 A short grand piano, with the top up. Most pianos are about 150 cm wide. Short grand pianos such as the "baby grand" pictured are about as long as they are wide, but a Concert Grand can measure up to 3.08 m (10 ft 1 in) [1] perpendicular to its keyboard. Piano is the general name given to a musical instrument classified as a keyboard, percussion, or string instrument, depending on the system of classification used. The piano produces sound by striking steel strings with felt hammers that immediately rebound allowing the string to continue vibrating at its resonant frequency. These vibrations are transmitted through the bridges to the soundboard, which amplifies them. Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (600x693, 66 KB)Clavecin électrique The clavecin électrique was invented in 1759 by Jean-Baptiste de La Borde, a Jesuit priest. ...
Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (600x693, 66 KB)Clavecin électrique The clavecin électrique was invented in 1759 by Jean-Baptiste de La Borde, a Jesuit priest. ...
Fortepiano designates the early version of the piano, as it existed from its invention by Cristofori around 1700 up to the early 19th century. ...
The word piano has several meanings: A piano is a musical instrument. ...
A musical instrument is a device constructed or modified with the purpose of making music. ...
Piano, a well-known instance of keyboard instruments A keyboard instrument is any musical instrument played using a musical keyboard. ...
A percussion instrument can be any object which produces a sound by being struck with an implement, shaken, rubbed, scraped, or by any other action which sets the object into vibration. ...
A string instrument (or stringed instrument) is a musical instrument that produces sound by means of vibrating strings. ...
At various times, and in various different cultures, various schemes of musical instrument classification have been used. ...
A selection of 4 different felt cloths. ...
A Violin Bridge blank and finished bridge A bridge is a device for supporting the strings on a stringed instrument and transmitting the vibration of those strings to some other structural component of the instrument in order to transfer the sound to the surrounding air balls. ...
The sounding board is the largest part of a string musical instruments body. ...
The piano is widely used in western music for solo performance, chamber music, and accompaniment. It is also very popular as an aid to composing and rehearsal. Although not portable and often expensive, the piano's versatility and ubiquity has made it among the most familiar of musical instruments. Western music is the genres of music originating in the Western world (Europe and its former colonies) including Western classical music, American Jazz, Country and Western, pop music and rock and roll. ...
Chamber music is a form of classical music, written for a small group of instruments which traditionally could be accommodated in a palace chamber. ...
In music accompaniment is the art of playing along with a soloist or ensemble, often known as the lead, in a supporting manner as well as the music thus played. ...
Musical composition is: a piece of music the structure of a musical piece the process of creating a new piece of music // A piece of music exists in the form of a written composition in musical notation or as a single acoustic event (a live performance or recorded track). ...
82. ...
The word piano is a shortened form of the word pianoforte, which is seldom used except in formal language and derived from the original Italian name for the instrument, gravicèmbalo col piano e forte (literally harpsichord with soft and loud). This refers to the ability of the piano to produce notes at different volumes depending on the amount of force used to press the keys. Harpsichord in the Flemish style A harpsichord is any of a family of European keyboard instruments, including the large instrument currently called a harpsichord, but also the smaller virginals, the muselar virginals and the spinet. ...
Early history
- See also: Fortepiano
Although there were various crude earlier attempts to make stringed keyboard instruments with struck strings,[2] it is widely considered that the piano was invented by a single individual: Bartolomeo Cristofori of Padua, Italy. It is not known exactly when Cristofori first built a piano, but an inventory made by his employers, the Medici family, indicates the existence of a piano by the year 1700. The three Cristofori pianos that survive today date from the 1720s. Fortepiano designates the early version of the piano, as it existed from its invention by Cristofori around 1700 up to the early 19th century. ...
Bartolomeo Cristofori di Francesco (May 4, 1655 - January 27, 1731) was an Italian maker of musical instruments, generally regarded as the inventor of the piano. ...
Tronco Maestro Riviera: a pedestrian walk along a section of the inland waterway or naviglio interno of Padua. ...
The Medici coat of arms The Medici family was a powerful and influential Florentine family from the 13th to 17th century. ...
Like many other inventions, the piano was founded on earlier technological innovations. The mechanisms of keyboard instruments such as the clavichord and the harpsichord were well known. In a clavichord the strings are struck by tangents, while in a harpsichord they are plucked by quills. Centuries of work on the mechanism of the harpsichord in particular had shown the most effective ways to construct the case, soundboard, bridge, and keyboard. Cristofori, himself an expert harpsichord maker, was well acquainted with this body of knowledge. Large five-octave unfretted clavichord by Paul Maurici, after J.A. Haas The clavichord is a European stringed keyboard instrument known from the late Medieval, through the Renaissance, Baroque and Classical eras. ...
Harpsichord in the Flemish style A harpsichord is any of a family of European keyboard instruments, including the large instrument currently called a harpsichord, but also the smaller virginals, the muselar virginals and the spinet. ...
A tangent, when referred to in the context of the action of a clavichord, refers to the small piece of metal similar in shape and size to the head of a regular (not philips) screwdriver. ...
Cristofori's great success was in solving, without any prior example, the fundamental mechanical problem of piano design: the hammers must strike the string, but not remain in contact with the string (as a tangent remains in contact with a clavichord string) because this would damp the sound. Moreover, the hammers must return to their rest position without bouncing violently, and it must be possible to repeat a note rapidly. Cristofori's piano action served as a model for the many different approaches to piano actions that followed. While Cristofori's early instruments were made with thin strings and were much quieter than the modern piano, compared to the clavichord (the only previous keyboard instrument capable of minutely controlled dynamic nuance through the keyboard) they were considerably louder and had more sustaining power. Image File history File links Cristofori_piano. ...
Image File history File links Cristofori_piano. ...
Damping is any effect, either deliberately engendered or inherent to a system, that tends to reduce the amplitude of oscillations of an oscillatory system. ...
Action of a circa 1907 upright piano The action of a piano is the mechanical assembly which translates the depression of the piano keys into a felt hammer striking the strings. ...
Cristofori's new instrument remained relatively unknown until an Italian writer, Scipione Maffei, wrote an enthusiastic article about it (1711), including a diagram of the mechanism. This article was widely distributed, and most of the next generation of piano builders started their work because of reading it. One of these builders was Gottfried Silbermann, better known as an organ builder. Silbermann's pianos were virtually direct copies of Cristofori's, with one important addition: Silbermann invented the forerunner of the modern damper pedal, which lifts all the dampers from the strings at once. Scipione Maffei (b. ...
Gottfried Silbermann (January 14, 1683-August 4, 1753) was an influential German constructor of keyboard instruments. ...
This article or section should be merged with Pipe organ The Casavant pipe organ at Notre-Dame de Montréal Basilica, Montreal The organ is a type of keyboard musical instrument, distinctive because the sound is not produced by a percussion action, as on a piano or celesta, or by...
A sustain or sustaining pedal (also damper pedal or loud pedal) is the most commonly-used pedal in a modern piano. ...
Silbermann showed Bach one of his early instruments in the 1730s, but Bach did not like it at that time, claiming 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. Places in which Bach resided throughout his life Johann Sebastian Bach (pronounced ) (21 March 1685 O.S. – 28 July 1750 N.S.) was a prolific German composer and organist whose sacred and secular works for choir, orchestra and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought...
Events and Trends The Great Awakening - A Protestant religious movement active in the British colonies of North America Sextant invented (probably around 1730) independently by John Hadley in Great Britain and Thomas Godfrey in the American colonies World leaders Louis XV King of France (king from 1715 to 1774) George...
Piano-making flourished during the late 18th century in the Viennese school, which included Johann Andreas Stein (who worked in Augsburg, Germany) and the Viennese makers Nannette Stein (daughter of Johann Andreas) and Anton Walter. Viennese-style pianos were built with wooden frames, two strings per note, and had leather-covered hammers. It was for such instruments that Mozart composed his concertos and sonatas, and replicas of them are built today for use in authentic-instrument performance of his music. The pianos of Mozart's day had a softer, clearer tone than today's pianos, with less sustaining power. The term fortepiano is nowadays often used to distinguish the 18th-century instrument from later pianos. (17th century - 18th century - 19th century - more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 18th century refers to the century that lasted from 1701 through 1800. ...
Johann Andreas Stein, (1728-1792), German maker of keyboard instruments and a friend of Mozart. ...
Augsburg is a city in south-central Germany. ...
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (IPA: , baptized Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart) (January 27, 1756 – December 5, 1791) was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. ...
A piano concerto is a concerto for solo piano and orchestra. ...
A piano sonata is a sonata written for unaccompanied piano. ...
The authentic performance movement is an effort on the part of musicians and scholars to perform works of classical music in ways similar to how they were performed when they were originally written. ...
Development of the modern piano
 Interior of an upright piano, showing the felt-covered hammers. The tuning pins can be seen at upper left. In the treble range shown, each note has three strings. In the period lasting from about 1790 to 1860, the Mozart-era piano underwent tremendous changes, which led to the modern form of the instrument. This revolution was in response to a consistent preference by composers and pianists for a more powerful, sustained piano sound. It was also a response to the ongoing Industrial Revolution, which made available technological resources like high-quality steel for strings (see piano wire) and precision casting for the production of iron frames. Image File history File links Piano_hammers. ...
Image File history File links Piano_hammers. ...
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (IPA: , baptized Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart) (January 27, 1756 – December 5, 1791) was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. ...
A Watt steam engine. ...
Piano wire is a specialized type of wire made for use in piano and other musical instrument strings, as well as many other purposes. ...
Over time, piano playing became a more strenuous and muscle-taxing activity, as the force needed to depress the keys, as well as the length of key travel, was increased. The tonal range of the piano was also increased, from the five octaves of Mozart's day to the 7⅓ (or even more) octaves found on modern pianos. For the numerical computation software, see GNU Octave. ...
In the first part of this era, technological progress owed much to the English firm of Broadwood, which already had a strong reputation for the splendour and powerful tone of its harpsichords. Over time, the Broadwood instruments grew progressively larger, louder, and more robustly constructed. The Broadwood firm, which sent pianos to both Haydn and Beethoven, was the first to build pianos with a range of more than five octaves: five octaves and a fifth during the 1790s, six octaves by 1810 (in time for Beethoven to use the extra notes in his later works), and seven octaves by 1820. The Viennese makers followed these trends. The two schools, however, used different piano actions: the Broadwood one more robust, the Viennese more sensitive. Broadwood and Sons is the oldest and one of the most prestigious piano companies in the world, named after its founder John Broadwood. ...
This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
1820 portrait by Joseph Karl Stieler Beethoven redirects here. ...
By the 1820s, the center of innovation had shifted to Paris, where the Érard firm manufactured pianos used by Chopin and Liszt. In 1821, Sébastien Érard invented the double escapement action, which permitted a note to be repeated even if the key had not yet risen to its maximum vertical position, a great benefit for rapid playing. When the invention became public, and as revised by Henri Herz, the double escapement action gradually became the standard action for grand pianos, and is used in all grand pianos currently produced. City flag City coat of arms Motto: Fluctuat nec mergitur (Latin: Tossed by the waves, she does not sink) Paris Eiffel tower as seen from the esplanade du Trocadéro. ...
The only known photograph of Frédéric Chopin (commonly mistaken for a daguerreotype), believed to have been taken by Louis-Auguste Bisson in 1849 “Chopin†redirects here. ...
Franz Liszt (Hungarian: Liszt Ferenc) (October 22, 1811 – July 31, 1886) was a Hungarian virtuoso pianist and composer of the Romantic period. ...
Sébastien Érard (born Sébastien Erhard, 5 April 1752 - 5th 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 modern piano. ...
Henri Herz (January 6, 1803–January 5, 1888) was an Austrian pianist and composer. ...
Some other important technical innovations of this era include the following:
- Use of three strings rather than two for all but the lower notes
- The iron frame, also called the "plate", sits atop the soundboard, and serves as the primary bulwark against the force of string tension. The iron frame was the ultimate solution to the problem of structural integrity as the strings were gradually made thicker, tenser, and more numerous (in a modern grand the total string tension can approach 20 tons). The single piece cast iron frame was patented in 1825 in Boston by Alpheus Babcock, 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 which patented the first full iron frame for grand pianos (1843). Composite forged metal frames were preferred by many European makers until the American system was fully adopted by the early 20th century.
- Felt hammer coverings, first introduced by Henri Pape in 1826, gradually replaced skillfully layered leather hammers, the more consistent material permitted wider dynamic ranges as hammer weights and string tensions increased.
- The sostenuto pedal (see below), invented in 1844 by Jean Louis Boisselot and improved by the Steinway firm in 1874.
- The over strung scale, also called "cross-stringing"; the strings are placed in a vertically overlapping slanted arrangement, with two heights of bridges on the soundboard, rather than just one. This permits larger, but not necessarily longer, strings to fit within the case of the piano. Over stringing was invented by Jean-Henri Pape during the 1820s, and first patented for use in grand pianos in the United States by Henry Steinway Jr. in 1859.
 Duplex scaling: Treble strings of a 182 cm. grand piano. From lower left to upper right: dampers, main sounding length of strings, treble bridge, duplex string length, duplex bridge (long bar perpendicular to strings), hitchpins. - Duplexes or aliquot scales; In 1872 Theodore Steinway patented a system to control different components of string vibrations by tuning their secondary parts in octave relationships with the sounding lengths. Similar systems developed by Blüthner (1872), as well as Taskin (1788), and Collard (1821) used more distinctly ringing undamped vibrations to modify tone. .
Today's upright, grand, and concert grand pianos attained their present forms by the end of the 19th century. Improvements have been made in manufacturing processes, and many individual details of the instrument continue to receive attention (see Innovations in the Piano). Nickname: City on the Hill, Beantown, Athens of America, The Hub (of the Universe)1 Location in Massachusetts, USA Counties Suffolk County - Mayor Thomas M. Menino (D) Area - City 89. ...
Alpheus Babcock (1785-1842) was a piano and music instrument maker in Boston, Massachusetts and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during the early 1800s. ...
Chickering and Sons was an American piano manufacturer located in Boston, known for producing award-winning instruments of superb quality and design. ...
Steinway & Sons is a piano manufacturing firm, currently based in New York and Hamburg, Germany. ...
Henri Pape(1787-1875) was distinguished piano maker in the early 1800s. ...
Steinway & Sons is a piano manufacturing firm, currently based in New York and Hamburg, Germany. ...
1859 (MDCCCLIX) is a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar). ...
Download high resolution version (1600x1200, 429 KB)Digital photograph taken by User:Opus33. ...
Download high resolution version (1600x1200, 429 KB)Digital photograph taken by User:Opus33. ...
Aliquot stringing is the use of extra unstruck strings in the piano for the purpose of enriching the tone. ...
To meet Wikipedias quality standards, this article or section may require cleanup. ...
This article covers a number of innovations from recent times in the building of pianos. ...
Some early pianos had shapes and designs that are no longer in use.
The square piano had horizontal strings arranged diagonally across the rectangular case above the hammers and with the keyboard set in the long side, it is variously attributed to Silbermann and Frederici and was improved by Petzold and Babcock. Built in quantity through the 1890s (in the United States), Steinway's celebrated iron framed over strung squares were more than two and a half times the size of Zumpe's wood framed instruments that were successful a century before, their overwhelming popularity was due to inexpensive construction and price, with performance and sonority frequently restricted by simple actions and closely spaced strings. Guillaume-Lebrecht Petzold was a piano maker in Paris in the early 1800s. ...
Alpheus Babcock (1785-1842) was a piano and music instrument maker in Boston, Massachusetts and Philadelphia, Pennsylvania during the early 1800s. ...
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The tall vertically strung upright grand was arranged with the soundboard and bridges perpendicular to keys, and above them so that the strings did not extend to the floor. Diagonally strung Giraffe, pyramid and lyre pianos employed this principle in more evocatively shaped cases. The term was later revived by many manufacturers for advertising purposes. The square piano had horizontal strings arranged diagonally across the rectangular case above the hammers and with the keyboard set in the long side, it is variously attributed to Silbermann and Frederici and was improved by Petzold and Babcock. ...
The very tall cabinet piano introduced by Southwell in 1806 and built through the 1840s 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, credited to Robert Wornum about 1810 was built into the 20th century. They are informally called birdcage pianos because of their prominent damper mechanism. Pianinos were distinguished from the oblique, or diagonally strung upright made popular in France by Roller & Blanchet during the late 1820s.
The tiny spinet upright was manufactured from the mid 1930s until recent times. It saved space by using a "drop action" arranged below the level of the keys.
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A harpsichord is the general term for a family of European keyboard instruments, including the large instrument nowadays called a harpsichord, but also the smaller virginals, the muselar virginals and the spinet. ...
Piano history and musical performance Much of the most widely admired piano repertoire — for example, that of Haydn, Mozart, and Beethoven — was composed for a type of instrument that is rather different from the modern instruments on which this music is normally performed today. Even the music of the Romantics, including Liszt, Chopin, Schumann, and Brahms, was written for pianos substantially different from ours. For a discussion of some of the interpretative consequences of performing this music on modern pianos, see piano history and musical performance. Original Handwritten MS of Beethovens Great Op. ...
This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (IPA: , baptized Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart) (January 27, 1756 – December 5, 1791) was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. ...
1820 portrait by Joseph Karl Stieler Beethoven redirects here. ...
Franz Liszt (Hungarian: Liszt Ferenc) (October 22, 1811 – July 31, 1886) was a Hungarian virtuoso pianist and composer of the Romantic period. ...
The only known photograph of Frédéric Chopin (commonly mistaken for a daguerreotype), believed to have been taken by Louis-Auguste Bisson in 1849 “Chopin†redirects here. ...
For others with the same name see Robert Schumann (disambiguation). ...
This article or section does not adequately cite its references or sources. ...
The piano has evolved technologically more than any other musical instrument, giving rise to difficult issues involving the performance of music written for earlier pianos. ...
The modern piano
 A schematic depiction of the construction of a pianoforte. Image File history File links Fortepian_-_schemat. ...
Image File history File links Fortepian_-_schemat. ...
Types Modern pianos come in two basic configurations and several sizes: the grand piano and the upright piano. A grand piano from Schiedmayer & Söhne, Stuttgart. ...
Grand pianos have the frame and strings placed horizontally, with the strings extending away from the keyboard. This makes the grand piano a large instrument, for which the ideal setting is a spacious room with high ceilings for proper resonance. There are several sizes of grand piano. Manufacturers and models vary, but a rough generalisation distinguishes the "concert grand", (between about 2.2 m to 3 m long) from the "boudoir grand" (about 1.7 m to 2.2 m) and the smaller "baby grand" (which may be shorter than it is wide). All else being equal, longer pianos have better sound and lower inharmonicity of the strings. This is partly because the strings will be tuned closer to equal temperament in relation to the standard pitch with less stretching (See: Piano tuning). Full-size grands are usually used for public concerts, whereas baby grands, invented by Sohmer & Co. in 1884, are often chosen for domestic use where space and cost are considerations. A grand piano from Schiedmayer & Söhne, Stuttgart. ...
In music, inharmonicity is the degree to which the frequencies of the overtones of a fundamental differ from whole number multiples of the fundamentals frequency. ...
An equal temperament is a musical temperament -- that is, a system of tuning intended to approximate some form of just intonation -- in which an interval, usually the octave, is divided into a series of equal steps (equal frequency ratios). ...
Piano tuner Piano tuner redirects here. ...
A 1901 Sohmer Grand (source: Kunkels Musical Review, June 1901) Hugo Sohmer (1845 - 1913) was born in the Black Forest, Germany. ...
Upright pianos, also called vertical pianos, are more compact because the frame and strings are placed vertically, extending in both directions from the keyboard and hammers. It is considered harder to produce a sensitive piano action when the hammers move horizontally, rather than upward against gravity as in a grand piano; however, the very best upright pianos now approach the level of grand pianos of the same size in tone quality and responsiveness. However, one feature of the grand piano action always makes it superior to the vertical piano. All grand pianos have a special repetition lever in the playing action that is absent in all verticals. This repetition lever, a separate one for every key, catches the hammer close to the strings as long as the key remains depressed. In this position, with the hammer resting on the lever, a pianist can play repeated notes, staccato, and trills with much more speed and control than they could on a vertical piano. The action design of a vertical prevents it from having a repetition lever. Because of this, piano manufacturers claim that a skilled piano player can play as many as 14 trill notes per second on grands but only seven on uprights. For recent advances, see Innovations in the piano. Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (1536x676, 360 KB) 1. ...
Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (1536x676, 360 KB) 1. ...
Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (1638x1602, 1000 KB) 1, Key 2. ...
Image File history File links Download high-resolution version (1638x1602, 1000 KB) 1, Key 2. ...
The trill is a musical ornament consisting of a rapid alternation between two adjacent notes of a scale (compare tremolo). ...
This article covers a number of innovations from recent times in the building of pianos. ...
In 1863, Henri Fourneaux invented the player piano, which "plays itself" from a piano roll without the need for a pianist. 1863 (MDCCCLXIII) is a common year starting on Thursday of the Gregorian calendar (or a common year starting on Saturday of the Julian calendar). ...
The player piano is a type of piano that plays music without the need for a human pianist to depress the normal keys or pedals. ...
A piano roll is the medium used to operate the player piano or pianola, band/fairground organs, calliopes and hand-cranked organs and orchestrions and pipe organs as well. ...
Also in the 19th century, toy pianos began to be manufactured. Alternative meaning: Nineteenth Century (periodical) (18th century — 19th century — 20th century — more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 19th century was that century which lasted from 1801-1900 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar. ...
Pooh Poppin Piano -- a diatonic one octave toy piano Photo of toy piano by Javier Mediavilla Ezquibela The toy piano is a musical instrument, made as a childs toy, but which has also been used in more serious musical contexts. ...
A relatively recent development is the prepared piano, which is simply a standard grand piano which has had objects placed inside it before a performance in order to alter its sound, or which has had its mechanism changed in some way. A prepared piano is a piano that has had its sound altered by placing objects (preparations) between or on the strings or on the hammers or dampers. ...
Since the 1980s, digital pianos have been available, which use digital sampling technology to reproduce the sound of each piano note. The best digital pianos are sophisticated, with features including working pedals, weighted keys, multiple voices, and MIDI interfaces. However, with current technology, it remains difficult to duplicate a crucial aspect of acoustic pianos, namely that when the damper pedal (see below) is depressed, the strings not struck vibrate sympathetically when other strings are struck as well as the unique instrument-specific mathematical non-linearity of partials on any given unison. Since this sympathetic vibration is considered central to a beautiful piano tone, in many experts' estimation digital pianos still do not compete with the best acoustic pianos in tone quality. Progress is being made in this area by including physical models of sympathetic vibration in the synthesis software. The 1980s refers to the years of 1980 to 1989. ...
A digital piano is a modern electronic musical instrument designed to serve primarily as an alternative to a traditional piano, both in the way it feels to play and in the sound produced. ...
In signal processing, sampling is the reduction of a continuous signal to a discrete signal. ...
Musical Instrument Digital Interface, or MIDI, is a system designed to transmit information between electronic musical instruments. ...
Sympathetic strings are strings on musical instruments which begin resonating, not due to any external influence such as picking or bowing, but due to another note (or frequency). ...
This article is about resonance in physics. ...
Physical modelling synthesis is the synthesis of sound by using a set of equations and algorithms to simulate a physical source of sound. ...
The modern equivalent to the player piano is the Yamaha Disklavier system, which uses solenoids and midi instead of pneumatics and rolls. Silent pianos, which silence the piano and convert it to a digital instrument are a recent innovation and are becoming more popular. The trade name Disklavier (DISC-lah-veer) refers to a family of piano-related products [1] originated and continuously manufactured by Yamaha Corporation, based in Hamamatsu, Japan, with branches and subsidiaries worldwide. ...
There are very few or no other articles that link to this one. ...
Keyboard For the arrangement of the keys on a piano keyboard, see Musical keyboard. This arrangement was inherited from the harpsichord without change, with the trivial exception of the colour scheme (white for notes in the C major scale and black for other notes) which became standard for pianos in the late 18th century. The layout of a typical musical keyboard A musical keyboard is the set of adjacent depressible levers on a musical instrument which cause the instrument to produce sounds. ...
Harpsichord in the Flemish style A harpsichord is any of a family of European keyboard instruments, including the large instrument currently called a harpsichord, but also the smaller virginals, the muselar virginals and the spinet. ...
A one octave music scale in C major. ...
Almost every modern piano has 88 keys (seven octaves plus a minor third, from A0 to C8). Many older pianos only have 85 keys (seven octaves from A0 to A7), while some manufacturers extend the range further in one or both directions. The most notable example of an extended range can be found on Bösendorfer pianos, one model which extends the normal range downwards to F0, with one other model going as far as a bottom C0, making a full eight octave range. Sometimes, these extra keys are hidden under a small hinged lid, which can be flipped down to cover the keys and avoid visual disorientation in a pianist unfamiliar with the extended keyboard; on others, the colours of the extra white keys are reversed (black instead of white). 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. More recently, the Stuart and Sons company has also manufactured extended-range pianos. On their instruments, the range is extended both down the bass to F0 and up the treble to F8 for a full eight octaves. The extra keys are the same as the other keys in appearance. In music, an octave (sometimes abbreviated 8ve or 8va) is the interval between one musical note and another with half or double the frequency. ...
Bösendorfer (L. Bösendorfer Klavierfabrik GmbH) is a piano manufacturer, a wholly owned subsidiary of the BAWAG PSK Gruppe, and is based in Vienna, Austria. ...
Stuart and Sons is a manufacturer of pianos based in Maryville, a suburb of Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia. ...
Pedals 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.) The three pedals that have become more or less standard on the modern piano are the following.
The damper pedal (also called the sustaining pedal or loud pedal) is often simply called "the pedal", since it is the most frequently used. It is placed as the rightmost pedal in the group. Every string on the piano, except the top two octaves, is equipped with a damper, which is a padded device that prevents the string from vibrating. The damper is raised off the string whenever the key for that note is pressed. When the damper pedal is pressed, all the dampers on the piano are lifted at once, so that every string can vibrate. This serves two purposes. First, it assists the pianist in producing a legato (playing smoothly connected notes) in passages where no fingering is available to make this otherwise possible. Second, raising the damper pedal causes all the strings to vibrate sympathetically with whichever notes are being played, which greatly enriches the piano's tone. A sustain or sustaining pedal (also damper pedal or loud pedal) is the most commonly-used pedal in a modern piano. ...
In musical notation legato indicates that musical notes are played smoothly. ...
This article is about resonance in physics. ...
Sensitive pedaling is one of the techniques a pianist must master, since piano music from Chopin onwards tends to benefit from extensive use of the sustaining pedal, both as a means of achieving a singing tone and as an aid to legato. In contrast, the sustaining pedal was used only sparingly by the composers of the 18th century, including Haydn, Mozart and in early works by Beethoven; in that era, pedalling was considered primarily as a special coloristic effect. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (2464x1643, 535 KB) Piano pedals on a Grand Piano. ...
Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (2464x1643, 535 KB) Piano pedals on a Grand Piano. ...
The soft pedal (or una corda pedal) is one of the standard pedals on a piano, generally placed to the left of the pedals. ...
In music, sostenuto is a term from Italian which means sustained, and occasionally also implies a slowing of tempo. ...
Sustain pedal is the most commonly used pedal in a modern piano. ...
The only known photograph of Frédéric Chopin (commonly mistaken for a daguerreotype), believed to have been taken by Louis-Auguste Bisson in 1849 “Chopin†redirects here. ...
This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart (IPA: , baptized Johannes Chrysostomus Wolfgangus Theophilus Mozart) (January 27, 1756 – December 5, 1791) was a prolific and influential composer of the Classical era. ...
1820 portrait by Joseph Karl Stieler Beethoven redirects here. ...
The soft pedal or "una corda" pedal is placed leftmost in the row of pedals. On a grand piano, this pedal shifts the whole action including the keyboard slightly to the right, so that hammers that normally strike all three of the strings for a note strike only two of them. This softens the note and modifies its tone quality. For notation of the soft pedal in printed music, see Italian musical terms. The soft pedal (or una corda pedal) is one of the standard pedals on a piano, generally placed to the left of the pedals. ...
For a general, non-language specific list of terms, see Musical terminology A great many musical terms are in Italian. ...
The soft pedal was invented by Cristofori and thus appeared on the very earliest pianos. In the 18th and early 19th centuries, the soft pedal was more effective than today, since pianos were manufactured with only two strings per note, just one string per note would be therefore struck — this is the origin of the name "una corda", Italian for "one string". In modern pianos, there are three strings per hammer and are spaced too closely to permit a true "una corda" effect — if shifted far enough to strike just one string on one note, the hammers would hit the string of the next note.
On many upright pianos, the soft pedal operates a mechanism which moves the hammers' resting position closer to the strings. Since the hammers have less distance to travel this reduces the speed at which they hit the strings, and hence the volume is reduced, but this does not change tone quality in the way the "una corda" pedal does on a grand piano.
Digital pianos often use this pedal to alter the sound to that of another instrument such as the organ, guitar, or harmonica. Pitch bends, leslie speaker on/off, vibrato modulation, etc. increase the already-great versatility of such instruments.
The sostenuto pedal or "middle pedal" keeps raised any damper that was raised at the moment the pedal is depressed. This makes it possible to sustain some notes (by depressing the sostenuto pedal before notes to be sustained are released) while the player's hands are free to play other notes. This can be useful for musical passages with pedal points and other otherwise tricky or impossible situations. The sostenuto pedal was the last of the three pedals to be added to the standard piano, and to this day, many pianos are not equipped with a sostenuto pedal. (Almost all modern grand pianos have a sostenuto pedal, while most upright pianos do not.) A number of twentieth-century works specifically call for the use of this pedal, for example Olivier Messiaen's Catalogue d'oiseaux. This pedal is often unused in modern music. In tonal music, a pedal point (also pedal tone, organ point, or just pedal) is a sustained tone, typically in the bass, during which at least one foreign, i. ...
Olivier Messiaen It has been suggested that List of students of Olivier Messiaen be merged into this article or section. ...
Many uprights and baby grands have a bass sustain in place of the sostenuto pedal, which lifts all the dampers in the bass. It works like the damper pedal, but only affects the lowest notes.
Some upright pianos have a practice pedal or celeste pedal in place of the sostenuto. This pedal, which can usually be locked in place by depressing it and pushing it to one side, drops a strip of felt between the hammers and the strings so that all the notes are greatly muted — a handy feature for those who wish to practice in domestic surroundings without disturbing the neighbours. The practice pedal is rarely used in performance.
The rare transposing piano, of which Irving Berlin possessed an example, uses the middle pedal as a clutch which disengages the keyboard from the mechanism, enabling the keyboard to be moved to left or right with a lever. The entire action of the piano is thus shifted to allow the pianist to play music written in one key so that it sounds in a different key. A Transposing piano is a special piano which can be adjusted by the player (e. ...
Irving Berlin (May 11, 1888 – September 22, 1989) was a Russian-American composer and lyricist, one of the most prodigious and famous American songwriters in history. ...
For other uses, see Clutch (disambiguation). ...
- See also: Pedal piano
The pedal piano is a kind of piano that includes a pedal keyboard, enabling notes to be played with the feet, as is standard on the pipe organ. ...
Materials Many parts of a piano are made of materials selected for extreme sturdiness. In quality pianos, the outer rim of the piano is made of a hardwood, normally maple or beech. 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." The rim is normally made by laminating flexible strips of hardwood to the desired shape, a system that was developed by Theodore Steinway in 1880.
The thick wooden braces at the bottom (grands) or back (uprights) of the piano are not as acoustically important as the rim, and are often made of a softwood, even in top-quality pianos, in order to save weight.
The pinblock, which holds the tuning pins in place, is another area of the piano where toughness is important. It is made of hardwood, (often maple) and generally is laminated (built of multiple layers) for additional strength and gripping power.
Piano strings (also called piano wire), which must endure years of extreme tension and hard blows, are made of high quality 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 flexibility. For the acoustic reasons behind this, see Piano acoustics. Piano wire is a specialized type of wire made for use in piano and other musical instrument strings, as well as many other purposes. ...
Piano acoustics is an exploration of how physical science, particularly acoustics, can help to explain a number of important properties of the piano. ...
The plate, or metal frame, of a piano is usually made of cast iron. It is advantageous for the plate to be quite massive. Since the strings are attached to the plate at one end, any vibrations transmitted to the plate will result in loss of energy to the desired (efficient) channel of sound transmission, namely the bridge and the soundboard. Some manufacturers now use cast steel in their plates, for greater strength. The casting of the plate is a delicate art, since the dimensions are crucial and the iron shrinks by about one percent during cooling. The inclusion in a piano of an extremely large piece of metal is potentially an aesthetic handicap. Piano makers overcome this handicap by polishing, painting, and decorating the plate; often plates include the manufacturer's ornamental medallion and can be strikingly attractive. In an effort to make pianos lighter, Alcoa worked with Winter and Company piano manufactuers to make pianos using an aluminum plate during the 1940s. The use of aluminum for piano plates, however, did not become widely accepted and was discontinued. Cast iron usually refers to grey cast iron, but can mean any of a group of iron-based alloys containing more than 2% carbon (alloys with less carbon are carbon steel by definition). ...
This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
There are very few or no other articles that link to this one. ...
The numerous grand parts and upright parts of a piano action are generally hardwood (e.g. maple, beech. hornbeam). However, since World War II, plastics have become available. Early plastics were incorporated into some pianos in the late 1940s and 1950s, but proved disastrous because they crystallized and lost their strength after only a few decades of use. The Steinway firm once incorporated Teflon, a synthetic material developed by DuPont, for some grand action parts in place of cloth, but ultimately abandoned the experiment due to an inherent "clicking" which invariably developed over time. (Also Teflon is "humidity stable" whereas the wood ajacent to the Teflon will swell and shrink with humidity changes, causing problems.) More recently, the Kawai firm has built pianos with action parts made of more modern and effective plastics such as carbon fiber; these parts have held up better and have generally received the respect of piano technicians. Beech is a typical temperate zone hardwood The term hardwood designates wood from angiosperm trees. ...
Combatants Allied powers: China France Great Britain Soviet Union United States and others Axis powers: Germany Italy Japan and others Commanders Chiang Kai-shek Charles de Gaulle Winston Churchill Joseph Stalin Franklin Roosevelt Adolf Hitler Benito Mussolini Hideki TÅjÅ Casualties Military dead: 17,000,000 Civilian dead: 33,000...
The term plastics covers a range of synthetic or semi-synthetic organic condensation or polymerization products that can be molded or extruded into objects or films or fibers. ...
Steinway & Sons is a piano manufacturing firm, currently based in New York and Hamburg, Germany. ...
Teflon is polytetrafluoroethylene (PTFE), a polymer of fluorinated ethylene. ...
This article is about the DuPont company. ...
The Kawai Musical Instruments Mfg. ...
Carbon fiber composite is a strong, light and very expensive material. ...
 View from below of a 182-cm grand piano. In order of distance from viewer: softwood braces, tapered soundboard ribs, soundboard. The metal rod at lower right is a humidity control device. The part of the piano where materials probably matter more than anywhere else is the soundboard. In quality pianos, this is made of solid spruce (that is, spruce boards glued together at their edges). Spruce is chosen for its high ratio of strength to weight. The best piano makers use close-grained, quarter-sawn, defect-free spruce, and make sure that it has been carefully dried over a long period of time before making it into soundboards. In cheap pianos, the soundboard is often made of plywood. Download high resolution version (1600x1200, 336 KB)View of soundboard, braces, and ribs of a grand piano. ...
Download high resolution version (1600x1200, 336 KB)View of soundboard, braces, and ribs of a grand piano. ...
The sounding board is the largest part of a string musical instruments body. ...
Species About 35; see text. ...
Toy constructed from plywood. ...
Piano keys are generally made of spruce or basswood, for lightness. Spruce is normally used in high-quality pianos. Traditionally, the black keys were made from ebony and the white keys were covered with strips of ivory, but since ivory-yielding species are now endangered and protected by treaty, plastics are now almost exclusively used. Basswood is the common name of timbers of Tilia species. ...
Binomial name Diospyros ebenum Koenig ex Retz. ...
This article or section does not cite its references or sources. ...
Legal ivory can still be obtained in limited quantities. At one time, the Yamaha firm innovated a plastic called "Ivorine" or "Ivorite", since imitated by other makers, that mimics the look and feel of ivory. Yamaha redirects here. ...
The requirement of structural strength, fulfilled with stout hardwood and thick metal, makes a piano heavy; even a small upright can weigh 136 kg (300 lb), and the Steinway concert grand (Model D) weighs 480 kg (990 lb). The largest piano built, the Fazioli F308, weighs 691 kg (1520 lb). Fazioli is a piano manufacturing company founded in 1978 in Sacile, Italy by Paolo Fazioli and a small team of his friends. ...
Care and maintenance - Main article: Care and maintenance of pianos
Pianos need regular tuning to keep them up to pitch and produce a pleasing sound; by convention they are tuned to the internationally recognized standard concert pitch of A = 440 Hz. The piano requires various forms of maintenance to produce its best sound. ...
The hammers of pianos are voiced to compensate for gradual hardening, and other parts also need periodic regulation. Aged and worn pianos can be rebuilt or reconditioned. Often, by replacing a great number of their parts, they can be made to perform as well as new pianos.
The role of the piano - See also: Social history of the piano
The piano is a crucial instrument in Western classical music, jazz, film, television, and most other complex western musical genres. Since a large number of composers are proficient pianists--and because the piano keyboard offers an easy means of complex melodic and harmonic interplay--the piano is often used as a tool for composition. This social history article treats the role of the piano in the home, from its invention in the early 18th century to the present day. ...
Classical music is a broad, somewhat imprecise term, referring to music produced in, or rooted in the traditions of, European art, ecclesiastical and concert music, encompassing a broad period from roughly 1000 to the present day. ...
Jazz is a style of music which originated in New Orleans, Louisiana, United States at around the start of the 20th century. ...
A film score is the background music in a film, generally specially written for the film and often used to heighten emotions provoked by the imagery on the screen or by the dialogue. ...
A composer is a person who writes music. ...
Pianos were, and still are, popular instruments for private household ownership, especially among the middle and upper classes. Hence, pianos have gained a place in the popular consciousness, and are sometimes referred to by nicknames including: "the ivories", "the joanna", "the eighty-eight", and "the black(s) and white(s)", "the little joe(s)". Playing the piano is sometimes referred to as "tickling the ivories".
The piano is frequently referenced in works of popular culture; see Piano in popular culture. Popular culture, or pop culture, (literally: the culture of the people) consists of widespread cultural elements in any given society. ...
The piano is frequently referenced in works of popular culture. ...
Media files Image File history File links Shostakovich's_Prelude_XXI_Bb_Major_(Allegro)_-_(Part_of_opus_87). ...
Software development stages In computer programming, development stage terminology expresses how the development of a piece of software has progressed and how much further development it may require. ...
A Prelude is something that serves as a preceding event or introduces what follows after it. ...
Notes For the Manfred Mann album, see 2006 (album). ...
May 18 is the 138th day of the year in the Gregorian Calendar (139th in leap years). ...
References Most of the information in this article can be found in the following published works: - The authoritative New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians (available online by subscription), contains a great wealth of information. Main article: "Pianoforte".
- The Encyclopædia Britannica (available online by subscription) also includes much information on the piano. In the 1988 edition, the primary article can be found in "Musical Instruments".
- The Piano Book by Larry Fine (4th ed. Jamaica Plain, Massachusetts: Brookside Press, 2001; ISBN 1-929145-01-2) 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.
- Giraffes, black dragons, and other pianos: a technological history from Cristofori to the modern concert grand by Edwin M. Good (1982, second ed., 2001, Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press) is a standard reference on the history of the piano.
- The Early Pianoforte by Stewart Pollens (1995, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press) is an authoritative work covering the ancestry of the piano, its invention by Cristofori, and the early stages of its subsequent evolution.
The Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians is a dictionary of music and musicians, generally considered to be one of the best general reference sources on the subject. ...
The Encyclopædia Britannica is a general encyclopedia published by Encyclopædia Britannica Inc. ...
Further reading - Banowetz, Joseph; Elder, Dean (1985). The pianist's guide to pedaling. Bloomington: Indiana University Press. ISBN 0-253-34494-8. — offers a history of the three piano pedals and covers the wide variety of ways in which they are used by professional pianists.
- Parakilas, James (1999). Piano roles : three hundred years of life with the piano. New Haven, Connecticut: Yale University Press. ISBN 0-300-08055-7. — provides much history of the instrument. The book is richly illustrated.
- Reblitz, Arthur A. (1993). Piano Servicing, Tuning and Rebuilding: For the Professional, the Student, and the Hobbyist. Vestal, NY: Vestal Press. ISBN 1-879511-03-7.
- Carhart, Thad [2001] (2002). The Piano Shop on the Left Bank. New York: Random House. ISBN 0-375-75862-3. — is a partly autobiographical exploration of the diversity and history of the piano, and is a readable introduction by an enthusiast.
- Loesser, Arthur [1954] (1991). Men, Women, and Pianos: A Social History. New York: Dover Publications. Originally New York: Simon and Schuster, 1954, this book is an extraordinarily wide-ranging survey of the history of the piano and its role in society.
- Lelie, Christo (1995). Van Piano tot Forte (The History of the Early Piano). Kampen: Kok-Lyra. The book is in Dutch, but contains many drawings, photographs en numerous quotations in the original languages.
- Fine, Larry; Gilbert, Douglas R (2001). The Piano Book: Buying and Owning a New or Used Piano (4th edition). Jamaica Plain, MA: Brookside Press. ISBN 1-929145-01-2. A comprehensive work on how to evaluate, buy and maintain a piano. Includes a great deal of information on how a piano works, and a lengthy guide to specific pianos.
See also Image File history File links Wikibooks-logo-en. ...
Wikibooks logo Wikibooks, previously called Wikimedia Free Textbook Project and Wikimedia-Textbooks, is a wiki for the creation of books. ...
This article covers a number of innovations from recent times in the building of pianos. ...
Piano tuner Piano tuner redirects here. ...
Pianist Claudio Arrau, Carnegie Hall, 1954. ...
Piano acoustics is an exploration of how physical science, particularly acoustics, can help to explain a number of important properties of the piano. ...
This is a virtual piano with 88 keys tuned to A440, showing the frequencies, in cycles per second (Hz), of each note (i. ...
An equal temperament is a musical temperament -- that is, a system of tuning intended to approximate some form of just intonation -- in which an interval, usually the octave, is divided into a series of equal steps (equal frequency ratios). ...
The player piano is a type of piano that plays music without the need for a human pianist to depress the normal keys or pedals. ...
A piano roll is the medium used to operate the player piano or pianola, band/fairground organs, calliopes and hand-cranked organs and orchestrions and pipe organs as well. ...
A prepared piano is a piano that has had its sound altered by placing objects (preparations) between or on the strings or on the hammers or dampers. ...
This social history article treats the role of the piano in the home, from its invention in the early 18th century to the present day. ...
String piano is a term coined by American composer-theorist Henry Cowell to collectively describe those pianistic techniques in which sound is produced by direct manipulation of the strings, rather than by striking of the pianos keys. ...
The tangent piano is a very rare keyboard instrument that resembles a harpsichord and early pianos in design. ...
Related lists The following are lists of solo piano pieces, where solo pieces here are defined as those either intentionally composed for solo piano, or where the piano is the major instrument of music. ...
Aeolian (1868) Albrecht, Charles [1779] American Piano Company (1908) Astin Weight (1959) Babcock (Boston, 1810) Baldwin (1890) Bechstein (1853) Blüthner (1853) Bösendorfer (1828) Boston (1991) Brinsmead (London, 1835) Broadwood and Sons (London, 1783) Challen (1804) Chappell Pianos (London, 1811) Chickering and Sons (Boston, 1823) Clementi Decker Brothers (New...
This is a list of pianists of whom recordings survive who play or played classical music. ...
Other types of pianos With the exception of the toy piano, these instruments are called "piano" by virtue of being keyboard instruments but are electric or electronic in nature, not acoustic. The article on electrical energy is located elsewhere. ...
This article is about the engineering discipline. ...
Acoustics is a branch of physics and is the study of sound (mechanical waves in gases, liquids, and solids). ...
A digital piano is a modern electronic musical instrument designed to serve primarily as an alternative to a traditional piano, both in the way it feels to play and in the sound produced. ...
An electric piano (e-piano) is an electric musical instrument whose popularity was at its greatest during the 1960s and 1970s. ...
An electronic piano is an entirely electronic musical instrument designed to simulate the timbre of a piano (and sometimes a harpsichord) using analog circuitry. ...
A Rhodes piano is a musical instrument, a brand of electric piano. ...
Roland RD-700 - a typical digital stage piano Yamaha P-250 - a digital stage piano with built-in speakers Casio AP-38 - a typical digital piano- notice the integrated modesty panel & pedals A stage piano is a digital piano that reproduces sound electronically by the use of sampled or digitally...
Pooh Poppin Piano -- a diatonic one octave toy piano Photo of toy piano by Javier Mediavilla Ezquibela The toy piano is a musical instrument, made as a childs toy, but which has also been used in more serious musical contexts. ...
Related instruments Large five-octave unfretted clavichord by Paul Maurici, after J.A. Haas The clavichord is a European stringed keyboard instrument known from the late Medieval, through the Renaissance, Baroque and Classical eras. ...
A diatonic hammered dulcimer made by Masterworks The hammered dulcimer is a stringed musical instrument with the strings stretched over a trapezoidal sounding board. ...
Harpsichord in the Flemish style A harpsichord is any of a family of European keyboard instruments, including the large instrument currently called a harpsichord, but also the smaller virginals, the muselar virginals and the spinet. ...
Organ in Katharinenkirche, Frankfurt am Main, Germany // The pipe organ (Greek ὄÏγανον, órganon) is a musical instrument that produces sound by admitting pressurized air through a series of pipes. ...
External links - History of the Piano Forte, Association of Blind Piano Tuners, UK
- The Frederick Historical Piano Collection
- Table of wood materials found in pianos
- Discover a Hobby: Online guide to learn the Piano
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