To say that the history of instrument pitches is long and varied would be an understatement.
For ages, people had no means of comparing the pitch of their instruments so across the continent of Europe the pitch of the various Organs, Harpsichords and eventually, pianos varied greatly.
Here is a very selective highlight of some of the many changes that happened throughout the ages.
Concert Pitch | ||
A brief and selective highlight | ||
1640 | A457.6 | Vienna Franciscan Organ |
1711 | A423.5 | John Shore’s tuning fork, a pitch of |
1751 | A422.5 | Handel’s own fork |
1780 | A422.6 | Stein’s tuning fork |
1780 | A421 | Stine’s, tuning fork for Mozart |
1813 | A423.3 | On behalf of the Philharmonic Society this pitch was adopted by George Smart |
1834 | A440 | A440 was recommended after the “tonometer” was invented. It was approved by the Society of German Natural Scientists |
1859 | A435 | French standard pitch. The fork temperature was 15 degrees centigrade. |
1860 | A448.4 | Cramer’s piano makers of London |
1877 | A449.9 | Collard’s piano maker standard pitch |
1879 | 455.3 | Erard’s factory fork 1880 Brinsmead, Broadwood, and Erard apparently used a pitch of A455.3 |
1880 | A455.3 | Brinsmead, Broadwood, and Erard apparently used a pitch of A455.3 |
A439 | Philharmonic pitch, which gave C the pitch of C522 | |
1936 | A440 | American Standards Association adopted A440. Despite this, the New York Philharmonic and the Boston Symphony Orchestra, use 442 Hz |
Sources differ on exactly which year but in the early 1950s the International Organization for Standardization set out to create a standard pitch for western music and A440 was agreed upon | ||
Despite all the changes we have made throughout history and the many conferences held in the hopes to finalise the standardisation many older pianos simply cannot handle being kept at A440 and will be tuned to A435 instead.
Many musicians, especially in Europe prefer A442 to A440 because it has a bright and clear tone.
For more information and an extended timeline please see https://piano-tuners.org/history/pitch.html