The Evolution of the Piano - A Short History

 Introduction:

I remember the first time going to piano lessons. I was just eight years old and more excited than ever. As I walked in, I saw this wooden instrument with ivory keys gleaming under the lights. Every key with its respective string ready to be struck by the hammers and create a beautiful sound. As soon as I started playing, I immediately fell in love with the piano. The thought of infinite creativity and infinite combinations of notes to create any music that I wanted sparked my enjoyment every time I played the piano. That feeling still resides within myself today, nearly eleven years later.

After many years of playing this instrument, I became fascinated with its history. I've seen a lot of instruments' history and timelines, but none really undergo the amount of change that the piano does. The piano didn't start as the wonderful electrical keyboards that we see today. In fact, the piano didn't even start out as the piano, but as a basic instrument that is not well known! Let's explore the history of this great instrument and see the changes that were made in it leading up to present day.

 

History of the Piano:

The piano has always been known as a percussion instrument. Even though it has strings, the hammer striking those strings is what makes it a part of the percussion section and not the strings section. What if I told you, though, that the piano's ancestor was a string instrument? Oddly enough, it's true. Dating back to the 6th century in Greece as a scientific measuring tool, the monochord was seen as one of the earliest ancestors to the modern day piano (Britannica.com, n.d.). It had a singular string, with a moveable bridge over a box that would produce different sounds and pitches at different intervals (this could also be seen as a ancestor to the guitar and other string instruments). Although the monochord wasn't a direct ancestor to the piano, the dulcimer certainly was. The dulcimer was an instrument from the middle east dating back to around the 11th century and was more closely related to the modern piano. You had strings with tension over a resonating box that you would hit with a hammer. Modern acoustic pianos have hammers that hit strings to produce sound, thus why the dulcimer was referenced as the true starting point (Yamaha.com, n.d.). 

The first instrument to be acknowledged as part of the keyboard family was the clavichord. It was one of the first steps towards the modern piano. The clavichord was created as an improvement of the organ during the 14th century (Renaissance Era). Instead of  having a burst of air blast though a pipe to make sound, the clavichord would send a brass rod (called a tangent) to strike a string and send vibrations that would emit a sound up to four or five octaves (Yamaha.com, n.d.). Now we are getting somewhere!

There were many variations of the piano made after this, but the most popular one was the Harpsichord, which spread to many different areas in Europe (created in Italy around 1500 AD or 16th century). This probably is more familiar to you, because this is a common setting on electrical keyboards today. The keyboard in my room and my piano downstairs both have this setting. The Harpsichord is very similar to the modern piano, but with some slight differences. Both had a wooden box protecting the actual instrument and both had strings. The major differences between the two, however, where that the harpsichord had two rows of keys on top of one another and that the strings were plucked inside instead of being struck by a hammer (Suzy, 2014). They may not sound that different at first, but the strings inside the Harpsichord being plucked meant that there were no dynamics when pushing down a key. Whether you slammed the keys or gently pressed them, it would always produce the same level of sound. That changes music drastically. Imagine if your favorite song was played pianissimo (very soft) or your least favorite song was played forte (loud) all the time with no change in dynamics. Those songs would no longer be enjoyable anymore. This is why the modern design of the piano is so important in music. The ability to control the dynamics of the note is what makes it so great.

The first piano was created by Bartolomeo Cristofori (1655-1731) of Italy. After years of not being able to change the volume at which a piece was played, Cristofori designed the string and hammer around the year 1700 AD (Yamaha.com, n.d.). The instrument was named "Pianoforte" or "loud soft". Now pianos could express new emotions through dynamics and volume control, giving the performer unlimited creativity.

After the Pianoforte, the piano slowly evolved into many different variations, such as the square piano, the upright piano, the grand piano (up to 11 feet long) and finally, the digital piano. The digital piano was first created in 1946 and quickly changed as technology did to where we are today. With many preinstalled sounds on a hard drive of an acoustic piano, the digital piano no longer needed the strings of classical acoustic pianos. Even though digital pianos are cheaper these days (brand new), I still prefer the rich sounds of the concert grand piano.

 

Visual Examples:

The history of the piano is huge and difficult to cover in one whole blog post (I tried my best). I found some videos on YouTube of different instruments being played and explaining their background.

No particular song, just some great examples!

This is a video showing the Clavichord by Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment. I really like his videos and the detail he goes into these instruments. The clavichord was one of the more quiet ancestors of the modern day piano and I find its sound to be beautiful. It is a very limited instrument, however, and it doesn't have a whole lot of keys to work with. Dynamics were again, not introduced yet.

"Concerto No.1 in D Minor" by Johann Sebastian Bach (Germany, Baroque Period)

This is a video I found a year ago and absolutely loved. Being a classical musician myself, this Bach piece was one of my favorite. Warner Classics on YouTube captured this amazing example of a Harpsichord in "Concerto No.1 in D Minor BWV 1052" played by Jean Rondeau and a number of other violinists and cello players surrounding him. You can definitely hear the intensity at which the Harpsichord plays. There were no dynamics in the Harpsichord, so that's why the song is in forte.

"Skylark" improvisation by Robert Dimbleby

For the final video I will post a song on the digital piano. I know, that's a pretty big jump from the Harpsichord, however, most pianos sound similar after the Pianoforte. So, this song is on a really nice keyboard with great sound quality. Skylark isn't a song, but a jazz standard that is one of the most beautiful ones I have ever heard. I have played this standard myself, but can't nearly come to the talent and skill of Robert Dimbleby. His playing is unmatched with dynamics and emotion. This video is a wonderful representation of the difference in music when you add dynamics and volume control to the piano (basically, the Clavichord to the Pianoforte). I hope you enjoy this video!

 

Music Elements Analysis:

 

The videos were a great representation of the evolution of the piano. Here are two of the elements that I will be analyzing about these pieces you hear in these videos.

 

Dynamics: The dynamics in each of these videos is obvious. The Clavichord was very soft, but diverse in its range of sounds and design. The Harpsichord was fairly loud and, because of its design, could not be played any louder or any softer. Finally, the digital keyboard seen in the last video is a very modernized electrical version of the Grand Piano and the Pianoforte, but the same rule of this musical element still applies. You can hear in the song the emotion and expression brought forth by the dynamics and volume of each chord and phrase. Clearly, the hammer-action replication taking place digitally inside this piano, offers more range for the the performer as they can now change the intensity, length, and emotion displayed by a note or piece.

 

 

Timbre: The timbre or sound quality changed a lot throughout the years. Most of the earliest pianos were very short and had short strings, giving them a worse sound quality (as you could probably hear in the Clavichord compared to the digital piano). The larger the piano, the longer the strings and the better the timbre. So, a grand piano will always sound better than a small upright piano. However, with the increase in technological advancements in keyboards, the piece that Robert Dimbleby plays on his really nice keyboard sounds much better than even some of the small upright acoustic pianos that I have played. This is because digital keyboards these days are often implemented with acoustic grand piano sounds, thus giving them a better timbre/ sound quality. As pianos evolved throughout the years, the length of their strings and their shape slowly got better and better until now where there is a much better sound quality. Trust me, I have played on a 11-foot Concert Grand Piano and it sounds so much better than the old piano I played at my piano lessons which was either a 50-year-old Baby Grand Piano or a 100-year-old Upright Bar Piano. The difference in the length of the strings is insane and it definitely helps the timbre.

My Reaction and Aesthetic Preferences:

Upon hearing these old cousins of the piano, I was honestly shocked. The tone, timbre, and dynamics have changed drastically over the years. Personally, I have either seen or played most of the instruments in this blog, so I know what they sound like. When it comes down to preference, I definitely prefer the traditional acoustic piano. I know that technology has become amazing (especially in digital pianos), however, the quality that comes with an acoustic piano is unmatched. You can't perfectly replicate that sound. As for the Clavichord and Harpsichord, I really like their sound, but not as much. They both have a very nasal tone and done sound that great by themselves. Not to mention you cannot turn the volume up or down! While I believe these instruments have their respective places in music, the acoustic piano simply sounds the most beautiful. It's the most diverse of the three, so I would definitely take the piano in Robert Dimbleby's video over the Clavichord in Orchestra the Age of Enlightenment's video any day.

Sources:

“Monochord.” Encyclopædia Britannica, Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc., www.britannica.com/art/monochord.

“The Origins of the Piano The Story of the Piano's Invention.” The Origins of the Piano:The Story of the Piano's Invention - Musical Instrument Guide - Yamaha Corporation, www.yamaha.com/en/musical_instrument_guide/piano/structure/.

*, Name. “The Evolution of the Piano: From the Harpsichord to the Modern Grand.” TakeLessons Blog, 14 Feb. 2019, takelessons.com/blog/piano-evolution.

"Bach: Harpsichord Concerto No.1 in D Minor BWV 1052 (Jean Rondeau)." YouTube, uploaded by  

    Warner Classics, 27 Jan. 2017, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XcsfDxojdV8

"Skylark | Robert Dimbleby." YouTube, uploaded by Robert Dimbleby, 1 Jan. 2021, 

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cgzmQKn-G2c

"Introducing the Clavichord." YouTube, uploaded by Orchestra the Age of Enlightenment, 29 Aug. 

    2018, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcfl3lYQy9M&t=101s