-casually strolls in with my giant pterodactyl hands that can comfortably span an eleventh-
-looks down at the tiny-handed people-
What’s this I hear about needing smaller keys. Having a trouble with the reach, eh?
Just kidding, just kidding!!! 😂😂😂
_
On a serious note, this conversation has taken such an interesting and important, turn! There really does need to be more of a push to create alternate standard sizes for the instrument. I’ve always had large hands - even as a preteen, I could comfortably span a 10th. So I never had this issue. BUT, I have great empathy, because I would see it all the time with two of my fellow students who had smaller hands. I could see how challenging it was for them: not just challenging to find repertoire to play, but emotionally challenging. I remember them really being so sad sometimes because they were really passionate about playing and there were pieces they truly wanted to play…but couldn’t. There was such a look of heartbreak on their faces when they’d hear a piece they loved, but then look at the sheet music and see too many chords or stretches beyond an octave, or find out there were parts where substitutions or leaving out notes simply wasn’t a feasible solution.
I also remember realizing how deep it must’ve impacted them when I saw a video, over on PW I believe, of a young lady trying a piano with narrower keys, and being able, for the first time, to play some of the pieces she desperately wanted to play with ease. She, literally, had tears in her eyes/was crying over it. It was such an emotional moment. And how many are there out there who experience, feel, and suppress such emotion; loving an instrument so desperately, but having, not a limitation of imagination, but a limitation of their own physical form - the very tool through which they manipulate the instrument.
And I think that the ignorance I had initially is the same ignorance that many in the piano world have and even lean into. People with smaller hands are sort of culled out of the field early on by teachers who just don’t want to take the time with them and an industry that doesn’t want to put the time into solutions. So, people don’t really pay attention to the fact that this problem exists and, yet, is easily solvable.
I do believe that creating pianos with different standard sizes is not only doable and feasible in today’s day and age, but also easily accomplishable. It just has to be a priority. And unfortunately, the exclusivity attitude of the field leans into a “meet the standard” not “build the standard around all” rule.
I think it’s just a matter of find two or three smaller alternate sizes, standardizing them, and building around those standards. Some of the smaller/narrower actions that exist out there don’t even require much change beyond the key sticks. This is an easy fix. People just have to make more of a fuss - and in a world where inclusivity and care for the diffferently-abled is increasingly at the forefront, I don’t see why this can’t become a standard.
