Piano Pedal Question

Oriel

Right, I've been playing the piano for 11 years - but still one thing still puzzles me.

On our piano, as like most pianos, there are two pedals - one damper pedal and one sustain pedal. However, on the pianos with 3 pedals, that is the third pedal for?

S.

Gordon

Quiet notes. Iirc it only plays one set of strings when usually a piano hammer hits two strings of the same note. Or is that the damping that you talk of?

Open her up and have a look inside.

Oriel

I don't have a 3 pedal piano though, just 2. I think maybe the technique used by the damper pedal varies from piano to piano.

S.

Sleipnir

The "sostenuto." This pedal selectively sustains notes, so that certain notes can ring out while others fade normally. It is usually found only on grand pianos.

robbie1876

Sleipnir wrote:

The "sostenuto." This pedal selectively sustains notes, so that certain notes can ring out while others fade normally. It is usually found only on grand pianos.

Correct. It's usually used where you need to sustain a chord and play a two handed passage over it. You play the chord, and while holding down the notes, press the pedal. Keep holding the pedal, release the notes and you'll find you can play other notes (not sustained) over the original sustained notes.

I found this out a few years ago while trying to play a Rachmaninov piece. They all cheated!

ogy

just for the sake of completion:) on an upright piano the third (middle) peddle is usually just a damper or "practise pedal" that you can kinda shimmy to one side and it holds in place incase your annoying the neighbours or something. as the lads said on a grand its sostenuto, the one giblet was talking about is the una corda pedal(far left) and it makes the hammers hit two strings instead of three on most notes and one in stead of two on the lower notes. on a grand you can actually see the keys shifting sideways when you put it down.