by Steinway & Sons were more than two-and-a-half times the size of Zumpe's wood-framed instruments from a century before. Their overwhelming popularity was due to inexpensive construction and price, although their tone and performance were limited by narrow soundboards, simple actions and string spacing that made proper hammer alignment difficult.
![Upright piano inside](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/80/Upright_piano_inside.jpg)
The tall, vertically strung upright grand was arranged like a grand set on end, with the soundboard and bridges above the keys, and tuning pins below them. "Giraffe pianos", "pyramid pianos" and "lyre pianos" were arranged in a somewhat similar fashion, using evocatively shaped cases. The very tall cabinet piano was introduced about 1805 and was built through the 1840s. It had strings arranged vertically on a continuous frame with bridges extended nearly to the floor, behind the keyboard and very large ''sticker action''. The short cottage upright or ''pianino'' with vertical stringing, made popular by
Robert Wornum
Robert Wornum (1780–1852) was a piano maker working in London during the first half of the 19th century. He is best known for introducing small cottage and oblique uprights and an action considered to be the predecessor of the modern upright ac ...
around 1815, was built into the 20th century. They are informally called ''birdcage pianos'' because of their prominent damper mechanism. The oblique upright, popularized in France by
Roller & Blanchet during the late 1820s, was diagonally strung throughout its compass. The tiny
spinet
A spinet is a smaller type of harpsichord or other keyboard instrument, such as a piano or organ.
Harpsichords
When the term ''spinet'' is used to designate a harpsichord, typically what is meant is the ''bentside spinet'', described in this ...
upright was manufactured from the mid-1930s until recent times. The low position of the hammers required the use of a "drop action" to preserve a reasonable keyboard height. Modern upright and grand pianos attained their present, 2000-era forms by the end of the 19th century. While improvements have been made in manufacturing processes, and many individual details of the instrument continue to receive attention, and a small number of acoustic pianos in the 2010s are produced with
MIDI
MIDI (; Musical Instrument Digital Interface) is a technical standard that describes a communications protocol, digital interface, and electrical connectors that connect a wide variety of electronic musical instruments, computers, and re ...
recording and digital
sound module
A sound module is an electronic musical instrument without a human-playable interface such as a piano-style musical keyboard. Sound modules have to be operated using an externally connected device, which is often a MIDI controller, of which the ...
-triggering capabilities, the 19th century was the era of the most dramatic innovations and modifications of the instrument.
Types
Modern pianos have two basic configurations, the grand piano and the upright piano, with various styles of each. There are also specialized and novelty pianos,
electric piano
An electric piano is a musical instrument which produces sounds when a performer presses the keys of a piano-style musical keyboard. Pressing keys causes mechanical hammers to strike metal strings, metal reeds or wire tines, leading to vibrations ...
s based on electromechanical designs,
electronic piano
An electronic piano is a keyboard instrument designed to simulate the timbre of a piano (and sometimes a harpsichord or an organ) using analog circuitry.
"Electronic Piano" was also the trade name used for Wurlitzer's popular line of electric ...
s that synthesize piano-like tones using oscillators, and
digital piano
A digital piano is a type of electronic keyboard instrument designed to serve primarily as an alternative to the traditional acoustic piano, both in how it feels to play and in the sound it produces. Digital pianos use either synthesized emulat ...
s using
digital sample
In signal processing, sampling is the reduction of a continuous-time signal to a discrete-time signal. A common example is the conversion of a sound wave to a sequence of "samples".
A sample is a value of the signal at a point in time and/or s ...
s of acoustic piano sounds.
Grand
![Piano in Entrance Hall](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/01/Piano_in_Entrance_Hall.jpg)
In grand pianos the frame and strings are horizontal, with the strings extending away from the keyboard. The action lies beneath the strings, and uses gravity as its means of return to a state of rest. Grand pianos range in length from approximately to . Some of the lengths have been given more-or-less customary names, which vary from time to time and place to place, but might include:
* Baby grand – around
* Parlor grand or boudoir grand –
* Concert grand – between )
All else being equal, longer pianos with longer strings have larger, richer sound and lower
inharmonicity
In music, inharmonicity is the degree to which the frequencies of overtones (also known as partials or partial tones) depart from whole multiples of the fundamental frequency ( harmonic series).
Acoustically, a note perceived to have a singl ...
of the strings. Inharmonicity is the degree to which the
frequencies
Frequency is the number of occurrences of a repeating event per unit of time. It is also occasionally referred to as ''temporal frequency'' for clarity, and is distinct from ''angular frequency''. Frequency is measured in hertz (Hz) which is eq ...
of
overtone
An overtone is any resonant frequency above the fundamental frequency of a sound. (An overtone may or may not be a harmonic) In other words, overtones are all pitches higher than the lowest pitch within an individual sound; the fundamental i ...
s (known as partials or
harmonic
A harmonic is a wave with a frequency that is a positive integer multiple of the ''fundamental frequency'', the frequency of the original periodic signal, such as a sinusoidal wave. The original signal is also called the ''1st harmonic'', the ...
s) sound
sharp
Sharp or SHARP may refer to:
Acronyms
* SHARP (helmet ratings) (Safety Helmet Assessment and Rating Programme), a British motorcycle helmet safety rating scheme
* Self Help Addiction Recovery Program, a charitable organisation founded in 199 ...
relative to whole multiples of the fundamental frequency. This results from the piano's considerable string stiffness; as a struck string decays its harmonics vibrate, not from their termination, but from a point very slightly toward the center (or more flexible part) of the string. The higher the partial, the further sharp it runs. Pianos with shorter and thicker string (i.e., small pianos with short string scales) have more inharmonicity. The greater the inharmonicity, the more the ear perceives it as harshness of tone.
The inharmonicity of piano strings requires that octaves be ''
stretched,'' or tuned to a lower octave's corresponding sharp overtone rather than to a theoretically correct octave. If octaves are not stretched, single octaves sound in tune, but double—and notably triple—octaves are unacceptably narrow. Stretching a small piano's octaves to match its inherent inharmonicity level creates an imbalance among all the instrument's intervallic relationships. In a concert grand, however, the octave "stretch" retains harmonic balance, even when aligning treble notes to a harmonic produced from three octaves below. This lets close and widespread octaves sound pure, and produces virtually beatless
perfect fifth
In music theory, a perfect fifth is the Interval (music), musical interval corresponding to a pair of pitch (music), pitches with a frequency ratio of 3:2, or very nearly so.
In classical music from Western culture, a fifth is the interval fro ...
s. This gives the concert grand a brilliant, singing and sustaining tone quality—one of the principal reasons that full-size grands are used in the concert hall. Smaller grands satisfy the space and cost needs of domestic use; as well, they are used in some small teaching studios and smaller performance venues.
Upright
![Klavier nah offen](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a5/Klavier_nah_offen.jpg)
Upright pianos, also called vertical pianos, are more compact due to the vertical structure of the frame and strings. The mechanical action structure of the upright piano was invented in London, England in 1826 by
Robert Wornum
Robert Wornum (1780–1852) was a piano maker working in London during the first half of the 19th century. He is best known for introducing small cottage and oblique uprights and an action considered to be the predecessor of the modern upright ac ...
, and upright models became the most popular model for domestic use. Upright pianos took less space than a grand piano, and as such they were a better size for use in private homes for domestic music-making and practice. The hammers move horizontally, and return to their resting position via springs, which are susceptible to degradation. Upright pianos with unusually tall frames and long strings were sometimes marketed as ''upright grand'' pianos, but that label is misleading. Some authors classify modern pianos according to their height and to modifications of the action that are necessary to accommodate the height. Upright pianos are generally less expensive than grand pianos. Upright pianos are widely used in churches,
community center
Community centres, community centers, or community halls are public locations where members of a community tend to gather for group activities, social support, public information, and other purposes. They may sometimes be open for the whole co ...
s, schools, music conservatories and university music programs as rehearsal and practice instruments, and they are popular models for in-home purchase.
* The top of a
spinet
A spinet is a smaller type of harpsichord or other keyboard instrument, such as a piano or organ.
Harpsichords
When the term ''spinet'' is used to designate a harpsichord, typically what is meant is the ''bentside spinet'', described in this ...
model barely rises above the keyboard. Unlike all other pianos, the spinet action is located below the keys, operated by vertical wires that are attached to the backs of the keys.
* Console pianos, which have a compact action (shorter hammers than a large upright has), but because the console's action is above the keys rather than below them as in a spinet, a console almost always plays better than a spinet does. Console pianos are a few inches shorter than studio models.
* Studio pianos are around tall. This is the shortest cabinet that can accommodate a full-sized action located above the keyboard.
* Anything taller than a studio piano is called an upright. (Technically, any piano with a vertically oriented soundboard could be called an upright, but that word is often reserved for the full-size models.)
Specialized
The
toy piano
The toy piano, also known as the ''kinderklavier'' (child's keyboard), is a small piano-like musical instrument. Most modern toy pianos use round metal rods, as opposed to strings in a regular piano, to produce sound. The U.S. Library of Congress ...
, introduced in the 19th century, is a small piano-like instrument, that generally uses round metal rods to produce sound, rather than strings. The US
Library of Congress
The Library of Congress (LOC) is the research library that officially serves the United States Congress and is the ''de facto'' national library of the United States. It is the oldest federal cultural institution in the country. The library is ...
recognizes the toy piano as a unique instrument with the subject designation, Toy Piano Scores: M175 T69.
In 1863,
Henri Fourneaux
Henri is an Estonian, Finnish, French, German and Luxembourgish form of the masculine given name Henry.
People with this given name
; French noblemen
:'' See the 'List of rulers named Henry' for Kings of France named Henri.''
* Henri I de Montm ...
invented the
player piano
A player piano (also known as a pianola) is a self-playing piano containing a pneumatic or electro-mechanical mechanism, that operates the piano action via programmed music recorded on perforated paper or metallic rolls, with more modern i ...
, which plays itself from a
piano roll. A machine perforates a performance recording into rolls of paper, and the player piano replays the performance using pneumatic devices. Modern equivalents of the player piano include the
Bösendorfer
Bösendorfer (L. Bösendorfer Klavierfabrik GmbH) is an Austrian piano manufacturer and, since 2008, a wholly owned subsidiary of Yamaha Corporation. Bösendorfer is unusual in that it produces 97- and 92-key models in addition to instrument ...
CEUS,
Yamaha Disklavier
Disklavier is a brand of reproducing pianos manufactured by Yamaha Corporation. The first Disklavier was introduced in the United States in 1987.
The typical Disklavier is a real acoustic piano outfitted with electronic sensors for recording and ...
and QRS Pianomation, using solenoids and MIDI rather than pneumatics and rolls.
A
silent piano
A silent piano is an acoustic piano where there is an option to silence the strings by stopping the hammers from striking them. A silent piano is designed for private silent practice. In the silent mode, sensors pick up the piano key movement, con ...
is an acoustic piano having an option to silence the strings by means of an interposing hammer bar. They are designed for private silent practice, to avoid disturbing others.
Edward Ryley invented the
transposing piano
A transposing piano is a special piano with a mechanism (operated by a pedal or lever) that changes the keyboard position relative to the ''action'' (see '' Development of the modern piano''
for details). This ''transposes'' (changes the key of) a ...
in 1801. This rare instrument has a lever under the keyboard to move the keyboard relative to the strings, so a pianist can play in a familiar key while the music sounds in a different key.
The
minipiano
The minipiano is a very small upright piano patented by the Brasted brothers in 1934 under the name of their company Eavestaff Ltd. The primary factor that sets a minipiano apart is the fact that the action is positioned below the keyboard, allow ...
is an instrument patented by the Brasted brothers of the Eavestaff Ltd. piano company in 1934. This instrument has a braceless back and a soundboard positioned below the keys—long metal rods pull on the levers to make the hammers strike the strings. The first model, known as the ''Pianette'', was unique in that the tuning pins extended through the instrument, so it could be tuned at the front.
The
prepared piano
A prepared piano is a piano that has had its sounds temporarily altered by placing bolts, screws, mutes, rubber erasers, and/or other objects on or between the strings. Its invention is usually traced to John Cage's dance music for ''Bacchanale' ...
, present in some contemporary art music from the 20th and 21st century is a piano which has objects placed inside it to alter its sound, or has had its mechanism changed in some other way. The scores for music for prepared piano specify the modifications, for example, instructing the pianist to insert pieces of rubber, paper, metal screws, or washers in between the strings. These objects mute the strings or alter their timbre.
The
pedal piano
The pedal piano (or piano-pédalier or pédalier,) is a kind of piano that includes a pedalboard, enabling bass register notes to be played with the feet, as is standard on the organ.
There are two broad types of pedal pianos: either the pedal ...
is a rare type of piano that has a
pedal keyboard
A pedalboard (also called a pedal keyboard, pedal clavier, or, with electronic instruments, a bass pedalboard) is a keyboard played with the feet that is usually used to produce the low-pitched bass line of a piece of music. A pedalboard has long ...
at the base, designed to be played by the feet. The pedals may play the existing bass strings on the piano, or rarely, the pedals may have their own set of bass strings and hammer mechanisms. While the typical intended use for pedal pianos is to enable a keyboardist to practice
pipe organ
The pipe organ is a musical instrument that produces sound by driving pressurized air (called ''wind'') through the organ pipes selected from a keyboard. Because each pipe produces a single pitch, the pipes are provided in sets called ''ranks ...
music at home, a few players of pedal piano use it as a performance instrument.
Wadia Sabra
Wadia (Wadih) Sabra ( ar, وديع صبرا ; 23 February 1876 – 11 April 1952) was a Lebanese composer and founder of the Conservatoire Libanais.
Life
Wadia (Wadih) Sabra was born in 1876 in the village of Ain el Jdideh and died in Beiru ...
had a microtone piano manufactured by
Pleyel
Ignace Joseph Pleyel (; ; 18 June 1757 – 14 November 1831) was an Austrian-born French composer, music publisher and piano builder of the Classical period.
Life Early years
He was born in in Lower Austria, the son of a schoolmaster named Ma ...
in 1920.
Abdallah Chahine
Abdallah Chahine ( ar, عبد الله شاهين; 1894–1975) was a Lebanese pianist and tuner-technician who devised an " Oriental piano" capable of playing quarter tones.
Abdallah Chahine constructed his Oriental piano with the help of Austria ...
later constructed his quartertone "Oriental piano" with the help of Austrian
Hofmann
Hoffman is a surname of German and Jewish origin. The original meaning in medieval times was "steward", i.e. one who manages the property of another. In English and other European languages, including Yiddish and Dutch, the name can also be spelle ...
.
Electric, electronic, and digital
![Wurlitzer210](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/4/45/Wurlitzer210.png)
With
technological advances,
amplified electric piano
An electric piano is a musical instrument which produces sounds when a performer presses the keys of a piano-style musical keyboard. Pressing keys causes mechanical hammers to strike metal strings, metal reeds or wire tines, leading to vibrations ...
s (1929),
electronic piano
An electronic piano is a keyboard instrument designed to simulate the timbre of a piano (and sometimes a harpsichord or an organ) using analog circuitry.
"Electronic Piano" was also the trade name used for Wurlitzer's popular line of electric ...
s (1970s), and
digital piano
A digital piano is a type of electronic keyboard instrument designed to serve primarily as an alternative to the traditional acoustic piano, both in how it feels to play and in the sound it produces. Digital pianos use either synthesized emulat ...
s (1980s) have been developed. The
electric piano
An electric piano is a musical instrument which produces sounds when a performer presses the keys of a piano-style musical keyboard. Pressing keys causes mechanical hammers to strike metal strings, metal reeds or wire tines, leading to vibrations ...
became a popular instrument in the 1960s and 1970s genres of
jazz fusion
Jazz fusion (also known as fusion and progressive jazz) is a music genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and jazz improvisation, improvisation with rock music, funk, and rhythm and blues. Electric guitars, ...
,
funk music
Funk is a music genre that originated in African American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African Americans in the m ...
and
rock music
Rock music is a broad genre of popular music that originated as " rock and roll" in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles in the mid-1960s and later, particularly in the United States an ...
. The first
electric piano
An electric piano is a musical instrument which produces sounds when a performer presses the keys of a piano-style musical keyboard. Pressing keys causes mechanical hammers to strike metal strings, metal reeds or wire tines, leading to vibrations ...
s from the late 1920s used metal strings with a
magnetic pickup, an
amplifier
An amplifier, electronic amplifier or (informally) amp is an electronic device that can increase the magnitude of a signal (a time-varying voltage or current). It may increase the power significantly, or its main effect may be to boost the v ...
and a
loudspeaker
A loudspeaker (commonly referred to as a speaker or speaker driver) is an electroacoustic transducer that converts an electrical audio signal into a corresponding sound. A ''speaker system'', also often simply referred to as a "speaker" or " ...
. The electric pianos that became most popular in
pop and
rock music
Rock music is a broad genre of popular music that originated as " rock and roll" in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles in the mid-1960s and later, particularly in the United States an ...
in the 1960s and 1970s, such as the
Fender Rhodes
The Rhodes piano (also known as the Fender Rhodes piano) is an electric piano invented by Harold Rhodes, which became popular in the 1970s. Like a conventional piano, the Rhodes generates sound with keys and hammers, but instead of strings, th ...
use metal tines in place of strings and use electromagnetic
pickups similar to those on an
electric guitar
An electric guitar is a guitar that requires external amplification in order to be heard at typical performance volumes, unlike a standard acoustic guitar (however combinations of the two - a semi-acoustic guitar and an electric acoustic gui ...
. The resulting electrical, analogue signal can then be amplified with a
keyboard amplifier
A keyboard amplifier is a powered electronic amplifier and loudspeaker in a wooden speaker cabinet used for amplification of electronic keyboard instruments. Keyboard amplifiers are distinct from other types of amplification systems such as g ...
or electronically manipulated with
effects unit
An effects unit or effects pedal is an electronic device that alters the sound of a musical instrument or other audio source through audio signal processing.
Common effects include distortion/overdrive, often used with electric guitar in el ...
s. In classical music, electric pianos are mainly used as inexpensive rehearsal or practice instruments. However, electric pianos, particularly the
Fender Rhodes
The Rhodes piano (also known as the Fender Rhodes piano) is an electric piano invented by Harold Rhodes, which became popular in the 1970s. Like a conventional piano, the Rhodes generates sound with keys and hammers, but instead of strings, th ...
, became important instruments in 1970s
funk
Funk is a music genre that originated in African American communities in the mid-1960s when musicians created a rhythmic, danceable new form of music through a mixture of various music genres that were popular among African Americans in the m ...
and
jazz fusion
Jazz fusion (also known as fusion and progressive jazz) is a music genre that developed in the late 1960s when musicians combined jazz harmony and jazz improvisation, improvisation with rock music, funk, and rhythm and blues. Electric guitars, ...
and in some
rock music
Rock music is a broad genre of popular music that originated as " rock and roll" in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles in the mid-1960s and later, particularly in the United States an ...
genres.
Electronic piano
An electronic piano is a keyboard instrument designed to simulate the timbre of a piano (and sometimes a harpsichord or an organ) using analog circuitry.
"Electronic Piano" was also the trade name used for Wurlitzer's popular line of electric ...
s are non-acoustic; they do not have strings, tines or hammers, but are a type of analog
synthesizer
A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and ...
that simulates or imitates piano sounds using
oscillators
Oscillation is the repetitive or periodic variation, typically in time, of some measure about a central value (often a point of equilibrium) or between two or more different states. Familiar examples of oscillation include a swinging pendulum ...
and filters that synthesize the sound of an acoustic piano. They must be connected to a
keyboard amplifier
A keyboard amplifier is a powered electronic amplifier and loudspeaker in a wooden speaker cabinet used for amplification of electronic keyboard instruments. Keyboard amplifiers are distinct from other types of amplification systems such as g ...
and speaker to produce sound (however, some electronic keyboards have a built-in amp and speaker). Alternatively, a person can play an electronic piano with
headphone
Headphones are a pair of small loudspeaker drivers worn on or around the head over a user's ears. They are electroacoustic transducers, which convert an electrical signal to a corresponding sound. Headphones let a single user listen to an au ...
s in quieter settings.
Digital piano
A digital piano is a type of electronic keyboard instrument designed to serve primarily as an alternative to the traditional acoustic piano, both in how it feels to play and in the sound it produces. Digital pianos use either synthesized emulat ...
s are also non-acoustic and do not have strings or hammers. They use
digital audio sampling technology to reproduce the acoustic sound of each piano note accurately. They also must be connected to a
power amplifier
An audio power amplifier (or power amp) is an electronic amplifier that amplifies low-power electronic audio signals, such as the signal from a radio receiver or an electric guitar pickup, to a level that is high enough for driving loudspea ...
and speaker to produce sound (however, most digital pianos have a built-in amp and speaker). Alternatively, a person can practise with
headphone
Headphones are a pair of small loudspeaker drivers worn on or around the head over a user's ears. They are electroacoustic transducers, which convert an electrical signal to a corresponding sound. Headphones let a single user listen to an au ...
s to avoid disturbing others. Digital pianos can include sustain pedals, weighted or semi-weighted keys, multiple voice options (e.g., sampled or synthesized imitations of
electric piano
An electric piano is a musical instrument which produces sounds when a performer presses the keys of a piano-style musical keyboard. Pressing keys causes mechanical hammers to strike metal strings, metal reeds or wire tines, leading to vibrations ...
,
Hammond organ
The Hammond organ is an electric organ invented by Laurens Hammond and John M. Hanert and first manufactured in 1935. Multiple models have been produced, most of which use sliding drawbars to vary sounds. Until 1975, Hammond organs generated s ...
,
violin
The violin, sometimes known as a ''fiddle'', is a wooden chordophone (string instrument) in the violin family. Most violins have a hollow wooden body. It is the smallest and thus highest-pitched instrument (soprano) in the family in regular ...
, etc.), and MIDI interfaces. MIDI inputs and outputs connect a digital piano to other electronic instruments or musical devices. For example, a digital piano's MIDI out signal could be connected by a
patch cord
A patch cable, patch cord or patch lead is an electrical or optical cable used to connect ("patch in") one electronic or optical device to another for signal routing. Devices of different types (e.g., a switch connected to a computer, or a sw ...
to a
synth module
A sound module is an electronic musical instrument without a human-playable interface such as a piano-style musical keyboard. Sound modules have to be operated using an externally connected device, which is often a MIDI controller, of which th ...
, which would allow the performer to use the keyboard of the digital piano to play modern
synthesizer
A synthesizer (also spelled synthesiser) is an electronic musical instrument that generates audio signals. Synthesizers typically create sounds by generating waveforms through methods including subtractive synthesis, additive synthesis and ...
sounds. Early digital pianos tended to lack a full set of
pedals
A pedal (from the Latin '' pes'' ''pedis'', "foot") is a lever designed to be operated by foot and may refer to:
Computers and other equipment
* Footmouse, a foot-operated computer mouse
* In medical transcription, a pedal is used to control p ...
but the synthesis software of later models such as the
Yamaha Clavinova
The Clavinova is a long-running line of digital pianos created by the Yamaha Corporation. The name is a portmanteau of the two words ''Clavier'' meaning 'keyboard instrument' and ''nova'' meaning 'new'.
It is similar in function to an acoustic ...
series
synthesised the
sympathetic vibration
Sympathetic resonance or sympathetic vibration is a harmonic phenomenon wherein a passive string or vibratory body responds to external vibrations to which it has a harmonic likeness. The classic example is demonstrated with two similarly-tuned ...
of the other strings (such as when the sustain pedal is depressed) and full pedal sets can now be replicated. The processing power of digital pianos has enabled highly realistic pianos using multi-gigabyte piano sample sets with as many as ninety recordings, each lasting many seconds, for each key under different conditions (e.g., there are samples of each note being struck softly, loudly, with a sharp attack, etc.). Additional samples emulate sympathetic resonance of the strings when the sustain pedal is depressed, key release, the drop of the dampers, and simulations of techniques such as re-pedalling.
Digital, MIDI-equipped pianos can output a stream of MIDI data, or record and play via a
CD ROM
A CD-ROM (, compact disc read-only memory) is a type of read-only memory consisting of a pre-pressed optical compact disc that contains data. Computers can read—but not write or erase—CD-ROMs. Some CDs, called enhanced CDs, hold both compute ...
or
USB flash drive
A USB flash drive (also called a thumb drive) is a data storage device that includes flash memory with an integrated USB interface. It is typically removable, rewritable and much smaller than an optical disc. Most weigh less than . Since firs ...
using MIDI format files, similar in concept to a pianola. The MIDI file records the physics of a note rather than its resulting sound and recreates the sounds from its physical properties (e.g., which note was struck and with what velocity). Computer based software, such as Modartt's 2006
Pianoteq
''Pianoteq'' is a software synthesizer that features real-time MIDI-control of digital physically modeled pianos and related instruments, including electric piano, harp, harpsichord, fortepiano, and various metallophones. It is usable as a s ...
, can be used to manipulate the MIDI stream in real time or subsequently to edit it. This type of software may use no samples but synthesize a sound based on aspects of the physics that went into the creation of a played note.
Hybrid instruments
![DisklavierPlayer](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/3a/DisklavierPlayer.jpg)
In the 2000s, some pianos include an acoustic grand piano or upright piano combined with MIDI electronic features. Such a piano can be played acoustically, or the keyboard can be used as a
MIDI controller
A MIDI controller is any hardware or software that generates and transmits Musical Instrument Digital Interface (MIDI) data to MIDI-enabled devices, typically to trigger sounds and control parameters of an electronic music performance. They mos ...
, which can trigger a
synthesizer module
A sound module is an electronic musical instrument without a human-playable interface such as a piano-style musical keyboard. Sound modules have to be operated using an externally connected device, which is often a MIDI controller, of which the ...
or
music sampler
In sound and music, sampling is the reuse of a portion (or sample) of a sound recording in another recording. Samples may comprise elements such as rhythm, melody, speech, sounds or entire bars of music, and may be layered, equalized, sped up or ...
. Some electronic feature-equipped pianos such as the Yamaha Disklavier electronic player piano, introduced in 1987, are outfitted with electronic sensors for recording and electromechanical solenoids for player piano-style playback. Sensors record the movements of the keys, hammers, and pedals during a performance, and the system saves the performance data as a Standard MIDI File (SMF). On playback, the solenoids move the keys and pedals and thus reproduce the original performance. Modern Disklaviers typically include an array of electronic features, such as a built-in tone generator for playing back MIDI accompaniment tracks, speakers, MIDI connectivity that supports communication with computing devices and external MIDI instruments, additional ports for audio and
SMPTE
The Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) (, rarely ), founded in 1916 as the Society of Motion Picture Engineers or SMPE, is a global professional association of engineers, technologists, and executives working in the m ...
input/output
In computing, input/output (I/O, or informally io or IO) is the communication between an information processing system, such as a computer, and the outside world, possibly a human or another information processing system. Inputs are the signals ...
(I/O), and Internet connectivity. Disklaviers have been manufactured in the form of upright, baby grand, and grand piano styles (including a nine-foot concert grand). Reproducing systems have ranged from relatively simple, playback-only models to professional models that can record performance data at resolutions that exceed the limits of normal MIDI data. The unit mounted under the keyboard of the piano can play MIDI or audio software on its CD.
Construction and components
![Fortepian - schemat](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/36/Fortepian_-_schemat.svg)
Pianos can have over 12,000 individual parts,
supporting six functional features: keyboard, hammers, dampers, bridge, soundboard, and strings. Many parts of a piano are made of materials selected for strength and longevity. This is especially true of the outer rim. It is most commonly made of
hardwood
Hardwood is wood from dicot trees. These are usually found in broad-leaved temperate and tropical forests. In temperate and boreal latitudes they are mostly deciduous, but in tropics and subtropics mostly evergreen. Hardwood (which comes from ...
, typically
hard maple
Hard may refer to:
* Hardness, resistance of physical materials to deformation or fracture
* Hard water, water with high mineral content
Arts and entertainment
* ''Hard'' (TV series), a French TV series
* Hard (band), a Hungarian hard rock super ...
or
beech
Beech (''Fagus'') is a genus of deciduous trees in the family Fagaceae, native to temperate Europe, Asia, and North America. Recent classifications recognize 10 to 13 species in two distinct subgenera, ''Engleriana'' and ''Fagus''. The ''Engle ...
, and its massiveness serves as an essentially immobile object from which the flexible soundboard can best vibrate. According to Harold A. Conklin, the purpose of a sturdy rim is so that, "... the vibrational energy will stay as much as possible in the soundboard instead of dissipating uselessly in the case parts, which are inefficient radiators of sound."
![Estonia klaver 3](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/82/Estonia_klaver_3.jpg)
Hardwood rims are commonly made by laminating thin, hence flexible, strips of hardwood, bending them to the desired shape immediately after the application of glue. The bent plywood system was developed by
C.F. Theodore Steinway in 1880 to reduce manufacturing time and costs. Previously, the rim was constructed from several pieces of solid wood, joined and veneered, and European makers used this method well into the 20th century. A modern exception,
Bösendorfer
Bösendorfer (L. Bösendorfer Klavierfabrik GmbH) is an Austrian piano manufacturer and, since 2008, a wholly owned subsidiary of Yamaha Corporation. Bösendorfer is unusual in that it produces 97- and 92-key models in addition to instrument ...
, the Austrian manufacturer of high-quality pianos, constructs their inner rims from solid spruce,
the same wood that the soundboard is made from, which is notched to allow it to bend; rather than isolating the rim from vibration, their "resonance case principle" allows the framework to resonate more freely with the soundboard, creating additional coloration and complexity of the overall sound.
![SoundboardBracesRibs](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/db/SoundboardBracesRibs.jpg)
The thick wooden posts on the underside (grands) or back (uprights) of the piano stabilize the rim structure, and are made of softwood for stability. The requirement of structural strength, fulfilled by stout hardwood and thick metal, makes a piano heavy. Even a small upright can weigh , and the
Steinway
Steinway & Sons, also known as Steinway (), is a German-American piano company, founded in 1853 in Manhattan by German piano builder Heinrich Engelhard Steinweg (later known as Henry E. Steinway). The company's growth led to the opening of a ...
concert grand (Model D) weighs . The largest piano available on the general market, the
Fazioli
Fazioli Pianoforti (), translated as Fazioli Pianos, produces grand and concert pianos from their factory in Sacile, Italy. The company was founded by engineer and pianist Paolo Fazioli in 1981. The craftsmen at Fazioli build 140 pianos a year. ...
F308, weighs .
["Fazioli, Paolo"](_blank)
''Grove Music Online'', 2009. Accessed 12 April 2009.["Model F308"](_blank)
, ''Official Fazioli Website''. Accessed 6 March 2015.
The pinblock, which holds the tuning pins in place, is another area where toughness is important. It is made of hardwood (typically hard maple or beech), and is laminated for strength, stability and longevity. Piano strings (also called
piano wire
Piano wire, or "music wire", is a specialized type of wire made for use in piano strings but also in other applications as springs. It is made from tempered high-carbon steel, also known as spring steel, which replaced iron as the material st ...
), which must endure years of extreme tension and hard blows, are made of high carbon steel. They are manufactured to vary as little as possible in diameter, since all deviations from uniformity introduce tonal distortion. The bass strings of a piano are made of a steel core wrapped with copper wire, to increase their mass whilst retaining flexibility. If all strings throughout the piano's compass were individual (monochord), the massive bass strings would overpower the upper ranges. Makers compensate for this with the use of double (bichord) strings in the tenor and triple (trichord) strings throughout the treble.
![Fluegel-Rahmen](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/9/92/Fluegel-Rahmen.jpg)
The plate (harp), or metal frame, of a piano is usually made of
cast iron
Cast iron is a class of iron–carbon alloys with a carbon content more than 2%. Its usefulness derives from its relatively low melting temperature. The alloy constituents affect its color when fractured: white cast iron has carbide impuriti ...
. A massive plate is advantageous. Since the strings vibrate from the plate at both ends, an insufficiently massive plate would absorb too much of the vibrational energy that should go through the bridge to the soundboard. While some manufacturers use cast steel in their plates, most prefer cast iron. Cast iron is easy to cast and machine, has flexibility sufficient for piano use, is much more resistant to deformation than steel, and is especially tolerant of compression. Plate casting is an art, since dimensions are crucial and the iron shrinks about one percent during cooling. Including an extremely large piece of metal in a piano is potentially an aesthetic handicap. Piano makers overcome this by polishing, painting, and decorating the plate. Plates often include the manufacturer's ornamental medallion. In an effort to make pianos lighter,
Alcoa
Alcoa Corporation (an acronym for Aluminum Company of America) is a Pittsburgh-based industrial corporation. It is the world's eighth-largest producer of aluminum. Alcoa conducts operations in 10 countries. Alcoa is a major producer of primary ...
worked with Winter and Company piano manufacturers to make pianos using an
aluminum plate during the 1940s. Aluminum piano plates were not widely accepted, and were discontinued.
The numerous parts of a piano action are generally made from
hardwood
Hardwood is wood from dicot trees. These are usually found in broad-leaved temperate and tropical forests. In temperate and boreal latitudes they are mostly deciduous, but in tropics and subtropics mostly evergreen. Hardwood (which comes from ...
, such as
maple
''Acer'' () is a genus of trees and shrubs commonly known as maples. The genus is placed in the family Sapindaceae.Stevens, P. F. (2001 onwards). Angiosperm Phylogeny Website. Version 9, June 2008 nd more or less continuously updated since http ...
,
beech
Beech (''Fagus'') is a genus of deciduous trees in the family Fagaceae, native to temperate Europe, Asia, and North America. Recent classifications recognize 10 to 13 species in two distinct subgenera, ''Engleriana'' and ''Fagus''. The ''Engle ...
, and
hornbeam
Hornbeams are hardwood trees in the flowering plant genus ''Carpinus'' in the birch family Betulaceae. The 30–40 species occur across much of the temperate regions of the Northern Hemisphere.
Origin of names
The common English name ''hornbeam' ...
; however, since World War II, makers have also incorporated plastics. Early plastics used in some pianos in the late 1940s and 1950s, proved disastrous when they lost strength after a few decades of use. Beginning in 1961, the
New York
New York most commonly refers to:
* New York City, the most populous city in the United States, located in the state of New York
* New York (state), a state in the northeastern United States
New York may also refer to:
Film and television
* '' ...
branch of the Steinway firm incorporated
Teflon
Polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE) is a synthetic fluoropolymer of tetrafluoroethylene that has numerous applications. It is one of the best-known and widely applied PFAS. The commonly known brand name of PTFE-based composition is Teflon by Chemou ...
, a synthetic material developed by
DuPont
DuPont de Nemours, Inc., commonly shortened to DuPont, is an American multinational chemical company first formed in 1802 by French-American chemist and industrialist Éleuthère Irénée du Pont de Nemours. The company played a major role in ...
, for some parts of its Permafree grand action in place of cloth bushings, but abandoned the experiment in 1982 due to excessive friction and a "clicking" that developed over time; Teflon is "humidity stable" whereas the wood adjacent to the Teflon swells and shrinks with humidity changes, causing problems. More recently, the
Kawai
is a musical instrument manufacturing company headquartered in Hamamatsu, Shizuoka, Japan. It is best known for its grand pianos, upright pianos, digital pianos, electronic keyboards and electronic synthesizers. The company was founded in Augus ...
firm built pianos with action parts made of more modern materials such as
carbon fiber reinforced plastic
Carbon fiber-reinforced polymers (American English), carbon-fibre-reinforced polymers (Commonwealth English), carbon-fiber-reinforced plastics, carbon-fiber reinforced-thermoplastic (CFRP, CRP, CFRTP), also known as carbon fiber, carbon compo ...
, and the piano parts manufacturer Wessell, Nickel and Gross has launched a new line of carefully engineered composite parts. Thus far these parts have performed reasonably, but it will take decades to know if they equal the longevity of wood.
![Steinway Grand Piano Iron Plates and Strings](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/25/Steinway_Grand_Piano_Iron_Plates_and_Strings.jpg)
In all but the lowest quality pianos the
soundboard is made of solid
spruce
A spruce is a tree of the genus ''Picea'' (), a genus of about 35 species of coniferous evergreen trees in the family Pinaceae, found in the northern temperate and boreal (taiga) regions of the Earth. ''Picea'' is the sole genus in the subfami ...
(that is, spruce boards glued together along the side grain). Spruce's high ratio of strength to weight minimizes
acoustic impedance
Acoustic impedance and specific acoustic impedance are measures of the opposition that a system presents to the acoustic flow resulting from an acoustic pressure applied to the system. The SI unit of acoustic impedance is the pascal-second per cub ...
while offering strength sufficient to withstand the downward force of the strings. The best piano makers use quarter-sawn, defect-free spruce of close annular grain, carefully seasoning it over a long period before fabricating the soundboards. This is the identical material that is used in quality acoustic guitar soundboards. Cheap pianos often have
plywood
Plywood is a material manufactured from thin layers or "plies" of wood veneer that are glued together with adjacent layers having their wood grain rotated up to 90 degrees to one another. It is an engineered wood from the family of manufactured ...
soundboards.
The design of the piano hammers requires having the hammer felt be soft enough so that it will not create loud, very high harmonics that a hard hammer will cause. The hammer must be lightweight enough to move swiftly when a key is pressed; yet at the same time, it must be strong enough so that it can hit strings hard when the player strikes the keys forcefully for fortissimo playing or
sforzando accents.
Keyboard
![Piano Frequencies](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/2/2e/Piano_Frequencies.svg)
In the early years of piano construction, keys were commonly made from sugar pine. In the 2010s, they are usually made of spruce or
basswood
''Tilia americana'' is a species of tree in the family Malvaceae, native to eastern North America, from southeast Manitoba east to New Brunswick, southwest to northeast Oklahoma, southeast to South Carolina, and west along the Niobrara River to ...
. Spruce is typically used in high-quality pianos. Black keys were traditionally made of
ebony
Ebony is a dense black/brown hardwood, coming from several species in the genus ''Diospyros'', which also contains the persimmons. Unlike most woods, ebony is dense enough to sink in water. It is finely textured and has a mirror finish when pol ...
, and the white keys were covered with strips of
ivory
Ivory is a hard, white material from the tusks (traditionally from elephants) and teeth of animals, that consists mainly of dentine, one of the physical structures of teeth and tusks. The chemical structure of the teeth and tusks of mammals is ...
. However, since ivory-yielding species are now endangered and protected by treaty, or are illegal in some countries, makers use plastics almost exclusively. Also, ivory tends to chip more easily than plastic. Legal ivory can still be obtained in limited quantities.
Yamaha Yamaha may refer to:
* Yamaha Corporation, a Japanese company with a wide range of products and services, established in 1887. The company is the largest shareholder of Yamaha Motor Company (below).
** Yamaha Music Foundation, an organization estab ...
developed a plastic called ''Ivorite'' intended to mimic the look and feel of ivory; other manufacturers have done likewise.
Almost every modern piano has 52 white keys and 36 black keys for a total of 88 keys (seven
octave
In music, an octave ( la, octavus: eighth) or perfect octave (sometimes called the diapason) is the interval between one musical pitch and another with double its frequency. The octave relationship is a natural phenomenon that has been refer ...
s plus a minor third, from A
0 to C
8). Many older pianos only have 85 keys (seven octaves from A
0 to A
7). Some piano manufacturers have extended the range further in one or both directions. For example, the
Imperial Bösendorfer
The Bösendorfer Model 290 Imperial, or Imperial Bösendorfer (also colloquially known as the 290) is the largest model and flagship piano manufactured by Bösendorfer, at around long, wide, and weighing . It has an eight-octave range from C0 to ...
has nine extra keys at the bass end, giving a total of 97 keys and an eight octave range. These extra keys are sometimes hidden under a small hinged lid that can cover the keys to prevent visual disorientation for pianists unfamiliar with the extra keys, or the colours of the extra white keys are reversed (black instead of white). More recently, Australian manufacturer
Stuart & Sons created a piano with 108 keys, going from C
0 to B
8, covering nine full octaves. The extra keys are the same as the other keys in appearance.
The extra keys are added primarily for increased resonance from the associated strings; that is, they vibrate sympathetically with other strings whenever the damper pedal is depressed and thus give a fuller tone. Only a very small number of works composed for piano actually use these notes.
Toy piano company Schoenhut Piano Company, Schoenhut manufactures grands and uprights with only 44 or 49 keys and a shorter distance between the keyboard and the pedals. These are true pianos with working mechanisms and strings.
![MIM Double Manual Piano CN5266](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/66/MIM_Double_Manual_Piano_CN5266.jpg)
A rare variant of the piano called the ''Emánuel Moór Pianoforte'' has double keyboards, one lying above the other. It was invented by Hungarian composer and pianist, Emánuel Moór (19 February 1863 – 20 October 1931). The lower keyboard has the usual 88 keys, whilst the upper keyboard has 76 keys. When the upper keyboard is played, an internal mechanism pulls down the corresponding key on the lower keyboard, but an octave higher. This lets a pianist reach two octaves with one hand, impossible on a conventional piano. Due to its double keyboard, musical works that were originally created for double-manual harpsichord, such as the ''Goldberg Variations'' by Johann Sebastian Bach, Bach, become much easier to play, since playing on a conventional single keyboard piano involves complex and hand-tangling cross-hand movements. The design also features a special fourth pedal that couples the lower and upper keyboard, so when playing on the lower keyboard the note one octave higher also plays. Only about 60 Emánuel Moór Pianofortes were made, mostly by
Bösendorfer
Bösendorfer (L. Bösendorfer Klavierfabrik GmbH) is an Austrian piano manufacturer and, since 2008, a wholly owned subsidiary of Yamaha Corporation. Bösendorfer is unusual in that it produces 97- and 92-key models in addition to instrument ...
. Other piano manufacturers, such as C. Bechstein Pianofortefabrik, Bechstein, Chickering, and Steinway & Sons, also manufactured a few.
Pianos have been built with alternative keyboard systems, e.g., the Jankó keyboard.
Pedals
![Steinway grand piano - pedals](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/da/Steinway_grand_piano_-_pedals.jpg)
Pianos have had pedals, or some close equivalent, since the earliest days. (In the 18th century, some pianos used levers pressed upward by the player's knee instead of pedals.) Most grand pianos in the US have three pedals: the soft pedal (una corda), sostenuto, and
sustain pedal
A sustain pedal or sustaining pedal (also called damper pedal, loud pedal, or open pedal) is the most commonly used pedal in a modern piano. It is typically the rightmost of two or three pedals. When pressed, the sustain pedal "sustains" all ...
(from left to right, respectively), while in Europe, the standard is two pedals: the soft pedal and the sustain pedal. Most modern upright pianos also have three pedals: soft pedal, practice pedal and sustain pedal, though older or cheaper models may lack the practice pedal. In Europe the standard for upright pianos is two pedals: the soft and the sustain pedals.
The sustain pedal (or, damper pedal) is often simply called "the pedal", since it is the most frequently used. It is placed as the rightmost pedal in the group. It lifts the dampers from all keys, sustaining all played notes. In addition, it alters the overall tone by allowing all strings, including those not directly played, to reverberate. When all of the other strings on the piano can vibrate, this allows sympathetic vibration of strings that are harmonically related to the sounded pitches. For example, if the pianist plays the 440 Hz "A" note, the higher octave "A" notes will also sound sympathetically.
The soft pedal or ''una corda'' pedal is placed leftmost in the row of pedals. In grand pianos it shifts the entire action/keyboard assembly to the right (a very few instruments have shifted left) so that the hammers hit two of the three strings for each note. In the earliest pianos whose unisons were bichords rather than trichords, the action shifted so that hammers hit a single string, hence the name ''una corda'', or 'one string'. The effect is to soften the note as well as change the tone. In uprights this action is not possible; instead the pedal moves the hammers closer to the strings, allowing the hammers to strike with less kinetic energy. This produces a slightly softer sound, but no change in timbre.
On grand pianos, the middle pedal is a sostenuto pedal. This pedal keeps raised any damper already raised at the moment the pedal is depressed. This makes it possible to sustain selected notes (by depressing the sostenuto pedal before those notes are released) while the player's hands are free to play additional notes (which don't sustain). This can be useful for musical passages with low bass pedal points, in which a bass note is sustained while a series of chords changes over top of it, and other otherwise tricky parts. On many upright pianos, the middle pedal is called the "practice" or ''celeste'' pedal. This drops a piece of felt between the hammers and strings, greatly muting the sounds. This pedal can be shifted while depressed, into a "locking" position.
There are also non-standard variants. On some pianos (grands and verticals), the middle pedal can be a bass sustain pedal: that is, when it is depressed, the dampers lift off the strings only in the bass section. Players use this pedal to sustain a single bass note or chord over many measures, while playing the melody in the treble section.
![Pedal piano 1](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b8/Pedal_piano_1.JPG)
The rare
transposing piano
A transposing piano is a special piano with a mechanism (operated by a pedal or lever) that changes the keyboard position relative to the ''action'' (see '' Development of the modern piano''
for details). This ''transposes'' (changes the key of) a ...
(an example of which was owned by Irving Berlin) has a middle pedal that functions as a clutch that disengages the keyboard from the mechanism, so the player can move the keyboard to the left or right with a lever. This shifts the entire piano action so the pianist can play music written in one key so that it sounds in a different key.
Some piano companies have included extra pedals other than the standard two or three. On the Stuart & Sons, Stuart and Sons pianos as well as the largest
Fazioli
Fazioli Pianoforti (), translated as Fazioli Pianos, produces grand and concert pianos from their factory in Sacile, Italy. The company was founded by engineer and pianist Paolo Fazioli in 1981. The craftsmen at Fazioli build 140 pianos a year. ...
piano, there is a fourth pedal to the left of the principal three. This fourth pedal works in the same way as the soft pedal of an upright piano, moving the hammers closer to the strings.
The Crown and Schubert Piano Company also produced a four-pedal piano.
Wing and Son of New York offered a five-pedal piano from approximately 1893 through the 1920s. There is no mention of the company past the 1930s. Labeled left to right, the pedals are Mandolin, Orchestra, Expression, Soft, and Forte (Sustain). The Orchestral pedal produced a sound similar to a tremolo feel by bouncing a set of small beads dangling against the strings, enabling the piano to mimic a mandolin, guitar, banjo, zither and harp, thus the name Orchestral. The Mandolin pedal used a similar approach, lowering a set of felt strips with metal rings in between the hammers and the strings (aka rinky-tink effect). This extended the life of the hammers when the Orch pedal was used, a good idea for practicing, and created an echo-like sound that mimicked playing in an orchestral hall.
The ''pedalier'' piano, or
pedal piano
The pedal piano (or piano-pédalier or pédalier,) is a kind of piano that includes a pedalboard, enabling bass register notes to be played with the feet, as is standard on the organ.
There are two broad types of pedal pianos: either the pedal ...
, is a rare type of piano that includes a Pedal keyboard, pedalboard so players can use their feet to play bass register notes, as on an pipe organ, organ. There are two types of pedal piano. On one, the pedal board is an integral part of the instrument, using the same strings and mechanism as the manual keyboard. The other, rarer type, consists of two independent pianos (each with separate mechanics and strings) placed one above the other—one for the hands and one for the feet. This was developed primarily as a practice instrument for organists, though there is a small repertoire written specifically for the instrument.
Mechanics
When the key is struck, a chain reaction occurs to produce the sound. First, the key raises the "wippen" mechanism, which forces the jack against the hammer roller (or ''knuckle''). The hammer roller then lifts the lever carrying the hammer. The key also raises the damper; and immediately after the hammer strikes the wire it falls back, allowing the wire to resonate and thus produce sound. When the key is released the damper falls back onto the strings, stopping the wire from vibrating, and thus stopping the sound. The vibrating piano strings themselves are not very loud, but their vibrations are transmitted to a large soundboard that moves air and thus converts the energy to sound. The irregular shape and off-center placement of the bridge ensure that the soundboard vibrates strongly at all frequencies.
The raised damper allows the note to sound until the key (or sustain pedal) is released.
There are three factors that influence the pitch of a vibrating wire.
* Length: All other factors the same, the shorter the wire, the higher the pitch.
* Mass per unit length: All other factors the same, the thinner the wire, the higher the pitch.
* Tension: All other factors the same, the tighter the wire, the higher the pitch.
A vibrating wire subdivides itself into many parts vibrating at the same time. Each part produces a pitch of its own, called a partial. A vibrating string has one fundamental and a series of partials. The purest combination of two pitches is when one is double the frequency of the other.
For a repeating wave, the velocity equals the wavelength times the frequency ,
:
On the piano string, waves reflect from both ends. The superposition principle, superposition of reflecting waves results in a standing wave pattern, but only for wavelengths , where is the length of the string. Therefore, the only frequencies produced on a single string are . Timbre is largely determined by the content of these harmonics. Different instruments have different harmonic content for the same pitch. A real string vibrates at harmonics that are not perfect multiples of the fundamental. This results in a little
inharmonicity
In music, inharmonicity is the degree to which the frequencies of overtones (also known as partials or partial tones) depart from whole multiples of the fundamental frequency ( harmonic series).
Acoustically, a note perceived to have a singl ...
, which gives richness to the tone but causes significant tuning challenges throughout the compass of the instrument.
Striking the piano key with greater velocity increases the amplitude of the waves and therefore the volume. From ''pianissimo'' () to ''fortissimo'' () the hammer velocity changes by almost a factor of a hundred. The hammer contact time with the string shortens from 4 milliseconds at to less than 2 ms at .
If two wires adjusted to the same pitch are struck at the same time, the sound produced by one reinforces the other, and a louder combined sound of shorter duration is produced. If one wire vibrates out of synchronization with the other, they subtract from each other and produce a softer tone of longer duration.
Maintenance
Pianos are heavy and powerful, yet delicate instruments. Over the years, professional piano movers have developed special techniques for transporting both grands and uprights, which prevent damage to the case and to the piano's mechanical elements. Pianos need regular tuning to keep them on correct pitch. The hammers of pianos are voiced to compensate for gradual hardening of the felt, and other parts also need periodic regulation. Pianos need regular maintenance to ensure the felt hammers and key mechanisms are functioning properly. Aged and worn pianos can be rebuilt or reconditioned by piano rebuilders. Strings eventually must be replaced. Often, by replacing a great number of their parts, and adjusting them, old instruments can perform as well as new pianos.
Piano tuning involves adjusting the tensions of the piano's strings with a specialized wrench, thereby aligning the intervals among their tones so that the instrument is Musical tuning, in tune. While guitar and violin players tune their own instruments, pianists usually hire a Piano tuning, piano tuner, a specialized technician, to tune their pianos. The piano tuner uses special tools. The meaning of the term ''in tune'' in the context of piano tuning is not simply a particular fixed set of Pitch (music), pitches. Fine piano tuning carefully assesses the interaction among all notes of the chromatic scale, different for every piano, and thus requires slightly different pitches from any theoretical standard. Pianos are usually tuned to a modified version of the system called equal temperament (see Piano key frequencies for the theoretical piano tuning). In all systems of tuning, each pitch is derived from its relationship to a chosen fixed pitch, usually the internationally recognized standard concert pitch of A
4 (the A above middle C). The term A440 (pitch standard), A440 refers to a widely accepted frequency of this pitch – 440 Hz.
![Piano tuner](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/d/d7/Piano_tuner.jpg)
The relationship between two pitches, called an Interval (music), interval, is the ratio of their absolute Frequency, frequencies. Two different intervals are perceived as the same when the pairs of pitches involved share the same frequency ratio. The easiest intervals to identify, and the easiest intervals to tune, are those that are Just intonation, just, meaning they have a simple whole-number ratio. The term ''Musical temperament, temperament'' refers to a tuning system that tempers the Just intonation, just intervals (usually the
perfect fifth
In music theory, a perfect fifth is the Interval (music), musical interval corresponding to a pair of pitch (music), pitches with a frequency ratio of 3:2, or very nearly so.
In classical music from Western culture, a fifth is the interval fro ...
, which has the ratio 3:2) to satisfy another mathematical property; in equal temperament, a fifth is tempered by narrowing it slightly, achieved by flattening its upper pitch slightly, or raising its lower pitch slightly. A temperament system is also known as a set of "bearings". Tempering an interval causes it to Beat (acoustics), beat, which is a fluctuation in perceived sound intensity due to interference between close (but unequal) pitches. The rate of beating is equal to the frequency differences of any harmonics that are present for both pitches and that coincide or nearly coincide. Piano tuners have to use their ear to "Stretched tuning, stretch" the tuning of a piano to make it sound in tune. This involves tuning the highest-pitched strings slightly higher and the lowest-pitched strings slightly lower than what a mathematical frequency table (in which octaves are derived by doubling the frequency) would suggest.
Playing and technique
![Piano player](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/05/Piano_player.jpg)
As with any other musical instrument, the piano may be played from Musical notation, written music, Play by ear (music), by ear, or through Musical improvisation, improvisation. While some folk and blues pianists were Autodidact, self-taught, in Classical and jazz, there are well-established piano teaching systems and institutions, including pre-college graded examinations, university, college and music conservatory diplomas and degrees, ranging from the B.Mus. and M.Mus. to the Doctor of Musical Arts in piano. Piano technique evolved during the transition from harpsichord and clavichord to fortepiano playing, and continued through the development of the modern piano. Changes in musical styles and audience preferences over the 19th and 20th century, as well as the emergence of virtuoso performers, contributed to this evolution and to the growth of distinct approaches or schools of piano playing. Although technique is often viewed as only the physical execution of a musical idea, many pedagogues and performers stress the interrelatedness of the physical and mental or emotional aspects of piano playing.
Well-known approaches to piano technique include those by Dorothy Taubman, Edna Golandsky, Fred Karpoff, Charles-Louis Hanon and Otto Ortmann.
Performance styles
Many classical music composers, including Joseph Haydn, Haydn, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Mozart, and Ludwig van Beethoven, Beethoven, composed for the fortepiano, a rather different instrument than the modern piano. Even composers of the Romantic movement, like
Franz Liszt
Franz Liszt, in modern usage ''Liszt Ferenc'' . Liszt's Hungarian passport spelled his given name as "Ferencz". An orthographic reform of the Hungarian language in 1922 (which was 36 years after Liszt's death) changed the letter "cz" to simpl ...
,
Frédéric Chopin
Frédéric François Chopin (born Fryderyk Franciszek Chopin; 1 March 181017 October 1849) was a Polish composer and virtuoso pianist of the Romantic period, who wrote primarily for solo piano. He has maintained worldwide renown as a leadin ...
, Clara Schumann, Clara and Robert Schumann, Fanny Mendelssohn, Fanny and Felix Mendelssohn, and Johannes Brahms, wrote for pianos substantially different from 2010-era modern pianos. Contemporary musicians may Piano history and musical performance, adjust their interpretation of historical compositions from the 1600s to the 1800s to account for sound quality differences between old and new instruments or to changing performance practice.
![Ravel Gershwin Leide-Tedesco002](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/a/a6/Ravel_Gershwin_Leide-Tedesco002.jpg)
Starting in Beethoven's later career, the fortepiano evolved into an instrument more like the modern piano of the 2000s. Modern pianos were in wide use by the late 19th century. They featured an octave range larger than the earlier fortepiano instrument, adding around 30 more keys to the instrument, which extended the deep bass range and the high treble range. Factory mass production of upright pianos made them more affordable for a larger number of middle-class people. They appeared in music halls and pubs during the 19th century, providing entertainment through a piano soloist, or in combination with a small dance band. Just as harpsichordists had accompanied singers or dancers performing on stage, or playing for dances, pianists took up this role in the late 1700s and in the following centuries.
During the 19th century, American musicians playing for working-class audiences in small pubs and bars, particularly :African-American composers, African-American composers, developed new musical genres based on the modern piano. Ragtime music, popularized by composers such as Scott Joplin, reached a broader audience by 1900. The popularity of ragtime music was quickly succeeded by Jazz piano. New techniques and rhythms were invented for the piano, including ostinato for boogie-woogie, and Shearing voicing. George Gershwin's ''Rhapsody in Blue'' broke new musical ground by combining American jazz piano with symphonic sounds. Comping (jazz), Comping, a technique for accompanying jazz vocalists on piano, was exemplified by Duke Ellington's technique. Honky-tonk music, featuring yet another style of piano rhythm, became popular during the same era. Bebop techniques grew out of jazz, with leading composer-pianists such as Thelonious Monk and Bud Powell. In the late 20th century, Bill Evans composed pieces combining classical techniques with his jazz experimentation. In the 1970s, Herbie Hancock was one of the first jazz composer-pianists to find mainstream popularity working with newer urban music techniques such as jazz-funk and jazz-rock.
Pianos have also been used prominently in rock and roll and
rock music
Rock music is a broad genre of popular music that originated as " rock and roll" in the United States in the late 1940s and early 1950s, developing into a range of different styles in the mid-1960s and later, particularly in the United States an ...
by performers such as Jerry Lee Lewis, Little Richard, Keith Emerson (Emerson, Lake & Palmer), Elton John, Ben Folds, Billy Joel, Nicky Hopkins, and Tori Amos, to name a few. Modernism, Modernist styles of music have also appealed to composers writing for the modern grand piano, including John Cage and Philip Glass.
Role
![Moritz von Schwind Schubertiade](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/b/b6/Moritz_von_Schwind_Schubertiade.jpg)
The piano is a crucial instrument in Western European classical music, classical music,
jazz
Jazz is a music genre that originated in the African-American communities of New Orleans, Louisiana in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, with its roots in blues and ragtime. Since the 1920s Jazz Age, it has been recognized as a major ...
, blues, rock music, rock, folk music, and many other Western musical genres. Pianos are used in soloing or melodic roles and as accompaniment instruments. As well, pianos can be played alone, with a voice or other instrument, in small groups (bands and chamber music ensembles) and large ensembles (big band or orchestra). A large number of composers and songwriters are proficient pianists because the piano keyboard offers an effective means of experimenting with complex melodic and harmonic interplay of chords and trying out polyphony, multiple, independent melody lines that are played at the same time. Pianos are used by composers doing Film music, film and television scoring, as the large range permits composers to try out melodies and bass lines, even if the music will be orchestrated for other instruments.
Bandleaders and choir conductors often learn the piano, as it is an excellent instrument for learning new pieces and songs to lead in performance. Many conducting, conductors are trained in piano, because it allows them to play parts of the symphonies they are conducting (using a piano reduction or doing a reduction from the full score), so that they can develop their interpretation. The piano is an essential tool in music education in elementary and secondary schools, and universities and colleges. Most music classrooms and many practice rooms have a piano. Pianos are used to help teach music theory, music history and music appreciation classes, and even non-pianist music professors or instructors may have a piano in their office.
See also
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* List of classical pianists
* List of films about pianists
* List of piano manufacturers
* List of piano brand names
* List of piano makers
* List of piano composers
Notes
References
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* Gives the basics of how pianos work, and a thorough evaluative survey of current pianos and their manufacturers. It also includes advice on buying and owning pianos.
* is a standard reference on the history of the piano.
* is an authoritative work covering the ancestry of the piano, its invention by Cristofori, and the early stages of its subsequent evolution.
* contains a wealth of information. Main article: Edwin M. Ripin, Stewart Pollens, Philip R. Belt, Maribel Meisel, Alfons Huber, Michael Cole, Gert Hecher, Beryl Kenyon de Pascual, Cynthia Adams Hoover, Cyril Ehrlich, Edwin M. Good, Robert Winter, and J. Bradford Robinson. "Pianoforte".
Further reading
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External links
History of the Piano Forte Association of Blind Piano Tuners, UK
* [http://www.frederickcollection.org/collection.html The Frederick Historical Piano Collection]
The Pianofortes of Bartolomeo Cristofori, Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, The Metropolitan Museum of Art*
The Piano in Polish Collections' (historical instruments)
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