|
|
|
|
|
|
Invention of the Piano |
|
|
Bartolomeo de Francesco Cristofori, an Italian harpsichord maker, is credited with the invention of the piano around the year 1700. Cristofori was born on May 4, 1655, and died January 2, 1732, making him 76 years old at his death and about 45 when he invented the piano. Originally described as a harpsichord that plays both loud and soft (a characteristic that is not present with a harpsichord), the piano was created by replacing the plucking mechanism of the harpsichord with hammers to strike the strings so that the volume of the sounds played on the instrument could be made dependent on the pressure on the keys. In addition to changing the plucking mechanism of the harpsichord, the wooden frame of the harpsichord was not strong enough to handle the increased string tension that gives the piano its more powerful tone, so the construction of the instrument was strengthened with a steel plate on which the strings are mounted. There are basically three categories of musical instruments based on how they produce sound: stringed instruments, wind instruments, and percussion instruments. Because the piano’s mechanism is to strike the strings with a hammer, it could be considered a percussion instrument. However, the Yamaha web site (https://www.yamaha.com/en/musical_instrument_guide/piano/structure/) traces the piano’s ancestry back to the monochord, which is a stringed instrument, so that the piano can also be classified as a stringed instrument, thus making the piano unusual in terms of its dual category status. The Yamaha web site gives a lot of information on the history of the piano along with some piano trivia ("The White Keys and Black Keys Were Reversed on Pianos in Mozart’s Day") Visit the following additional web sites for more information about the piano and its history: https://www.britannica.com/biography/Bartolomeo-Cristofori https://www.thoughtco.com/history-of-the-piano-1992319 https://www.merriammusic.com/pianos/acoustic-pianos/history-of-the-piano/ |
|
or click the blue title bar at the top of the page |
|
|
dicksblog.info. All rights are reserved.
|
