Page 14 - 2016Spring

Nicholas Giordano
Postal:
Department of Physics Auburn University Auburn, AL 36849-5319 USA
Email:
njg0003@auburn.edu
The Invention and Evolution of the Piano
The piano was invented 300 years ago — and the instrument has changed considerably since then.
Introduction
The piano is a fascinating instrument with an interesting history. The inventor of the piano was Bartolomeo Cristofori, a gifted and creative maker of keyboard in- struments, who spent his most productive years in the employ of the Medici family in Florence (Pollens, 1995; Good, 2002). Cristofori lived at essentially the same time as the celebrated luthier, Antonio Stradivari, and both worked in what is now northern Italy (although there is no evidence that they ever met).
A number of Cristofori's instruments can be found in museums around the world, including harpsichords and other string instruments, as well as the three oldest known pianos. These pianos were built in the 1720s and can be seen in the Met- ropolitan Museum of Art in New York City, the Museo Nationale degli Strumenti
Figure 1. Piano made by Bartolomeo Cristo- fori in approximately 1722. This piano is in the Museo Nationale degli Strumenti Musicali in Rome. Image from Wikimedia Commons (wi- kimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/3/32/Piano_ forte_Cristofori_1722.JPG).
Musicali in Rome (which houses the piano in Figure 1), and the Musikin- strumenten-Museum in Leipzig. These instruments resemble in a general way the Italian-style harpsi- chords of that period, but with the incorporation of hammers and what is now known as the piano "action." The action is the mechanical mecha- nism that links each hammer to a key lever, and it is this mechanism that gives the piano its unique capa- bilities, setting it apart from its fore- runner, the harpsichord. The piano in Figure 1 has a range of 4 octaves (49 notes), from two octaves below middle C to two octaves above. It is composed almost entirely of wood (except for the strings and a few mis- cellaneous parts), with each string held at a tension of about 65 N. The
Cristofori instruments contrast with the modern grand piano (Figure 2), which has nearly twice the range (88 notes covering 71⁄3 octaves), with strings held at ten- sions of more than 600 N and a massive iron plate to allow the case to withstand the much greater force from the strings.
Cristofori called his instrument an "Arpicembalo del piano e forte" which trans- lates from Italian roughly as "harp-harpsichord with soft and loud" (Pollens, 1995). Over time the name has been shortened and rearranged to "pianoforte," "fortepi-
12 | Acoustics Today | Spring 2016 | volume 12, issue 1 ©2016 Acoustical Society of America. All rights reserved.