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Reconstruction of a tangent piano according to historical examples by Dierik Potvlieghe

The tangent piano is a very rare keyboard instrument that resembles a harpsichord and early pianos in design. It normally features five octaves of keys and the strings are acted upon by narrow wooden or metal slips when the keys are depressed.

History

In 1440, Henri Arnaut de Zwolle described a dulce melos, a dulcimer that is struck with a tangent mechanism attached to a keyboard. No sample of the instrument has survived.

The inventor of the tangent piano is generally regarded to be Franz Jakob Spath from Regensburg. In 1751 he presented a Tangentenflügel to the Elector of Bonn. The instrument was referred as the clavecin d'amour, due to its expressiveness and dynamic range, while its action was referred as Tangirung. The earliest use of the name Tangentenflügel appears in 1791. It is likely that the instrument was referred to simply as Clavier.

Mechanism

Tangent mechanism of Späth and Schmahl

In the action of a tangent piano, the tangent is a small slip of wood similar in shape to a harpsichord jack or similar to an unleathered fortepiano hammer which strikes the string to produce sound.

It is similar to the tangent of a clavichord only in the sense that they both are driven ultimately by the player's finger to strike the string to initiate sound. In the clavichord, the tangent remains in contact with the string to keep the note sounding, while in the tangent piano, the tangent immediately rebounds from the string so that the string is allowed to vibrate freely (that is, it has an escapement).

The instrument can have numerous stops to soften and sweeten the sound: una corda, moderator, harp. Also, it has a device which allows the performer to raise all the dampers (like the modern damper pedal), and another that will only raise the treble dampers (a typical feature on many early pianos). See Piano pedals.

Tonal quality

The tangent piano has an unusual sound that combines the qualities of the harpsichord and piano. The treble resembles the bright sound from a light action piano, and the bass resembles the bass from a harpsichord. The sound varies from instrument to instrument, as do personal descriptions of the tangent piano's sound.

References

Sources

• Bowles, Edmund A. (1966). "On the Origin of the Keyboard Mechanism in the Late Middle Ages". Technology and Culture. 7 (2): 152–162. doi:10.2307/3102080. ISSN 0040-165X.
• Latcham, Michael (2004). "Franz Jakob Spath and the "Tangentenflügel", an Eighteenth-Century Tradition". The Galpin Society Journal. 57: 150–170. ISSN 0072-0127.
• Pollens, Stewart (2022). A history of stringed keyboard instruments. Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-1-108-42199-7.
• Di Stefano, Giovanni Paolo (2008). "The "Tangentenflügel" and Other Pianos with Non-Pivoting Hammers". The Galpin Society Journal. 61: 79–104. ISSN 0072-0127.

Category:Piano