Everything Everywhere Daily: History, Science, Geography & More - The History of the Piano

Episode Date: January 6, 2022

Subscribe to the podcast!  https://podfollow.com/everythingeverywhere/ It is an instrument that we are all familiar with, even if we don’t know how to play it. It is one of the most commonly played instruments in the world, yet its origins are rather recent.  Its origins come from an instrument that most people don’t realize and it has significant differences from other instruments which look very similar.  Learn more about the piano, also known as the pianoforte. How it works and how it was invented, on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. -------------------------------- Associate Producers: Peter Bennett & Thor Thomsen   Become a supporter on Patreon: https://www.patreon.com/everythingeverywhere Discord Server: https://discord.gg/UkRUJFh   Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/everythingeverywhere/ Twitter: https://twitter.com/everywheretrip Reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/EEDailyPodcast/ Website: https://everything-everywhere.com/everything-everywhere-daily-podcast/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

It's an instrument that we're all familiar with, even if we don't know how to play it. It's one of the most commonly played instruments in the world, yet its origins are rather recent. Its direct ancestor is an instrument that most people don't realize, aimed it as a significant difference from other instruments that look very similar. Learn more about the piano, also known as the Piano Forte, how it works and how it was invented, on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily. Do you ever climb into bed ready to sleep, only to have your mind start racing the moment your head hits the pill?

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Episodes are every Monday and Thursday. The origins of the piano only go back about 300 years, and the modern version of the piano goes back much less than that. But before we get into the specifics, it's necessary to know exactly how and why the piano came about. The piano wasn't the first keyboard. instrument, or even close to the first keyboard instrument for that matter. The first known instrument to use a keyboard was the water organ, which was popular in ancient Greece and Rome. It was an early organ that used water to push air through pipes. It would require one or two people to pump the water while the musician played. I think there's an interesting

future episode on ancient musical instruments, but for the purpose of this episode, the main thing is to note that the water organ was the first instrument to use a keyboard. Here I will note that keyboard instruments are not technically a class of musical instruments. Broadly speaking, there are three types of instruments, wind instruments, string instruments, and percussion instruments. A keyboard is just an input device. There are actually wind, string, and percussion instruments that all use a keyboard, similar to how a typing keyboard can be used for both an analog typewriter and a computer. The ancient water organ, just like its successor instrument, the pipe organ, is a wind instrument. The next big step towards the piano came with the creation of the harpsichord.

The earliest known reference to the harpsichord was in 1397, and the inventor was claimed to be a German by the name of Herman Pohl. The harpsichord became the most popular keyboard instrument during the late Middle Ages and the Renaissance. It didn't require a massive installation like a pipe organ, and it could easily fit in a room and be carried by two or three people. Like a piano, the harpsichord is a string instrument. The secret to the harpsichord can be found in its name, harp. When the keys on harpsichord are pressed, it lifts up an element inside called a jack. The jack sits on the side of the string, which is to be played. Extruding directly outward from the jack is a tiny thing called the Plectrum.

In early harpsichord, the Plectrum was made from the quill of a bird feather. Today, they would probably be made out of plastic. The Plectrum would pluck the string when the jack is lifted, which is what made the sound. A Plectrum is also a generic word for anything used to strum a stringed instrument, so a guitar pick would technically be a Plectrum. There's also a dampener that rests on the string when the key is not being pressed, which prevents the string from being vibrated when it isn't wanted. The sound which comes from a harpsichord is more tinny than what you might hear from a piano,

and in fact it does sound more like a harp. There's one major drawback to the harpsichord. No matter how hard or soft you press a key, the sound is going to end up the same. Once a string is plucked, it's plucked. Around the same time, another source. string keyboard instrument was created called the clavacord. The clavacord was much smaller and more compact than a harpsichord. If the harpsichord can be thought of as a keyboard interface to a harp, then the clavacord can be thought of as a keyboard interface to a stringed instrument like an auto harp

or a zither. If you look inside, you'll find a stringed instrument with a resonance box, just like a guitar or a violin. The way it works is that pressing a string would cause a metallic blade to rise up striking the string. Unlike harpsichord, there wasn't a string devoted to every key, however. Some keys would strike the same string in different places to produce different notes, similar to how Eddie Van Halen could produce different notes by hammering on the same string of his guitar. There were two major problems with the clavichord. The first is that it just wasn't very loud. If you remember back to my episode on how orchestras work, the reason why there are so many string instruments in an orchestra is simply a matter of volume. You couldn't really play the

clavichord for a large audience. The second problem was that because some keys used the same string, you couldn't use those keys at the same time. This made it much more difficult to play than a harpsichord. The creation of the piano was designed to fix the problems of both the harpsichord and the clavacord. The word piano is just short for the Italian word, Piano Forte, or alternatively known as a forte piano. It comes from the phrase, clavi symbolo called piano and forte. Clavi means keys, Simballo is the Italian word for harpsichord. Piano basically means quiet and forte. means loud. The ability to make sounds of various volumes was the primary difference between a

piano and a harpsichord. I should note that while the word piano is just short for pianoforte, today the term piano is reserved for modern pianos, and the term pianoforte is usually reserved for 18th century older pianos. The invention of the pianoforte is credited to Bartolomo Cristofore, who is an instrument maker in Padua, Italy. We don't know the exact date he created the first pianoforte, but it's usually given around the year 1700. The primary innovation of the piano forte was to have keys hammering the strings rather than to pluck them like a harpsichord. By hammering the string, unlike a harpsichord, you can vary the volume of the sound depending on how hard you press the keys. To this extent, the real predecessor of the piano isn't the harpsichord.

It would be the hammered dulcimer, an instrument where you use small mallets to hit strings. However, you can't just hammer the strings. If you press a key on a piano and hold it down, it'll continue to make a sound. If all pressing a key did was hammer a string, it would dampen the sound unless the hammer was quickly lifted from the string to allow it to vibrate. So, the real innovation of Bartolomo Cristofori was creating what is known as the action of the piano key, which lifts the damper on the strings, brings the hammer down, and then lifts the hammer as soon as it strikes the string. There are currently only three surviving piano fortees which were created by Christofori. They're located at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the National Museum of Rome,

and the Musical Instrument Museum in Leipzig, Germany. The oldest of these three is at the Metropolitan Museum in New York, and there are videos online of it being played. It sounds like a cross between a modern piano and a harpsichord. Other than the hammer mechanism, the construction of these early piano fortes was very similar to harpsichords. The next big innovation in the piano was the addition of the sustained pedal. This was created by the German Gottfried Silberman. The pedal lifts all the dampers on the strings to allow for sustained notes. The number of keys on the early pianofortes was much less than the number of keys found on modern pianos.

The very early pianofortes only had a four-octave range with 49 keys. The acoustical range of pianos gradually increased over time. The piano used by Mozart only had a five-octave range, and Beethoven wrote for a piano with about a six-octive. octave range. Also, some of the pianos from this period had the black and white keys reversed. So, believe it or not, the piano works of Mozart, Beethoven, and Bach were not written for modern pianos. There are actually people who make replicas of older pianofortes for concerts where period-accurate instruments are used. There were many small innovations to the piano

throughout the 19th century. More pedals were added, with three being found on higher-end pianos. They became larger and heavier, often with a metal frame, unlike a harpsichord or piano forte. The stronger metallic frame allowed a piano to support higher tensions on strings, which can sometimes reach up to 20 tons on modern pianos. More strings were added for each note, and today a modern piano will have between two or four strings for each note that is played. The 88 keys on a modern piano were established in 1880 by the Steinway Company, giving pianos a seven-and-a-half octave range.

The vast majority of pianos since then have had 88 keys, but not all of them do. In 2018, the Australian company, Stuart and Sons, released a piano with 108 keys and a full nine-octave range. Pianoes also come in different forms. An upright piano is a type that you might see in a saloon in the Old West. They have more compact form, and they are much easier to transport. A full concert grand piano might be as much as nine feet long, whereas a baby grand piano may only be five feet long. Of course, like everything else, pianos have become digitized. Yamaha introduced a piano called the disc clavier in 1987.

It was a full acoustic piano. However, it had electronic sensors which could accurately record everything the musician did, including pressing of keys, the hammers, and the pedals. Likewise, it could also acoustically play digitally recorded music, just like an old player piano could. I'm going to close with one final thing. I mentioned before that a keyboard is just an interface for making sounds. An organ is a wind instrument and a piano is a string instrument.

Well, that raises the question. Is there a percussion instrument that uses a keyboard? The answer is, yes. It's called a cellesta or a cellast. It works very similarly to a piano, except instead of hitting strings, it hits metal bars. It gives a sound very similar to a Glockenspiel or a xylophone. You've probably heard a chelesta even if you didn't know it.

The most famous work composed for the chelesta is Dance of the Sugar Plum Ferrys by Chikovsky. Likewise, it's the primary instrument in the theme of the Harry Potter movies, and the theme to Mr. Rogers' neighborhood. Today, the piano is one of, if not the most popular instrument in the world to play, despite only finding its modern form in the late 19th century. It can be played by amateurs who can barely read music, and some people can spend a lifetime mastering it. And it's all due to a 16th century Italian instrument maker

who just wanted to make a better harpsichord. Everything Everywhere Daily is an Airwave Media podcast. The associate producers are Thor Thompson and Peter Bennett. Today's review comes from listener Mike Braydenbach over at Podcast Addit. He writes, Fantastic, 10-minute overviews of lesser-known topics in history. Thanks, Mike. As I like to tell people, it's all about learning stuff you didn't even know that you didn't know.

Remember, if you leave a review or send in a question, you two can have it read on the show.