09-29-2024, 05:33 PM
(This post was last modified: 09-29-2024, 08:27 PM by Hugh Wallington.)
What do the three pedals on a grand piano do?
When I started playing piano in my early teens I knew the right hand pedal as the ‘loud’ pedal. This is also known as the sustain pedal, or damper pedal, and allows notes to continue sounding after the key is released. It works by lifting the dampers off the strings, allowing them to vibrate freely. The notes will continue to sound until the vibration stops or the pedal is released.
The one thing that seems to be overlooked is that when the dampers are taken off all the strings, other strings vibrate ‘in sympathy’ with the note(s) being played .. which alters the tonal quality of the piano and makes it sound ‘richer’.
The left hand pedal is called the ‘soft’ pedal, and on an upright piano it brings all the hammers closer to the strings so they don’t play as ‘forcefully’. On a grand piano it is done differently, which I discovered when having access to a ‘baby grand’ in a holiday cottage on the Isle of Wight .. which, I might add, came as quite a shock! See the video below.
As for the ‘middle’ pedal .. Victor Borge, pianist and comedian, was asked about the pedal in the middle, and famously said, “Well, the pedal in the middle is there to separate the other two.”
What do the three pedals on a grand piano do?
On our keyboards we don’t have that ‘middle pedal’ and I often wonder if we get ‘classical piano music’ to sound as the composer intended. Chopin made frequent use of the pedal, and through an intuition born of genius he knew when to press it as well as when to release it.
Victor Borge
Apart from Victor Borge’s piano comedy, he is probably best known from these two skits on the English language.
Victor Borge – Phonetic Punctuation
Victor Borge – Inflationary Language
(If they are showing, you can turn the Subtitles OFF by clicking the Subtitles/Closed Captions button, bottom right).
Hugh
When I started playing piano in my early teens I knew the right hand pedal as the ‘loud’ pedal. This is also known as the sustain pedal, or damper pedal, and allows notes to continue sounding after the key is released. It works by lifting the dampers off the strings, allowing them to vibrate freely. The notes will continue to sound until the vibration stops or the pedal is released.
The one thing that seems to be overlooked is that when the dampers are taken off all the strings, other strings vibrate ‘in sympathy’ with the note(s) being played .. which alters the tonal quality of the piano and makes it sound ‘richer’.
The left hand pedal is called the ‘soft’ pedal, and on an upright piano it brings all the hammers closer to the strings so they don’t play as ‘forcefully’. On a grand piano it is done differently, which I discovered when having access to a ‘baby grand’ in a holiday cottage on the Isle of Wight .. which, I might add, came as quite a shock! See the video below.
As for the ‘middle’ pedal .. Victor Borge, pianist and comedian, was asked about the pedal in the middle, and famously said, “Well, the pedal in the middle is there to separate the other two.”
What do the three pedals on a grand piano do?
On our keyboards we don’t have that ‘middle pedal’ and I often wonder if we get ‘classical piano music’ to sound as the composer intended. Chopin made frequent use of the pedal, and through an intuition born of genius he knew when to press it as well as when to release it.
Victor Borge
Apart from Victor Borge’s piano comedy, he is probably best known from these two skits on the English language.
Victor Borge – Phonetic Punctuation
Victor Borge – Inflationary Language
(If they are showing, you can turn the Subtitles OFF by clicking the Subtitles/Closed Captions button, bottom right).
Hugh
It's all about the music!
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