A musical keyboard is the set of adjacent depressible levers or keys on a musical instrument, particularly the piano. A musical instrument is a device constructed or modified for the purpose of making Music. Keyboards typically contain keys for playing the twelve notes of the Western musical scale, with a combination of larger, longer keys and smaller, shorter keys that repeats at the interval of an octave. In Music, a scale is a group of musical notes collected in ascending and descending order that provides material for or is used to conveniently represent part or all In Music, an octave ( is the the use of which is "common in most musical systems Depressing a key on the keyboard causes the instrument to produce sounds, either by mechanically striking a string or tine (piano,electric piano); plucking a string (harpsichord, clavichord); causing air to flow through a pipe ( organ); or strike a bell ( carillon). The piano is a Musical instrument played by means of a keyboard that produces sound by striking steel strings with Felt covered hammers An electric piano is an electric Musical instrument. The popularity of the electric piano began to grow in the late 1960s, reaching its greatest height during the A harpsichord is a Musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. The clavichord is a European stringed Keyboard instrument known from the late Medieval, through the Renaissance, Baroque and Classical The organ (from Greek όργανον – organon "organ instrument tool" is a Keyboard instrument of one or more divisions each A carillon (/kaʁijɔ̃/ /ˈkærɪljɒn/ or /kəˈrɪljən/ is a Musical instrument consisting of at least 23 cast bronze cup-shaped bells which are played On electric and electronic keyboards, depressing a key connects a circuit ( Hammond organ, digital piano, synthesizer). The Hammond organ is an electric organ which was invented by Laurens Hammond in 1934 and manufactured by the Hammond Organ Company A digital piano is a modern Electronic musical instrument designed to serve primarily as an alternative to a traditional Piano, both in the way it feels to play Since the most commonly encountered keyboard instrument is the piano, the keyboard layout is often referred to as the "piano keyboard. "
Contents |
Description
The twelve notes of the Western musical scale are laid out with the lowest note on the left; the larger keys (for the seven "natural" notes of the C major scale: C, D, E, F, G, A, B) jut forward. In Music, a scale is a group of musical notes collected in ascending and descending order that provides material for or is used to conveniently represent part or all In Music, a scale is a group of musical notes collected in ascending and descending order that provides material for or is used to conveniently represent part or all Because these keys are often coloured white on a keyboard, these are often called the white notes or white keys. The keys for the remaining five notes which are not part of the C major scale (namely C♯/D♭, D♯/E♭, F♯/G♭, G♯/A♭, A♯/B♭) are set back. Because these keys are often coloured black, these notes are often called the black notes or black keys. The pattern repeats at the interval of an octave. In Music, an octave ( is the the use of which is "common in most musical systems
The arrangement of longer keys for C major with intervening, shorter keys for the intermediate semitones dates to the 15th century. Many keyboard instruments dating from before the nineteenth century, such as harpsichords and pipe organs, have a keyboard with the colours of the keys reversed - darker coloured keys for the white notes and white keys for the black notes. A few electric and electronic instruments from the 1960s and subsequent decades have also done this; Vox's electronic organs of the 1960s, Farfisa's FAST portable organs, Hohner's Clavinet L, one version of Korg's Poly-800 synthesizer and Roland's digital harpsichords. A Clavinet is an electrophonic Keyboard instrument manufactured by the Hohner company Some 1960s electronic organs used reverse colors or gray sharps or naturals to indicate the lower part(s) of a split keyboard. A split keyboard is a single keyboard which is divided into two parts, each of which produces a different registration or sound. The reverse-colored keys on Hammond organs such as the B3, C3 and A100 are latch-style radio buttons for selecting pre-set sounds. The Hammond organ is an electric organ which was invented by Laurens Hammond in 1934 and manufactured by the Hammond Organ Company A radio button or option button is a type of Graphical user interface widget that allows the user to choose one of a predefined set of options
Size and historical variation
The chromatic compass of keyboard instruments has tended to increase. is a Japanese manufacturer of Electronic musical instruments electronic equipment and Software. Harpsichords often extended over five octaves (61+ keys) in the 18th century, while most pianos manufactured since about 1870 have 88 keys. Some modern pianos have even more notes (a Bösendorfer 225 has 92 and a Bösendorfer 290 "Imperial" has 97 keys). While modern synthesizer keyboards commonly have either 61, 76 or 88 keys, small MIDI controllers are available with 25 notes. Organs normally have 61 keys per manual, though some spinet models have 44 or 49. An organ pedalboard is a keyboard with long pedals which are played by the organist's feet. A pedalboard (also called a pedal keyboard pedal clavier or with electronic instruments a bass pedalboard is a keyboard played with the feet that is usually used to Pedalboards vary in size from 12 to 32 notes.
In a typical keyboard layout, black note keys have uniform width, and white note keys have uniform width and uniform spacing at the front of the keyboard. In the larger gaps between the black keys, the width of the natural notes C, D and E differ slightly from the width of keys F, G, A and B. This allows close to uniform spacing of 12 keys per octave while maintaining uniformity of seven "natural" keys per octave.
Over the last three hundred years, the octave span distance found on historical keyboard instruments (organs, virginals, clavichords, harpsichords, and pianos) has ranged from as little as 125mm to as much as 170mm. The virginals (the plural form does not necessarily denote more than one instrument or virginal is a Keyboard instrument of the Harpsichord family The clavichord is a European stringed Keyboard instrument known from the late Medieval, through the Renaissance, Baroque and Classical A harpsichord is a Musical instrument played by means of a keyboard. The piano is a Musical instrument played by means of a keyboard that produces sound by striking steel strings with Felt covered hammers Modern piano keyboards ordinarily have an octave span of 164-165mm, but several reduced-size standards have been proposed and marketed. A 15/16 size (152 mm octave span) and the 7/8 DS Standard (140 mm octave span) keyboard developed by Christopher Donison in the 1970s and developed and marketed by Steinbuhler & Company. U. S. pianist Hannah Reiman has promoted piano keyboards with narrower octave spans and has a U. S. patent (#6,020,549) on the apparatus and methods for modifying existing pianos to provide interchangeable keyboards of different sizes.
There have been variations in the design of the keyboard to address technical and musical issues. During the sixteenth century, when instruments were often tuned in meantone temperament, some harpsichords were constructed with the G♯ and E♭ keys split into two. Meantone temperament is a Musical temperament, which is a system of Musical tuning. One portion of the G♯ key operated a string tuned to G♯ and the other operated a string tuned to A♭, similarly one portion of the E♭ key operated a string tuned to E♭, the other portion operating a string tuned to D♯. This extended the flexibility of the harpsichord, enabling composers to write keyboard music calling for harmonies containing the so-called wolf fifth (G-sharp♭ to E-flat♯}, but without producing aural discomfort in the listeners. Other examples of variations in keyboard design include the Janko keyboard and the chromatic keyboard systems on the accordion and bandoneón. The Jankó keyboard is a Musical keyboard layout for a Piano designed by Paul von Jankó in 1882. The accordion is a portable box-shaped Musical instrument of the hand-held Bellows -driven free-reed aerophone family sometimes referred to as a Squeezebox The bandoneón is a Free-reed instrument particularly popular in Argentina.
On electric and electronic keyboards, there is an electric switch under each key. Depressing a key connects a circuit, which causes the tone generation mechanism to be triggered. Most electronic keyboards use a matrix circuit in which the rows and columns are made up of wiring. Most electronic keyboards used in Synthesizers Electronic organs and Digital pianos use a keyboard matrix circuit to connect the switches for each Without a matrix circuit, a 61-key keyboard would have to have 61 wires into the integrated circuit of the keyboard. With the matrix circuit, the entire keyboard can send signals to the integrated circuit with two matrices of eight wires that are conceptually arranged into columns and rows. The keyboard controller scans all all of the columns, to determine if a key has been pressed. If a key in the column has been pressed, then the controller scan the rows, to determine which row has been activated. In a manner analogous to the children's board game "Battleship!", the keyboard controller determines which key has been pressed, and then closes the switch for that key's note. This entire process takes place so quickly that the performer is not aware of the delay. [1]
Playing techniques
Despite their apparent similarity, keyboard instruments of different types require different techniques. For instance, a piano will produce a louder note the harder the key is pressed. On the other hand, the volume and timbre of the sound on the pipe organ are dictated by the flow of air from the bellows and the stops selected by the player; in the harpsichord the strings are plucked and the volume of the note is not perceptibly varied by using a different touch on the keyboard. The pipe organ is a Musical instrument that produces sound when pressurized air (wind is driven through a series of pipes, controlled by a keyboard Players of these instruments must use other techniques to color the sound. The arranger keyboard uses preset drum rhythms that respond to chords played in the left hand by the instrumentalist, with other buttons and switches used to change rhythms and even the voice of the instrument. An electronic keyboard or digital keyboard is a type of Keyboard instrument.
Playing a keyboard instrument can prove to be a challenging task; even though the layout is quite simple and all notes are easily accessible, some music puts high demand on the performer's skills to play accurately and in tempo, and beginners will often struggle to produce a passable rendition of a simple piece due to technique deficiency, which takes training to improve. 2266-Tetramethylpiperidine-1-oxyl or TEMPO is the Chemical compound with the formula (CH23(CMe22NO The sequence of movements executed by the playing hand can be almost arbitrarily complicated, with some possible problems being wide-spanned chords, which can be problematic for people with small hands, chords that require unusual hand positions which can initially be uncomfortable or even painful, and also fast scales, trills and arpeggios. In Music, a scale is a group of musical notes collected in ascending and descending order that provides material for or is used to conveniently represent part or all In Music, an arpeggio is a broken chord where the Notes are played or sung in Sequence, one after the other rather than Ringing out simultaneously
Playing instruments with dynamic keyboards (i. e. ones that respond to varying force with which the key is struck) may require independence of the fingers so that some fingers are able to strike harder while others play more softly. Players need to learn to coordinating two hands and use them independently. Most music is written for two hands; typically the right hand plays the melody in the treble range, while the left plays an accompaniment of bass notes and chords in the bass range. In Music, a melody (from Greek μελῳδία - melōidía, "singing chanting" also tune, voice, or A clef (from the French for "key" is a musical symbol used to indicate the pitch of written notes. A clef (from the French for "key" is a musical symbol used to indicate the pitch of written notes. Some music is written for the left hand alone, such as Godowsky's 53 Studies on Chopin's Etudes and Ravel's Piano Concerto for the Left Hand. Leopold Godowsky (Leopold Godowski ( February 13, 1870 &ndash November 21, 1938) was a famed Polish - American pianist composer The Studies on Chopin's Etudes, by Leopold Godowsky, is a set of 53 arrangements of Chopin's Études, (there are actually 54 with the opus 25 no The Piano Concerto for the Left Hand in D major ( Concerto pour la main gauche en ré majeur) was composed by Maurice Ravel between 1929 and 1930 In music that uses counterpoint technique, both hands play different melodies at the same time. In Music, counterpoint is the relationship between two or more voices that are independent in contour and Rhythm, and interdependent in Harmony
Other uses
Other instruments share the keyboard layout, although they are not keyboard instruments. For example, the xylophone, marimba, vibraphone, and glockenspiel all have a separate-sounding tone bar of metal or wood for each note. The xylophone (from the Greek words ξύλον - xylon, "wood" + φωνή - phone, "voice" meaning "wooden In some parts of Africa the term "marimba" refers to the Kalimba. The vibraphone, sometimes called the vibraharp or simply the vibes, is a Musical instrument in the mallet subfamily of the percussion family The glockenspiel ( German, "set of bells quot or "play-bells" also known as orchestra bells and in its portable These bars are laid out in the same configuration as a common keyboard.
Keyboards with alternate keys
There are some rare variations of keyboards with more or less than 12 keys per octave, mostly used in microtonal music. Microtonal music is Music using microtones — intervals of less than an equally spaced Semitone.
Some free-reed instrument keyboards (accordion/Indian harmonium) include microtones. In music 19 equal temperament, called 19-TET 19- EDO, or 19-ET is the tempered scale derived by dividing the octave into 19 equally large steps Microtonal music is Music using microtones — intervals of less than an equally spaced Semitone. The accordion is a portable box-shaped Musical instrument of the hand-held Bellows -driven free-reed aerophone family sometimes referred to as a Squeezebox A harmonium is a free-standing musical keyboard instrument similar to a Reed Organ or Pipe Organ Electronic music pioneer Pauline Oliveros plays one of these. Pauline Oliveros (born May 30, 1932 in Houston Texas) is an Accordionist and Composer who currently resides in Kingston New Egyptian belly-dance musicians like Hassam Ramzy use a custom-tuned accordion in order to play traditional scales (before synthesizers). The small Garmon accordion played in the Music of Azerbaijan sometimes has keys that can play microtones when a "shift" key is pressed. The garmon (гармонь is a kind of Russian button Accordion, a free-reed wind instrument. Music of Azerbaijan includes various styles that reflect influences from the music of the Iran, Caucasus and Central Asia.
References
- Bond, Ann (1997). A Guide to the Harpsichord. Amadeus Press. ISBN 1-57467-063-8.
See also
External links
- Keyboard Magazine - features selections from magazine, along with multimedia examples. The piano is a Musical instrument played by means of a keyboard that produces sound by striking steel strings with Felt covered hammers A keytar is a relatively lightweight keyboard or Synthesizer that is supported by a strap around the neck and shoulders similar to the way a Guitar The Jankó keyboard is a Musical keyboard layout for a Piano designed by Paul von Jankó in 1882. The Prophet-5 was an analog Synthesizer manufactured by Sequential Circuits in San Jose California between 1978 and 1984. This is a virtual piano with 88 keys tuned to A440, showing the frequencies in cycles per second ( Hz) of each note (ie note frequencies of each note found on a standard
- Synth Zone - a link directory of keyboard and synthesizer resources.
- Electronic Keyboard News - features news and reviews of keyboards, synthesizers and synth modules.
- Click MusicalKeys - free on-screen musical keyboard with 128 instruments.
- Keyboard Chords - Chords for keyboards.
- MathPages - Mathematical discussion of the distribution of the keys
- Keyboard Quiz
- The Keyboard of a Harpsichord
Dapyx Software network: MP3 Explorer | Ebook Manager | Zenithic