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Columbia Encyclopedia entry: clavichord

Clavichordklăv'ĭkôrd, keyboard musical instrument invented in the Middle Ages. It consists of a small rectangular wooden box, placed upon a table or on legs, containing a sounding board and a set of strings. Keys cause the strings to be struck with small wedges of metal called tangents, which not only set the string into vibration but determine its vibrating length by means of a sort of fretting. Thus one string suffices for about four keys. Early in the 18th cent., clavichords were built with a string for each key; such instruments were more expensive and harder to tune, but gradually supplanted the older ones. The clavichord was musically important from the 16th until the end of the 18th cent. when the pianoforte replaced it. The most notable composer to write expressly for it was Carl Philipp Emanuel Bach.

See P. James, Early Keyboard Instruments (1930); D. Matthews, ed., Keyboard Music (1972).

Wikipedia search results for: Clavichord

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The clavichord is a European stringed keyboard instrument known from the late Medieval, through the Renaissance, Baroque and Classical eras. Historically, it was widely used as a practice instrument and as an aid to composition. The clavichord produces sound by striking brass or iron strings with small metal blades called tangents. Vibrations are transmitted through the bridge to the soundboard. The name is derived from the Latin word clavis, meaning "key" and chorda meaning "string, especially of a musical instrument". The clavichord was invented in the early fourteenth century. In 1504, the German poem Der Minne Regeln mentions the terms...more »

Columbia Encyclopedia search results: clavichord

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Froberger, Johann Jakob
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stringed instrument
Stringed instrument, any musical instrument whose tone is produced by vibrating strings. Those whose strings are plucked with the finger or a plectrum include the balalaika, banjo, guitar, har...
piano
Piano or pianoforte, musical instrument whose sound is produced by vibrating strings struck by felt hammers that are controlled from a keyboard.The piano's earliest predecessor was the dulcime...
Perelman, S. J.
Perelman, S. J. (Sidney Joseph Perelman), 1904–79, American comic writer, b. Brooklyn, N.Y. He entered the magazine world as a cartoonist for a New York weekly, soon turning from drawing to wr...

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