Hammers and Tempered pitch

[Barrie Heaton]

Could someone please answer these two questions?

How did the hammers develop??

Various materials have been tried leather was one of the main material then leather with cloth under it – some tried cork felt was then introduced quite early on and has just got harder

How was tempered pitch important to the development of the piano??

willcoxji

If you mean equal temperament that only came quite late in the UK Broadwoods was the first to use it as a selling point see
http://www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/index.html
http://www.uk-piano.org/edfoote/well_te ... piano.html


If you just mean pitch see
http://www.uk-piano.org/history/pitch.html
and
http://www.uk-piano.org/history/compass.html


Barrie,