A History of Stringed Keyboard Instruments

Stewart Pollens

ISBN 10: 1108434452 / ISBN 13: 9781108434454

Published by Cambridge University Press, 2024

About this Item

Druck auf Anfrage Neuware - Printed after ordering - 'This chapter deals with the earliest references to keyboard instruments in the writings of Martin Agricola, Henri Arnaut of Zwolle, Juan Bermudo, Ercole Bottrigari, Antonio de Cabezon, Eberhardus Cersne, Paulus Paulirinus, Hermann Poll, Michael Praetorius, Sesto Tantini, Sebastian Virdung, and others. Described is the earliest depiction of a keyboard instrument appearing in an altarpiece carving in the cathedral of Minden, Germany, as well as the earliest extant keyboard instrument, a clavicytherium made around 1480, now in the Royal College of Music, London. This chapter deals with the origin of such terms as the chekker, clavichordium, clavicembalo, clavicimbalo, clavicymbalum, claviciterium, clavicytherium, clavisimbalum, dulce melos, epinette, manichordium, monochordion, and monocordo. Also considered are the keyboard ranges of early keyboard instruments and the earliest music written for keyboard instruments, such as the Mulliner Book, Robertsbridge fragment and Faenza Codex'--.

Seller Inventory # 9781108434454

Bibliographic Details

• Title: A History of Stringed Keyboard Instruments
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press
• Publication Date: 2024
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1108434452
• ISBN 13: 9781108434454
• Binding: Taschenbuch
• Condition: Neu

About this title

Synopsis

This book explores the history of keyboard instruments from their fourteenth-century origins to the development of the modern piano. It reveals the principles of their design and describes structural and mechanical developments through the medieval and renaissance periods and eighteenth- and nineteenth-centuries, as well as the early music revival. Stewart Pollens identifies and describes the types of keyboard instruments played by major composers and virtuosi through the ages and provides the reader with detailed instructions on their regulating, stringing, tuning and voicing drawn from historical sources.

About the Author

Trained as a harpsichord, organ, and violin maker, Stewart Pollens served as the conservator of musical instruments at The Metropolitan Museum of Art from 1976 to 2006. He has published widely on the history of musical instruments and is the recipient of the American Musical Instrument Society's 1997 Bessaraboff Prize for The Early Pianoforte (Cambridge University Press, 1995).