*News Flash*
Zebra's and Pianos may share same DNA!!
I've always wondered if these two creatures were genetically related..

Tiny Harpsichord threatened by hungry Grand Piano

Ships Piano
Here’s another small, slightly portable and largely neglected keyboard instrument. Designed by JB Cramer and Sons of London in the late 1800’s, the ships piano (or yacht piano) was built especially for the cramped confines of Victorian pleasure boats. The perfect thing for a little sea bound entertainment in the good old pre-ipod days of the empire.

A ships piano is basically a tiny rudimentary upright piano with a five octave keyboard that folds upwards to save space. It has no bottom half and sits either on a low table or a stand with a small leather and chain contraption dangling from its bottom that loops around the foot for the sustain pedal.

Because of its small frame size it struggles with low notes so the bass strings are very wide gauge and particularly flabby, resulting in a strange almost atonal metallic sound in the lower reaches.

Italian polygonal virginal after Pertici (1684) by Matthew Redsell (Toronto) 1980

This style of instrument was popular starting around 1460 through to the end of the 17th century.
Compass CC/EE to c''', 45 notes but short octave bass gives effective compass of four octaves. Transposing keyboard, A=440 or 415 without loss of any note. Single strung in brass and phosphor bronze. Case in pine with cherry mouldings and trim, cherry keytops and sharps, dust cover of birch and luan ply with pine mouldings finished with cherry stain. Pegged stand in pine.

Decorative Soundboard on a Harpsichord, pity this tradition did not catch on with Grand Pianos...

MAKING THE 1690 CRISTOFORI OVAL SPINET COPY

After the discovery in 2000 of the 'missing' Cristofori oval spinet made for the Medici in a palazzo once belonging to the antiquarian Bardini, the instrument was transfered to the Galleria dell'Accademia in Florence (famous for housing the Michelangelo statue of David) . The oval spinet is one of two very similar instruments, the other is dated 1693 and is now in the Leipsig instrument museum. The Galleria dell'Accademia includes a gallery of musical instruments of the conservatory, comprising the vestiges of the Medici collection of musical instruments. These include a famous ebony harpsichord also made by Cristofori for the Medici

It was decided to carry out a series of analyses and measurements, incuding x-rays, analyses of the woods and metals used. Also I made a CAD plan of the instrument and keyboard. This was done by mounting a laser pointer on a system of sliding beams mounted above the instrument, and reading off the x and y coordinates of various points (along the edges of the case, bridges etc. and the pin positions) from metal rules (the system would be suitable for automization given time and money). The positions and dimensions of internal parts were taken from the full size x-ray and direct measurement (through cracks and openings in the case).

Harling Cottage Upright (London)

http://shafferpianos.com/harling/
This mid-nineteenth century London piano is one of the most unique and ornate upright pianos we have ever seen. It features a beautifully styled case with bookmatched burled walnut, brass candelabra, and Chippendale-style legs. The ivory naturals and ebony sharps are rounded on the fronts. The sound of the piano is also warm and charming. This instrument would make an outstanding addition to any fine antiques collection, perfectly complementing any Victorian, Chippendale, or British furniture collection.

Ornate Oak Upright Piano by Mathushek

The Mathushek Piano Company was established in 1852 in New York, later moving to Connecticut. Mathushek Pianos are generally considered among the finest American pianos built during the early nineteenth century. They were known for making high quality, heavily constructed pianos. This beautiful oak upright piano is in excellent original condition with carved, foliate design to the front, double column legs and and ivory and ebony keyboard.

1885 Chickering Square Grand

Square grand pianos preceded the modern grand. They were used by the greatest composers of the 18th century including Bach and Mozart. They came into existence in the United States during the 1820s and were the primary piano produced through the 1880s.

1906 PLEYEL BABY GRAND

Stunning Four Piece Diamond Matched Rosewood Veneer
Ignace Pleyel was not only a successful piano designer and manufacturer, but notable pianist and composer, and a student of Haydn. Pleyel composed more than 60 symphonies, a number of string quartets, 8 concertos, 2 operas and various chamber works.

[IMG]http://shafferpianos.com/pleyel1906/pleyel(inside).jpg[/IMG]
[IMG]http://shafferpianos.com/pleyel1906/pleyel(keys)-a.JPG[/IMG]

French Art-Case Piano by Gaveau
A rare and beautiful harpsichord-style, art-case piano painted inside and out with floral designs and supported by a base with six turned legs and heavy shaped stretchers. The piano has an iron frame and a full 88 keyboard with perfect ivory keytops. All the original paintings are perfectly intact, and the piano mechanism is restored.

Gaveau was a French firm of piano and harpsichord makers. Joseph Gaveau (b. Paris, 1824; d. Paris 1903) founded the firm in 1847, working with his employees in a small shop in the rue des Vinaigriers in Paris; the workshop and the offices were later transferred to the rue Servan. The firm established an excellent reputation for its smaller pianos. Gaveau was a competitor of Erard and Pleyel, and built exceptional instruments, with highly decorative cases. This rare piano is an outstanding example of how Gaveau blended elements of early eighteenth century harpsichord style in their piano making.

Mitts off Zorba...this one's mine!!!

Simon Starling, Inverted Retrograde Theme, 2001. Secession, Vienna.

Starling’s work does exhibit a creative process, indeed it can be said to represent creative process. But his approach is of particular interest to the discussion in this chapter because it flags an intersection between the autonomous association of ideas and rational-analytical processes.

Thus, in Inverted Retrograde Theme, 2001, Starling creates a connection between sculptural processes and an instance of artistic system in the form of Arnold Schönberg’s twelve-tone technique of musical composition which uses the chromatic semitone scale rather than the more harmonious diatonic scale. The score illustrated in Fig. 1 is from one of Schoenberg’s students Anton Webern’s Concerto which uses Schoenberg’s twelve tone technique.




Simon Starling, detail from Inverted Retrograde Theme, 2001. Secession, Vienna.



Toshio Iwai, Piano as Image Media, 1995.

The viewer-participant uses a trackball to create patterns on 'player-piano' music scroll that moves up to a grand piano that plays notes accompanied by patterns of coloured light that emanate from the keyboard.
In Piano As Image Media, 1995, the viewer-participant uses a trackball to construct a (virtual) music-box scroll represented as a sheet of transparent material made up of a matrix of dots of light that moved upwards towards a piano keyboard. When the light dots reached the keyboard they activated the piano creating tonal structures without the need to know how to use the piano keyboard. A vertical screen ascended from the piano to the roof generating three-dimensional abstract patterns as interpretations of the tonal picture.

Aunt Louie Boyd's Piano
Piano showroom ad from the Henry Piano Company, 1909

*Prepared Piano*