Go to a music shop. On display on the shelves lie notes: collections of piano pieces and etudes, works for voice or any instrument with piano, piano arrangements of orchestral works...
Tell me, have you ever thought ever that this is, in fact, the piano, and why it occupies such an important place in music?
Of course, you are familiar with the piano. It can be seen in concert halls, at the Palace of pioneers in the music school. You see on the TV screens. He is a big and important, stands in the place of honor on the stage, and sometimes, in special cases, he lifted the lid, and the piano is like a huge wondrous bird, waved a wing.
Piano you probably saw in the school or club, or perhaps it is you or your friends. The piano is much more modest of his "noble" family member, takes up less space. And the sound he is weaker than at the piano.
And the piano, and the piano is played in exactly the same way, with the same piece, the music was written for piano.
What is happening here? Why such a strange name?
To answer these questions, let's take a trip into the distant past. Very long ago, in Ancient Greece, during the time of Pythagoras, which every schoolboy knows the famous theorem that there was a musical instrument, which was called the monochord (monos - Greek one, chorde - string). It was a long and narrow wooden box with a tight top string. From a box, made of special wood, depended timbre and volume. String tightly attached to the drawer fixed pedestals, and besides them there was another - mobile. She moved along the string, shortening the vibrating part of it, again extending and changing the pitch.
Gradually to one string were added others. Played on them by pinching pastry edges together strings with your fingers or special plates - plectrum (mediators), and sometimes hitting the string, sticks, hammers.
Centuries went by, the instrument continued to improve. The box was rectangular, and on one of its sides is the keyboard, that is the row of keys (from Latin clavis - key). Now the player pressed the button, and they set in motion the so-called PTT switch - metal plates. The PTT switch touched the strings, and they began to sound. This tool was called clavichord (from Latin clavis and Greek chorde). He should have been put on the table and play standing up.
Of course, nobody believed this tool is the ultimate sophistication. It appeared, according to scientists, in the XII century, and for five centuries masters from different countries tried to improve it. To the sound became stronger, decided on each key to put not one, but several strings, increased the size of the mailbox.
Over time, clavichord began to make a few keyboards. They were placed one above the other in the form of a ladder. Each keyboard corresponded to a specific register of the instrument. Sound clavichord was very sweet and melodious. The contractor wish could play louder or quieter. Slightly twist the key, he thereby rocked the string, causing a kind of fluttering sound. Contemporaries wrote about clavichord: "It is more suitable for home and gentle music than pop or large areas". He is "...consolation in suffering and other involved in the fun".
But was clavichord and significant drawback: despite all improvements, large volume and failed to achieve. Of course, "comfort in suffering" clavichord only very rich people. After all, he was a luxury item, decoration living rooms and salons. Therefore, the clavichord was doing elegant, beautifully adorned with mother-of-pearl, tortoise, precious wood. At the end of the seventeenth century in France the lower keys (those that modern pianos are white) began to carve ebony, and the top covered with ivory. They say it was done so on a dark background is better allocated elegant white hands ladies-clavichordist.
However, to play on the keyboard was not very convenient: the dark keys are merged, the boundaries between them were invisible. And in the XVIII century the arrangement of colors on the keyboard has changed. It became so, what we see now at pianos. Clavichord was not the only keyboard instrument. At the same time have evolved another like him in the other countries named in different ways: clavicembalo, Cembalo, virginal, harpsichord. The last name, the most common, eventually became a General, collective for all varieties of this instrument.
Unlike clavichord, the strings of the harpsichord were of different lengths, and it is determined characteristic form, which is then moved to the piano. Initially, it was also a box that was put on the table. Later the same instrument stood on its own legs - sleek, chiseled.
The sound of the harpsichord was not removed by the blow, and a pinch: key resulted in the movement of the elastic tabs (most often they were made of bird feathers), which was hooked the string. He was stronger than clavichord, but not so expressive and beautiful. The contractor could not affect its quality, as when playing on clavichord. Whatever force or hit the keys, did it sharply or gently - nothing changed.
In order to diversify the sound, the master was invented various devices. So, did the tools with multiple keyboards, differing from each other by the degree of volume. Finally a pedal - lever, which you need to press the leg. With its help, you were suddenly to attenuate the sound.
The harpsichord was not only household tools. He was involved in various bands, even in the orchestra, where he performed the role of accompaniment. For harpsichord sat conductor. With his left hand he was playing the chords, and the right led the orchestra. Significant was the role of the harpsichord as a solo instrument. Plays were written by many composers of the XVII - XVIII centuries: Italian, French, German, English. In the history of music called harpsichord. The most famous French clavecinists - Couperin, Daquin, Rameau. They wrote dances for harpsichord, such as the minuet, Gavotte, rigadoon, created a kind of musical portraits and pictures: "the Reapers", "Knitter", "Florentine", "Gypsy", "Butterflies" and "Chicken". These elegant little pieces, richly adorned with melismas, were quite in the spirit of the time, when wore powdered wigs, dresses with lots of ribbons and lace. This "gallant style" really fit the tone of the harpsichord sound resembling a plucked string instruments, but more full and rich.
All musical instruments are continually being improved. Continued search and keyboard wizard. And here in 1711, in the Italian city of Padua harpsichord master Bartolomé Cristofori invented a new instrument. The sound was extracted with wooden mallets with upholstered elastic material heads. Now the performer could play quieter or louder than the piano or forte. Hence the name of the tool - pianoforte, and later piano. This name has survived to our time and is the umbrella for all stringed keyboard instruments.
The first piano sound were very little like those great tools that you can now see in our concert halls. The mechanism that is used to strike the strings, was still very imperfect, and beginning piano could not successfully compete with recognised at that time the king of musical instruments of the harpsichord. Throughout most of the eighteenth century composers continued to write music for the elder brother of the piano. Meanwhile, a new tool was improved. Complicated the device, changed the location of the strings.
The piano hammer pressing strikes the strings of the same length and thickness. And so with time the pedal (now it is called the soft pedal), which shifts the hammers out of the way so that they are not hit by three strings, and two or one, depending on the desires of the performer. This changes the timbre of the sound and its power. When the pianist presses a key, the hammer strikes the strings. From them bounces felt pad - muffler (damper). Strings trembling from shock - vibrate - and there is sound. If the muffler is not moved away from the strings, the sound was dull and short. And if the muffler was not at all, the strings would fluctuate much longer than necessary, and instead of music heard continuous rumble. So the silencer is a very important part of the tool, Release the key and the sound stopped. But not because the place was back hammer: he had bounced off the strings so as not to disturb her to hesitate. Now place back muffler. He clung tightly to the string and choked sound.
Another pedal - right, then appeared at the piano, began to take the mufflers from the strings. By pressing it, you can release the keys, but the sound will still last a long time, until you die, because the pedal will not allow silencers back in place. The right pedal is allowed to enter in piano music, new paint, new interesting effects.
Throughout the nineteenth century there were two main types of piano: horizontal piano (French royal - Royal) with housing in the form of the wing and vertical - piano (Italian pianino - a little piano). The piano is a concert instrument. It is used where a full, powerful sound. The piano we meet in those places where it is impossible to put a big and bulky piano, where you can get a smaller power of sound.
Many composers of the XIX and XX century was written for piano. They are attracted by its immense possibilities. Its range includes the ranges of almost all other musical instruments. The power of sound can be very different, from the lightest pianissimo to a powerful fortissimo. The piano playing and singing melodies and polyphonic chords, and virtuoso passages. The instrument can sound gently like a flute, and maybe like an entire orchestra. For piano wrote Beethoven, Schubert, Schumann, Mendelssohn, Chopin and Grieg, Tchaikovsky, Mussorgsky, Balakirev, Rachmaninoff and Scriabin.
A very important role in the potential of this instrument was played by the Sheet, which is not only composed piano pieces, but shifted to different piano works written for Symphony orchestra, until the symphonies of Beethoven. Leaf wanted to prove that the piano is not inferior to the orchestra in their expressive, artistic opportunities.
"Soul of the piano" was called the great Polish composer Chopin. Almost all his works he created only for piano.
A lot of music for piano written by Soviet composers - Prokofiev, Shostakovich, Khachaturian, Kabalevsky and others. The whole world knows the famous pianists from Liszt and Chopin, who were not only composers, but also outstanding performers on this instrument, to the brothers Anton and Nicholas Rubinstein.
Huge popularity and love of the audience enjoyed Sviatoslav Richter, Emil Gilels, Arturo michelangely, Glenn Gould, van Cliburn, Eliso Virsaladze, Vladimir Krainev, Dmitri Bashkirov, Mikhail Pletnev and other