Having never played on a harpsichord I am curious about its note action. When you press a note down does it stop sounding and soon as you stop pressing it (as on a piano), or does the sound linger for a bit? If not then is it possible to sustain notes on the harpsichord?

Any answers would be appreciated. Thanks

I have never played a harpsicord with a piece, but I have messed around on one, and have a few friends who hve played. When you press a key on a harpsicord the note sounds, but it goes pretty quick. Hence in music for the harpsicord when there is a long note that needs to be sustained there is normally a trill above it, or the player will most of hte time put on in. I hope this helps.

When you press a key down on a harpsichord, the jack (which rests vertically at the end of the key) jumps up and the pretruding plectrum plucks the string. The plectrum is attached to a pivot which prevents it from plucking again when its falling down. There is a damper that then stops the string from resonating. So, the player does not have direct control over the length of the note. The harpsichord does have shorter note durations than the piano.

Hope that answers your question!

There is a distinctive 'key off' sound if the key is released before the sound has died away of its own accord; it gives fast passages a lovely 'crunchy' sound to them!

But, yes, the sound is definitely a lot more short lived than that on a piano, hence the abundance of ornamentation. Some late 17th/early 18th century artists recommend ornamenting each significant minim and crotchet, with a shorter ornament on crotchets than on minims; in modern times, with people used to the sustained tone of a piano, this would sound terribly over-the-top though.

Hi

Having never played a harpsicord I don't know much about them but I have seen some harpsicords with double manuals and as far as I know the harpsicord is a fixed volume instrument, is the second set of keys the same as the first but at a different volume or is the second set in a different register?

Harpsichord manuals generally have an 8' register, and then others which can be switched in using the stops, varying from instrument to instrument. If there is a second manual, the 8' register on it often has a different dynamic and/or timbre to the 8' register on the other. Quite often the two manuals can be coupled, so that both 8' registers can be combined to reinforce the sound - then, for the sake of argument, an mf and mp manual can be coupled to form an f manual. Bach did write dynamics in some of his suites with these effects in mind.

Having two manuals also allows effects such as the lute stop to be employed - applying the lute stop to one manual for the accompaniment and using the other manual for the melody allows some beautiful tones to be produced. Or, in the case of Red Priest, it allows them to reproduce the lute part in the Four Seasons on the harpsichord.

QUOTE (YetAnotherPianist @ May 26 2005, 12:38 PM)

There is a distinctive 'key off' sound if the key is released before the sound has died away of its own accord; it gives fast passages a lovely 'crunchy' sound to them!

That's interesting to know - I wonder how faithfuly this is reproduced on Clavinovas, etc... not very at a guess but I could be wrong! I'm now SO intrigued to *hear* this affect....!

QUOTE

That's interesting to know - I wonder how faithfuly this is reproduced on Clavinovas, etc... not very at a guess but I could be wrong! I'm now SO intrigued to *hear* this affect....

I have written a piece of music in the style of Bach played with the harpsicord sound from a Yamaha P90 stage piano which has Yamaha's new D.S.S soundset
and features the key off to.

Here is a link to my page the tune is called "Hasta La Vista Baby, I'll Be Bach"

http://unsignedbandweb.com/music/Johnny_mack

The harpsicord sound on the Yamaha in my opinion sounds better than some real harpsicords as does the grand piano sounds

QUOTE (sarah-flute @ May 26 2005, 02:58 PM)

That's interesting to know - I wonder how faithfuly this is reproduced on Clavinovas, etc... not very at a guess but I could be wrong! I'm now SO intrigued to *hear* this affect....!

It depends on the model - one of the reasons we got the CLP150 as opposed to the 130 is that it introduces key-off sounds on piano and harpsichord (and maybe other voices, I don't know). On an acoustic piano even it's quite noticeable if you give a bass string a good thunk then let it spring back up you get a noticeable sound when the damper hits the string and all the energy has to go somewhere.

On harpsichord the presence of the key-off sound make staccato interesting- it needs to be detached, but too detached and the key-off noise makes it sound quite grotty.

mmmm that's interesting - I forget which model the one at chapel is. I shall have to try it out...

QUOTE (mack4 @ May 26 2005, 11:27 AM)

The harpsicord sound on the Yamaha in my opinion sounds better than some real harpsicords...

Impossible!!!

QUOTE (grand choeur @ May 26 2005, 05:55 PM)

QUOTE (mack4 @ May 26 2005, 11:27 AM) The harpsicord sound on the Yamaha in my opinion sounds better than some real harpsicords... Impossible!!!

I'd say it's far from impossible: clavinovas sound better than some real pianos in poor condition, so it stands to reason that it can sound better than some harpsichords in poor condition. From what I've read, harpsichords don't age as gracefully as pianos as the wooden frame is more susceptible to warping with age than a metal frame; that and they need tuning more frequently.

Why I'm lost is that I cant see how a replication can be better than the original which is still extant.
It's not like the harpsichord is a relic like the dinosaur that you can only conjecture what it used to sound like.

BAH...

I'll just clarify that the dofference between the two keybaords is in timbre only - not dynamics. Dynamics are achieved by coupling the two manuals so that the upper manual is quiter than the lower.