Missouri Classical Music News and Notes

It does not add a new sonority. The double-keyboard piano sounds like a piano, but with fuller chords and denser harmonies. Unlike an organ with additional stops and pipes or a harpsichord with separate strings for the second manual, the double-keyboard piano still has only one set of hammers and strings. And Mr. Taylor still has only 10 fingers.

But the two keyboards, one with the usual 88 notes, the other with only 76, lets him try some intriguing moves. The shorter keyboard plays notes an octave above the ones on the longer keyboard. Pressing a key on the shorter keyboard activates a mechanism inside the piano that pulls down the corresponding key on the lower keyboard, but an octave higher.