The harpsichord is a double, treble or quad ruple spinet, the sounds being excited by a jack and quill plectrum, as in the case of the virginal or spinet. More exactly stated, instead of hav ing one string to a note, as in the virginal or spinet, it has two, three and sometimes four strings to a note, which, with the exception of the common features of the case, sound-board, wires and keyboard, it differs entirely in sound, excitement and effect from the clavichord. It has an individuality of tone not possessed by the pianoforte, and a brilliancy of effect be yond the capacity of the clavichord, but in ex pressiveness depending upon touch its power is much less than either.
The harpsichord was a much favored musi cal instrument during the 17th century, occupy ing the place now filled by the grand piano, and while not so much a solo instrument, it was of considerable importance in the orchestra, its player generally assuming the responsibility of conductor. The complex character of its mech anism required a larger and differently shaped case to that of the spinet and prefigured that of the grand piano, the wing-shape giving rise to the German name fluegel, also kielfluegel, from the plectrum (kiel, quill) producing the sound. With the Italians—it was known as the clavicem bolo, while the French called it clavecin. In the English term harpsichord, the harp disposi tion is recognized in contrast to the trapeze shape of the spinet, which appeared about the same time—the earlier part of the 15th cen tury.
The description of a very fine example of a Roman harpsichord in the South Kensington Museum, London, inscribed and dated gleirony mus Bononiensis Facietat Romae, MDXXIX,D will serve to illustrate the general character of the instruments of that time. It has one key board and two unison strings to each note; boxwood natural keys, with an apparent com pass of nearly four octaves, E to cls, which by a short octave in the bass becomes C to In the Italian instruments no change of power was attainable by stops, while the pedals, as in the Trasuntino harpsichords, controlling a sordino for muting, were a very late addition (see Fig. 4). The highest credit for excellence in the manufacture of harpsichords belongs to the famous Ruckers family of Antwerp. The earli est instruments made by them bear the date of 1590, and the latest 1659, a short period of splen did work. Of their instruments there are 70 existing specimens, including some of great beauty of decoration, but they have all been sub jected to one or more alterations of scale and keyboard compass. It is claimed that Hans Ruckers, the elder, added the octave register and steel wire instead of brass for the treble notes, designed a second keyboard in imitation of the organ and increased the number of keys from E to C' to C-c , thus making the short octave in the bass a long or chromatic one down to the lowest notes. The most famous harpsi chord makers of the 18th century were Burkat Shudi (Burkhardt Techudi) and Jacob Kirck man (Kirchmann) in London, and Taskin in Paris. Burkat Shudi began business in 1732 in the house still occupied by his descendants, the Broadwoods, 33, Great Pulteney street, Golden square, London; while Kirchmann continues to be represented by his descendants in a first class London pianoforte manufactory.
About this time, makers, more or less con trolled by the prevailing style of domestic fur niture, substituted the more rigid cases of wal nut and Spanish mahogany for those of reso nant cypress, cedar and pine, and thus obtained a greater power and majesty of tone, while a greater variety of tone was derived by a freer use of the stops. To the three shifting regis ters of jacks of the octave and first and second unisons, Van Blankenburg's lute stop was added, which by plucking the strings in the lower and medium divisions of the scale, close to the bridge and much nearer the treble, pro duced a charmingly delicate, reedy tone quality very much like that of the mandolin. Finally, to obtain "crescendo° and "diminuendo,)) a swell was introduced, which consisted in gradu ally raising a hinged portion of the cover with a pedal. This invention of Roger Plenius was probably suggested to him by the nascent piano forte which appears to have been first made by him in England.
Although references to the pianoforte occur in the correspondence of musical instrument makers during the latter part of the 16th cen tury, as, for example, in the letters written by Hippolito Crica or Paliarmo, dated 27 June and 31 Dec. 1598, and addressed to Alfonso II, Duke of Modena, the first true pianoforte, as now understood by that term, was invented by Bartolommeo Cristofori, a Paduan harpsichord maker, in Florence about 1709. At that time kings and princes well disposed toward music were accustomed to keep large collections of musical instruments to be used in connection with their domestic and courtly festivals, and to keep such instruments in playing order it was necessary to employ men possessing the requi site abihty. It is of record that Cristofori was engaged in that capacity by Prince Ferdinand dei Medici, and while thus employed invented and produced the pianoforte. The record of this invention is given by the Marchese Scipione Maffee, under the date of 1711, in a description which appeared in the Giornale dei letterati &Italia, a publication conducted by Apostolo Zeno. It gives the information that in 1709 Cristofori had completed four "gravecembali col piano e forte' — keyed psalteries with soft and loud, three of them having the long or harpsichord form. There are two grand pianos still in existence, made by Cristofori, and dated respectively 1720 and 1726. They are of a very perfect construction, and embody all the essen tials of piano movement. The first belonged to the Signora Ernesta Mocenni Martelli of Flor ence, and was acquired by Mrs. J. Crosby Brown of New York in 1895 for presentation to the Metropolitan Museum of Art of that city. It has a compass of four and a half octaves, C-f'. The second belongs to the Commendatore Alessandro Kraus of Florence. Their actions are similar, and show that Cristofori succeeded in satisfactorily solving the problem of escape ment, and had also provided for repetition without a double escapement. Fig. 5 is a com plete diagram of this action: (k) is the key; (h) the hopper or movable tongue; (n) the notch for the hopper beneath an underhammer or escapement lever (I), which being covered with leather upon the end operates to raise the hammer butt (d) ; (e) is the hammerhead; (s) the spring regulating the play of the hop per or distance between it and the string and regulated by a small hopper check (w) ; (f) hammer check; (g) damper, and (j) damper stop. It appears that in this action, Cristofori retained the shallow measure of an Italian harpsichord, and consequently inverted his wrest-plank (the block in which the tuning pins are held), which had to be much stronger than in the harpsichord, owing to the increased thickness of the strings which were required to stand the impact of the hammers, and attached the strings beneath. The pins pierced the wrest plank so that the tuning was accomplished harp fashion. His instruments ranged in compass from four to four and a half octaves. The essential features of Cristofori's action were adopted by Gottfried Silbermann, the great organ builder and clavichord maker of Dresden. He made two pianofortes, which he submitted to J. S. Bach, who disapproved of them on ac count of their weak treble and heavy action. Recognizing that he had not attained the req uisite skill to reproduce the excellent quality of his models, he devoted several years to ex periments, and finally submitted another to Bach, which met with the great composer's ap proval. It is a fact, however, that the elder Bach never really adopted the pianoforte, and that all of J. S. Bach's compositions for the clavichord and harpsichord, no less than those for the organ, have to be virtually transcribed in the rendering when transferred to the piano forte. This fact is very clearly shown in Czerny's edition of the Preludes and Fugues.) The Seven Years' War (1755-62) terminated Saxon pianoforte making, and scattered the workmen, some of whom found their way ,to England and made a fresh start in the business.