Ever Wonder Why the Piano Keys are Arranged that Way?
Many people dont know that the piano key layout was already in existence 2000 years before there was ever such a thing as a piano.
The first piano keyboard was invented over 2300 years ago in Greece and only had 7 basic notes based on the first seven letters of the latin alphabet. A, B, C, D, E, F, and G. The instrument was the Hydraulis. To read more about the Hydraulis, click here.
And just like today’s modern piano keyboard, these seven notes repeated themselves within a specific pattern throughout the length of the piano note chart. However, it was missing the accidental keys (black keys). Without the black keys, you can imagine how limited early musicians were in their ability to create complex sounding music compositions.
By the year 757 AD, the Hydraulis had finally found its way into the western world where the Catholic Church adopted it. Here is where it underwent many transformations. However, as late as the year 1200 AD the medieval church organ was still only using the same seven notes it originally inherited from its ancestor.
As the medieval church organist continued to push beyond the boundaries of early music composition and experiment with different theories in music, the original seven piano key notes were eventually joined with five additional (and very useful) “half-tones”.
The incorporation of these five additional piano key notes, gave the world of music a wide variety of scales and modes, fourteen new key signatures, and an almost infinite number of chord possibilities.
But it was the 18th century that ushered in the golden age of the pipe organ with a culmination of organ works composed by the most celebrated organist the world had ever know: Johann Sebastian Bach.
(Source: get-piano-lessons.com)
