When Bartolomeo Cristofori constructed his “gravicembalo col piano e forte“ (harpsichord with soft and loud) in the early 1700s, he wasn’t trying to create a new instrument — he was actually trying to build a harpsichord with a little more control. WQXR host Jeff Spurgeon visited the The Metropolitan Museum of Art's Department of Musical Instruments to speak with curator Jayson Dobney about the oldest piano in existence.
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