Our Love Affair With Pianos

To be experts in Piano Restoration, you have to have an innate love of the musical instrument itself.  To our modern way of thinking, pianos may appear to have been around forever. However, you may be surprised to hear that the instrument we know and love as a piano today, was in fact not ‘invented’ until the late 17th century. Prior to this, the closest thing to a piano was the harpsichord – an instrument with a very different look, feel and sound where the strings are plucked rather than hit by a hammer.

We owe the creation of the piano to one Bartolomeno Cristofori who invented the instrument for his extremely wealthy patron, Ferdinando de Medici. The piano he designed was incredibly expensive and was thus enjoyed only by the gentry, nobility and royalty – being well out of the price range for even the wealthiest of the merchant classes.

Piano gets its Black Keys

Later, in the mid 18th century, a German by the name of Johann Zumpe fled to London where he set to redesigning and refining the Cristofori piano by adding the black keys we see today. Unfortunately, this led to the perception that the new ‘Zumpe’ piano was difficult to play and it may well have disappeared into obscurity if it wasn’t for one lucky break…Zumpe was somehow able to persuade Johan Christian Bach (youngest son of Johan Sebastian Bach) to buy and, importantly PLAY, one of his instruments. Bach’s fame ultimately led to the Zumpe piano replacing the harpsichord as the instrument of choice.

The Zumpe piano was still exorbitantly expensive though, and owning one was seen as a symbol of one’s social status. The French revolution in 1789 and the demise of the aristocracy there, led to piano music becoming available to a wider audience via concert halls and the like and led to an increased demand for instruments with louder volume and longer sustain. The age of more industrialised piano manufacturing began.

Moving into the 19th Century, and with the Industrial Revolution in full swing creating wealthy Victorian industrialists; owning a piano increasingly became a sign of upward mobility.

Demonstrating that:

a) one could afford to buy a piano, and
b) that someone in the household (usually the wife/daughters) could play one, signifying they had the leisure time to learn.

We could say then, that our love affair with pianos really began in the 19th century when they became more accessible to people; even the poorest in society would have had some exposure to pianos/piano playing thanks to pubs and music halls of the day.

Our Changing Relationship With Pianos

Even until quite recently pianos, particularly uprights, were a feature in many middle-class homes; the arrival of alternative forms of accessing music such as radio, TV, record players etc undoubtedly caused the demise of the piano in many households.

Many of the second-hand pianos currently on the market in London and elsewhere probably date back to the explosion of homeownership from Victorian times onward, and as a consequence will require restoration in order to sound their best.

Protecting Pianos is vital

Whilst the modern, electronic pianos are gaining ground in our post analogue world, nothing can replace the look, feel and sound of a real piano. Courtney Pianos are experts in restoration; when a piano leaves our capable hands it will be as close to its original style and character as possible.

Is your piano in need of a restoration? If so, please, get in touch today for a free consultation.