When my husband and I moved into our house back in 2014, we inherited an old upright piano. Throughout the years, my husband has done a lot of work on it, but it was still an old crappy piano that would not stay in tune. My favorite part of it was the fact that he took off and kept off the front cover the piano so you could the inner workings of the instrument as you played (albeit out of tune). I really enjoyed being able to see the mechanism of the little hammers hit the strings in response to the keys being pressed. But we are now going to be inheriting another old piano that belongs to my husband's family, and that he grew up playing as a kid (and it actually works and is tunable, unlike the one we have). In preparation of receiving this new-to-us piano, we had to say goodbye to the old one. Because of the horrible condition it was in, it was definitely not worth even giving away (because pianos are SO expensive to move), so my husband decided to take it apart to have more manageable pieces to dispose of. I think this process completely delighted him, and it delighted me to experience his delight 😀, especially as he walked me through some of the more intricate and complex pieces of the internal works of a piano. He showed me things like how the pedals work to do things like sustain the sound and how sound board vibrates to create sound.
Whenever I learn about how things work, I always ask myself, "How did someone come up with this?" Thanks to internet, I am often able to answer this question, at least partially. A quick Wikipedia search taught me that the piano was invented in the 1700s, but was based on other instruments like the hammered dulcimer, which uses hammers or mallets to strike strings, instead of plucking them (apparently that's the difference between a "stringed" instrument and a "percussion" instrument. For example, a harp is a stringed instrument because you pluck the strings but the piano is a percussion instrument because the strings are struck by hammers). The hammered dulcimer probably originated in the Middle East about the year 900, but required a human to physically hold the mallets to strike the strings, while the piano used a keyboard to control the hammers. Another big difference between the piano and similar instruments of its day that did use keyboards (like the harpsichord which could play loudly and the clavichord which could only play softly) was that the piano could play at a variety of volumes, from loud to soft. Bartolomeo Cristofori originally named his invention "un cimbalo di cipresso di piano e forte" (Italian for "a keyboard of cypress with soft and loud"), which was eventually shortened to pianoforte or fortepiano, and later, simply, piano. Fascinating!
I unfortunately never really learned to play the piano. I didn't have one growing up, but I did have a dinky little keyboard that I taught myself how to play on. I learned to play some Hanson songs by ear, and I practiced a few songs I had sheet music for like Canon in D, Trois Gymnopedies, Fur Elise, etc. I would play around with the piano at church, and my best friend had a piano that he would always play for me. In college, when I lived at my music sorority, I practiced piano occasionally, and even performed a song from the movie Amelie for a recital. I always wished that I had had the opportunity to take piano lessons as a kid, but maybe this new piano will inspire me to buy a book for beginners and start over with my piano learning. I really do love the instrument, and maybe I will delight in re-learning how to play it as much as I have been delighted learning about how it physically works!
With delight,
♥Jamie
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