The piano has been such a centerpiece of modern music we forget that, in some ways, it’s a relative newcomer. What could be considered the modern piano was invented in about 1700 but wasn’t widely used for another hundred years. Today, of course, we can hardly imagine a popular band without a piano or keyboard.
Read on for more fun facts about one of the most versatile and popular instruments today!
It’s no surprise that the piano has a lot of parts; it’s a complex instrument. But would you have guessed that it has more than 12,000 parts? Or that the tension in the steel strings of a modern piano can pass 20 tons? Wow.
Speaking of large numbers: Erik Satie’s “Vexations” is the longest piano piece ever written. Composed in 1893, the full version lasts a good 19 hours. Perhaps you’d rather check out this 11-minute performance, instead.
One of the most elaborate pianos out there is a Steinway called “Pictures at an Exhibition.” Designed and hand-painted by artist Paul Wyse, it features images depicting Russian musical history and folklore. Each leg is shaped like Baba Yaga’s hut and rests on a bronze hen’s leg. The instrument is remarkable not only for its appearance, but for the fact that Paul Wyse is also an acclaimed concert pianist. See him play his work of art here.
When Bartolomeo Cristofori invented the piano, he called it the “gravicembalo col piano e forte” (harpsichord with soft and loud). Fortunately, that name was eventually whittled down to the considerably more manageable “piano”!
What really set Cristofori’s instrument apart was the hammer mechanism that controlled the volume of sound based on how hard the player pressed a key. The mechanism was so well designed and constructed that, according to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York (where a Cristofori piano is currently on display, see photo), “no other of comparable sensitivity and reliability was devised for another seventy-five years.”