• The world's first piano appears to have been created in Italy in 1698 by Bartolomeo Cristofori.

• The piano is short for piano/forte, meaning soft/loud, because of its unique ability to change its dynamic expression.
  

• At the time the piano was invented, it was not very popular in Italy, and many musicians shunned the instrument in favour of the more traditional harpsichord. As a result Cristofori went back to making these in the later part of his life.

• One of Cristofori's students, Giovanni Ferrini, also produced a harpsichord-piano, which was capable of both plucking and striking the strings.

• The oldest surviving Cristofori piano currently resides at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, and dates from 1720.

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