NAHRE SOL IN CONCERT
The harpsichord and early pianos had fewer keys and less range than a modern piano , but , as more pieces were composed for the instrument , that changed ; ultimately leading to Steinway ’ s creation in the 1880s of the 88-key version we know and love .
Why stop there ? Why not make a bigger piano ? Good questions – allegedly , because of the limitation of our ears , and the fact that sub-woofers were not a thing at the time . There are some exceptions , however , including Bösendorfer ’ s 97-key pianos and Stuart and Sons nine-octave , 108-key , world recordsetter ( circa 2018 ).
Because the piano offers a huge range of flexibility and expression , and since musicians and composers tend to be free thinkers who wanted to explore its possibilities as both a string and percussion instrument , eventually some people got the bright idea to expand those possibilities via screws , rubber bands , silicone baking sheets , and duct-taping Tic Tacs to the piano ’ s interior , thus spawning a quirky , but
highly-intriguing composition / playing technique .
What treatments can be applied are only limited by imagination , and the need to avoid permanently damaging the instrument . That was the case with preparations used by John Cage ( 1912-1992 ), who ’ s widely credited with inventing the technique for his 1940 composition , “ Bacchanale .” Cage , however , cited Henry Cowell ( 1897 – 1965 ) as his inspiration . Since then , there have been many who have expanded on Cage ’ s techniques – and there ’ s no guarantee such things weren ’ t done before Cage ’ s work — who knows what the composers of yore got up to during or following gigs after they had a few flagons of ale or mead into them ?
While that ’ s a mystery , we do know what drove Cage ’ s choice for his initial preparations . At the time he was working as an accompanist for modern dance classes at the Cornish School in Seattle and was asked by a dancer , Sylvia Fort , to write music for her performance . Cage wanted to compose music that incorporated percussion instruments , but with limited room on stage to accommodate both the dance and the musical performance , he was forced to stick to a piano . Rather than let that stand in the way , Cage went to town ; allegedly altering the piano ’ s sound by placing a pie plate on the strings before moving on to nails , screws , and bolts , among other things .
Initially , in composition , he hoped to be able to repeat the works he created ( or have others do so ). But , as Cage wrote in the foreword of Richard Bunger ’ s 1973 book , The Well-Prepared Piano , he came to understand that : “ As the music left my home and went from piano to piano and from pianist to pianist , it became clear that not only are two pianists essentially different from one another , but two pianos are not the same either . Instead of the possibility of repetition , we are faced in life with the unique qualities and characteristics of each occasion .”
There ’ s no better way to illustrate those unique qualities than by speaking with two contemporary
CANADIAN MUSICIAN 51