Harpsichord
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the harpsichord uses a bird quill or a piece of hard leather (referred to as the plectrum) to pluck its strings. Also, the harpsichord’s strings run parallel to the keys, like a grand piano. When a harpsichord is played, the key lifts a jack, which pushes the plectrum against the string, causing the string to be plucked. Like the clavichord, the harpsichord contains a damper to cut off the vibration as soon as the key is released [17]. Because of the nature of this plucking mechanism the harpsichord can’t create loud and soft sounds in the way the piano does by pressing harder on the keys; instead the instruments have several different sets of strings that can be combined in different ways to vary the sound, which is usually done by moving metal levers or hand stops. The keys of the instruments are made from a variety of materials – some are stained wood, others bone or ivory [18].
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The keyboard instrument was invented in the fourteenth century and remained popular up to the end of the eighteenth century. Many of the classical Piano pieces we know today were composed using the Harpsichord.