The history of the Harpsichord can be traced back to the 15th century, but the instrument actually got its start from the psaltery, which was a stringed instrument that the player held upright to pluck its strings (unlike the dulcimer which rested on the player's lap so the strings could be hit with a hammer). In the 14th century a keyboard was placed on the psaltery, and it's believed that this variation led to the modern harpsichord.

A harpsichord has strings which are plucked according to which key on the keyboard is depressed. It can either sit on a table or be free-standing, like a small piano or organ. In Elizabethan England, harpsichords were called virginals. The earliest harpsichords were small with very thick cases and complicated plucking devices that made the sounds. Some actually plucked the strings with a quill, much like the way a psaltery was played, by the musician plucking the strings. Other harpsichords made music by striking the strings with a small piece of metal, giving it a sound similar to a dulcimer. The first harpsichords are believed to have been Flemish, given their heavy cases and designs.

In the 16th century, Italians began creating harpsichords and made some design changes, giving them lighter cases, therefore making them more portable than ever. About 40 harpsichords still exist from this time period, and only a few are not Italian. These improved instruments weren't just lighter weight, they had a different plucking mechanism that was uniform throughout all of them and they keyboard was twice as long, offering more variety in the music played. This marked the beginning of the instrument's widespread popularity.

These first Italian harpsichords were typically single strung and were variable in pitch. This means that unlike the pianos of today, for which middle C will always sound the same note, harpsichords did not all play in the same octaves or ranges. The spinette, an early Italian type of harpsichord, had the strings parallel to the keyboard with the ends of the strings resting on a soundboard. During this time, Flemish harpsichords were changing, too, with sometimes an entire octave variation between the two keyboards that now made up the instrument.

By the mid-17th century, harpsichords were double strung, and the Italians made few advances in harpsichord design after that, with the rest of the innovations usually coming about through Flemish invention. Then by the end of the 18th century, the harpsichord was falling out of vogue as a popular parlor instrument, replaced by the piano instead, though it was sometimes used in opera during the 19th century.

In the mid-1900s the harpsichord was revamped to compete by bringing back the building practices of the Baroque period in the hopes to repopularize classical music and harpsichords. While the harpsichord isn't a popular instrument overall, it has been used in some popular music. Two examples of top acts who've used the harpsichord successfully in their music are the wildly popular classic rock band the Rolling Stones, and alternative rockers R.E.M.

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Originally posted 2009-01-08 05:05:10. Republished by Blog Post Promoter

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Acoustic Musical Instruments, harpsichord, Instrument History

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14th century, 15th century, 16th century, design changes, dulcimer, elizabethan england, history of the harpsichord, italian harpsichords, italian type, italians, keyboard, middle c, musician, octaves, pianos, pitch, psaltery, quill, stringed instrument, time period