Piano Design Innovations

Friday, March 10, 2006

The design of pianos has changed substantially over the years. The types of pianos that Mozart or other masters played on are much different than the pianos professional players use today. In this article I want to go over some piano design innovations which have been made over the years.

The construction of pianos today is considered to be conventional. Most of the major advances in piano design were made in the 18th century. Many buyers of fine pianos are wary of pianos which are designed differently than pianos which were designed during this period.

Despite this, smaller manufacturers are looking at different ways to build better pianos. Since the beginning of the 21st century, many piano designers have begin using digital methods of constructing them. While improving the piano from a digital perspective is easy, the real challenge comes in trying to design a better mechanical instrument.

The piano designers of the 19th century are seen to have ingenious minds when it came to the construction of mechanical pianos. The pianos built during this time were extremely complex, and there was a much larger market for pianos than there is today.

The Stuart and Sons piano company in Australia manufactures a piano with bridge agraffes. Bridge agraffes are strong metal clips which hold the piano strings in place. They were invented at the beginning of the 18th century and have been a standard piece of equipment in high quality pianos.

A company based in Utah called Astin Weight has introduced two advanced for the upright piano. Their goal is to design the largest soundboard, and their soundboads cover the entire area of the piano. They do this by placing the pinblock to the front of the soundboard, and then they use a metal frame in place of the back posts.

Digital advances in piano technology have made them much more flexible. Many modern digital pianos also have the ability to record as well as play music. These pianos tend to have a combination of the characteristics found in acoustic and digital pianos.

Technological advances continue to be made in digital pianos and electronic keyboards. Many of these devices do not even contain strings. While they may be despised by more traditional pianists, many musicians in the future will gradually begin to use these instrument more due to their low cost.

While creating more advanced mechanical pianos is challenging for designers, digital pianos are rising in popularity.