[rlevinson]

I have recently taken up the piano at age 50+ and am compensating for a lack of talent with enthusiasm and inquisitiveness. I am afraid I bring too much of a mathemetician's approach to my playing and have stumped my teacher with questions on the logic of the instrument. The question I have been unable to resolve is why there are not accidentals between each key. At least in theory, the sound spectrum could be divided this way and it would seem that transpositions would be simpler if there were regular accidentals. My teacher speculates that the current design is influenced by the western ear and culture but I wonder if the causality isn't circular: i.e. design may be influenced by the western ear and culture but over time the culture would be influenced by the design. I would be most grateful for any advice or references that the members could offer. Thank you

R. Levinson

[Bill Kibby]

It's a BIG question! But if you want to email me, I'll do what I can, this may be a long conversation of short emails. Don't worry about maths, it's a great help, music is very logical sometimes, but it would be impossible if we didn't know our A from our B, and the odd design certainly helps us to find our way around the notes. The octave is a natural relationship, one that even animals can recognise, but as far as the division of that octave into smaller intervals is concerned, at a time in history when people around the world couldn't communicate, they still produced very similar musical scales, based on an unneven and illogical arrangement of wholetones and semitones, and it is on this so-called "natural scale" that the keyboard layout is based. Tuning it is a headache though!
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I do not buy, sell or value pianos, but I sometimes rescue pre-1880 pianos in the UK.

My own website: http://www.pianogen.org

Email Bill@PianoGen.org

Piano History Centre