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The history of the piano

Your piano is probably the biggest investment in your home. It is certainly the most versatile. With it’s 88 keys it has the widest range of any instrument. This gives it an incredible range. In fact, your piano can reach higher than a piccolo and lower than a bass drum. The pianist can play both melody and accompaniment at the same time. The piano is able to accompany virtually any other instrument. All of this from that stately looking wooden box on legs. Have you ever wondered where the piano came from?

The first real piano didn’t come about until around 1700. The inventor was a maker of harpsichords in Florence, Italy by the name of Bartolomeo Cristofori. By adding different groups of strings to the harpsichord Cristofori was able to extend the range of the harpsichord. But it wasn’t until he made of small hammers that struck the strings rather than plucking them that a real breakthrough came about. Now the player could control the sound of each note by the force with which he struck the key. He could accent the notes and had the whole range from piano(soft) to forte(loud) to draw from. Cristofori called his new invention gravicembalo coi piano e forte which meant ‘harpsichord with soft and loud.’ Happily, this was later reduced to piano forte and finally simply piano.

Cristifori’s new invention, however, did not catch the public imagination and he soon returned to making harpsichords. It was up to others to refine the developments over the next 100 or so years. The first public piano performance was given in 1777 by Johann Christian Bach, son of the great Johann Sebastian Bach.

However, it was the Austrian compser Wolgang Amadeus Mozart who took piano music to the next level.Mozart wrote his first piano concerto at age 11. His favorite pianos were those made by skilled German piano maker Johann A.Stein. Along with Ludwig Van Beethoven, Mozart created music specifically for the piano that demanded the best out of both performer and instrument. Beethoven was known to attack the piano with such force that keys and strings were liable to go flying.

As pianists demanded more and more from their instruments, manufacturers built larger and heavier frames to support the higher string tension that was desired. The one piece cast iron frame, developed in 1825, was a great advancement in this area. By 1880 the piano had developed into the instrument we know today.

The history of the piano, then, revolves around the life’s work of some very skilled individuals – Bartolomeo Christofori, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, Ludwig Van Beethoven, Johann Stein. Who knows? Your continued practice may see your name ranked as one of the future greats in the history of the piano.