As the title says, types of piano, let me give you a brief intro about the piano. The piano is an acoustic, stringed musical instrument invented in Italy by Bartolomeo Cristofori di Francesco around the year 1700.
The strings struck by wooden hammers coated with a softer material and played using a keyboard, that the performer presses down or strikes with the fingers and thumbs of both hands to cause the hammers to strike the strings.
Now let us understand the configurations of modern pianos, such as the grand piano and the upright piano, with various styles of each.
GRAND PIANO
In grand pianos, with the strings extending away from the keyboard, the frame and strings are horizontal. The action lies beneath the strings and uses gravity as its means of return to a state of rest.
There are multiple sizes of a grand piano:
Baby grand (around 1.5 m)
Parlor grand, or boudoir grand (1.7 to 2.2 m)
Concert grand (between 2.2 and 3 m)
All being equal, longer pianos with longer strings have larger, richer sound and lower inharmonicity (partial) of the strings. The higher the partial, the further sharp it runs. Pianos with shorter and thicker strings have more inharmonicity. The greater the inharmonicity, the more harshness of tone. Smaller grands satisfy the space and cost needs of domestic use; It uses them in some small teaching studios and smaller performance venues.
UPRIGHT PIANO
Upright pianos (vertical pianos) are more compact because of the vertical structure of the frame and strings. Upright pianos took less space than a grand piano, and they were a better size for private homes for domestic music-making and practice.
The hammers move horizontally and return to their resting position via springs. Upright pianos with unusually tall frames and long strings sometimes marketed as upright grand pianos, but that label is misleading. Upright pianos are less expensive than grand pianos.
Upright pianos widely used in churches, schools, music conservatories and university music programs as rehearsal and practise instruments, and they are popular models for in-home purchase.
TOY PIANO
The toy or player piano is a small piano-like instrument that uses round metal rods to produce sound, rather than strings. The US recognizes the toy piano as a unique instrument. A machine perforates a performance recording into rolls of paper, and the player piano replays the performance using pneumatic devices. Modern equivalents of the player piano include the Bosendorfer CEUS, Yamaha Dis-klavier and QRS Pianomation, using solenoids and MIDI rather than pneumatics and rolls.
SILENT PIANO
A silent piano is an acoustic piano having an option to silence the strings by an interposing hammer bar. They designed for private silent practice, to avoid disturbing others. This rare instrument has a lever under the keyboard to move the keyboard relative to the strings so a pianist can play in a familiar key while the music sounds in a different key.
MINI PIANO
The mini piano is an instrument that has a braceless back, and a soundboard positioned below the keys that long metal rods pulled on the levers to make the hammers strike the strings. The first model, known as the Pianette, was unique in that the tuning pins extended through the instrument, so they could tune it at the front.
PREPARED PIANO
The prepared piano is a piano with objects placed inside it to alter its sound, or has had its mechanism changed in some other way. The scores for music for the prepared piano specify the modifications, for example, instructing the pianist to insert pieces of rubber, paper, metal screws, or washers in between the strings. These objects mute the strings or alter their timbre.
PEDAL PIANO
The pedal piano is a rare piano that has a pedal keyboard at the base. The pedals may play the existing bass strings on the piano, or rarely, the pedals may have their own set of bass strings and hammer mechanisms. While the typical intended use for pedal pianos is to enable a keyboardist to practice pipe organ music at home, a few players of pedal piano use it as a performance instrument.
ELECTRIC PIANO
The electric piano used metal strings with a magnetic pickup, an amplifier, and a loudspeaker. The electric pianos that became most popular in pop and rock music. It uses metal tines in place of strings and uses electromagnetic pickups similar to those on an electric guitar.
The resulting electrical, analogue signal can amplify with a keyboard amplifier or electronically manipulated. Electric pianos used in classical music, where the main usage of them is an as inexpensive rehearsal or practise instruments in music schools.
ELECTRONIC PIANO
Electronic pianos are non-acoustic and do not have strings, tines or hammers, but are a synthesizer that simulates or imitates piano sounds using oscillators and filters that synthesize the sound of an acoustic piano. They connected to a keyboard amplifier and speaker to produce sound. Alternatively, a person can play an electronic piano with headphones.
DIGITAL PIANO
Digital pianos are also non-acoustic and do not have strings or hammers. They use digital sampling technology to reproduce the acoustic sound of each piano note accurately. They also connected to a power amplifier and speaker to produce sound. Digital pianos can include sustenance pedals, weighted or semi-weighted keys, multiple voice options and MIDI interfaces. MIDI inputs and outputs connect a digital piano to other electronic instruments or musical devices.
HYBRID INSTRUMENTS
As the latest version, some pianos included an acoustic grand piano or upright piano combined with MIDI electronic features. Such a piano can play acoustically, or the keyboard used as a MIDI controller, which can trigger a synthesizer module or music sampler. Sensors record the movements of the keys, hammers, and pedals during a performance, and the system saves the performance data as a Standard MIDI File (SMF). On playback, the solenoids move the keys and pedals and thus reproduce the original performance.
Reproducing systems have ranged from relatively simple, playback-only models to professional models that can record performance data at resolutions that exceed the limits of normal MIDI data. The unit mounted under the keyboard of the piano can play MIDI or audio software on its CD or floppy disk drive.
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Reviewed by Goldsmth
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August 14, 2020
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