Piano: Difference between revisions

A piano is a musical instrument with a keyboard. It has strings which are stuck by hammers when one or more of its 88 keys are depressed.

It is said to have been invented by Bartolomeo Cristofori, who originally called it a "gravicembalo col piano e forte" -- a large harpsichord with soft and loud. "Pianoforte" stuck as the name for the instrument.

Early pianos had wooden frames, two strings per note, and deerskin-covered hammers. The development of the modern piano owes much to the collaboration between Beethoven and the English firm of Broadwood: as Beethoven grew progressively more deaf, the instruments that Broadwood sent him grew progressively larger, louder, and more robustly constructed -- iron frames, three strings per note, the modern felt-covered hammer.

Much great music has been written for the piano...

A person who plays a piano is known as a pianist.

The keys for a piano are white and black. The lower notes are the the leftmost ones, with the highest notes as the rightmost ones. Typically piano music is written with a treble clef and a bass clef. Each group of 12 notes is an octave (so called, because there are eight whole notes, or white keys per octave). There are four black notes for the half-steps within an octave.

The pattern for black and white keys is White-Black-White-Black-White-White-Black-White-Black-White-Black-White. (ie: C C# D D# E F F# G G# A A# B )

piano is an instuction in music. It means to play softly. See Also: forte