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I imagined this at first too and was confused because a wider piano makes no sense. The 88s keys already cover almost the entire range of human hearing. Adding

I imagined this at first too and was confused because a wider piano makes no sense. The 88s keys already cover almost the entire range of human hearing. Adding just one more octave (a few keys below and above the range) would basically cover it all. Of course, you could argue that there is merit to having low keys whose fundamental is below human hearing because the overtones would still be audible. But that seems to be of pretty limited use to me.

impendia 5y ago
Stuart and Sons, a boutique piano manufacturer in Australia, made a piano with 108 keys: https://www.stuartandsons.com/108keys.html https://www.stuartandsons.com/108keys.html They have an elaborate explanation of why they did it, and they are a commercial outfit, but the basic reason still seems to be "we wanted to see if we could".
rnestler 5y ago
> The 88s keys already cover almost the entire range of human hearing. Adding just one more octave (a few keys below and above the range) would basically cover it all. This was surprising for me, I thought no way is this almost the range of hearing. But a quick calculation showed it to be right: The range of human hearing is approximately from 20Hz to 20kHz which is ~10 octaves (20*2^10 ~= 20k). 10 octaves would need 120keys, so ~2.5 Octaves more than the 88 keys range.
- lupire 5y ago
  a piano has wide range but less than 8bits of precision.
throwaway81523 5y ago
Bösendorfer makes some large grand pianos with 92 or 97 keys. The 92 key one has 4 extra bass keys. I don't know about the 97 key one. The extra bass keys are under a little wooden cover that you can flip up if you want to play them, but I think the real purpose of the extra strings is to vibrate sympathetically with the regular strings, giving some additional bass oomph. Maybe the long strings on the Alexander piano provide oomph enough while staying more in tune. At the upper end it's perfectly possible to reach the end of the treble scale, so maybe the 97 key Bösendorfer has extra treble keys in addition to extra bass keys. I haven't seen one though.

impendia 5y ago

Stuart and Sons, a boutique piano manufacturer in Australia, made a piano with 108 keys: https://www.stuartandsons.com/108keys.html https://www.stuartandsons.com/108keys.html They have an elaborate explanation of why they did it, and they are a commercial outfit, but the basic reason still seems to be "we wanted to see if we could".

rnestler 5y ago

> The 88s keys already cover almost the entire range of human hearing. Adding just one more octave (a few keys below and above the range) would basically cover it all. This was surprising for me, I thought no way is this almost the range of hearing. But a quick calculation showed it to be right: The range of human hearing is approximately from 20Hz to 20kHz which is ~10 octaves (20*2^10 ~= 20k). 10 octaves would need 120keys, so ~2.5 Octaves more than the 88 keys range.

lupire 5y ago
a piano has wide range but less than 8bits of precision.

throwaway81523 5y ago

Bösendorfer makes some large grand pianos with 92 or 97 keys. The 92 key one has 4 extra bass keys. I don't know about the 97 key one. The extra bass keys are under a little wooden cover that you can flip up if you want to play them, but I think the real purpose of the extra strings is to vibrate sympathetically with the regular strings, giving some additional bass oomph. Maybe the long strings on the Alexander piano provide oomph enough while staying more in tune. At the upper end it's perfectly possible to reach the end of the treble scale, so maybe the 97 key Bösendorfer has extra treble keys in addition to extra bass keys. I haven't seen one though.