Piano Guidance
Piano Guidance
Photo: Charles Parker
Sitting in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York is the world's oldest piano. Dating from 1720, the piano was one of the earliest creations by Bartolomeo Cristofori, the inventor of the piano.
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Read More »The very first piano made by Cristofori in 1700 is no longer in existence, but the title given to it, gravicembalo col piano e forte, reminds us of the essential characteristic of early pianos; playing loud and soft. Indeed, gravicembalo col piano e forte translates to “harpsichord with soft and loud”. And this is exactly what Cristofori was striving for. Prior to the piano, keyboard instruments such as the harpsichord or clavichord could not make significant changes in dynamics. Cristofori’s pianos changed that. The new mechanism that created the sound, the striking of the string with a hammer rather than plucking the strings with a quill as happens in a harpsichord, allowed control over dynamics. Composers grasped the possibilities presented by the piano and in 1732 Lodovico Giustini published his twelve Sonate da cimbalo di piano e forte detto volgarmente di martelletti; the first piano music ever written. Giustini leapt at the piano’s ability to use dynamics with pianos and fortes littering the score. The oldest piano is constructed similarly to Italian harpsichords from the same period, being housed in a wing-shaped case with a single keyboard. A noticeable feature in contrast with modern pianos is the total of only fifty four keys rather than eighty eight. The sound is different too, the thin strings create a timbre that is equally similar to a harpsichord as a modern piano. This timbre resulted in the Italian writer and critic Francesco Scipione, marchese di Maffei describing early pianos as suited for accompanying single instruments or performing alone. Certainly, the world’s oldest piano would not survive a Tchaikovsky or Rachmaninoff concerto!
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Read More »Vexations - The longest known piano piece is Erik Satie's Vexations, if we we overlook the requirement for a piece of music to be “non-repetitive”. Though undated, scholars predict the piece to be dated to around 1893-1894.
Cage underestimated the concert’s duration, which went on for as long as 18 hours. Actor Karl Schenzer was present throughout, and the concert received coverage by the New York Times. The 1971 Guinness Book of Records stated that critics from The New York Times fell asleep at 4am, and only six people remained in the audience. One of the enduring overnighters exclaimed, “Encore!” when the concert ended. The following integral performance was in October 1967, at the Arts Lab, located in Drury Lane in London. Performed by Richard Toop, the performance lasted about 24 hours, and was first time anyone had performed the piece solo. Nicolas Horvath also performed a non-stop solo version of the piece in the Palais de Tokyo, in December 2012. The 35-hour performance is regarded as the longest non-stop solo version of the piece! Vexations got another chance to be heard when the alt-classical concert series ChamberLab hosted a marathon performance in December 2017. This event was held at the Hotel Congress in Tucson, Arizona, and it was used as a means to raise funds for the American Civil Liberties Union. The performance, which attracted 34 musicians, raised over $16,731 in pledges and donations. MakerBot industries also programmed one of their robots to perform the piece, which was performed in public at the 2010 New York City Maker Faire.
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