Category:Janissary pedals

During the late 18th century, Europeans developed a love for Turkish band music, and the Turkish music style was an outgrowth of this. According to Good, this possibly began "...when King Augustus the Strong of Poland received the gift of a Turkish military band at some time after 1710."^[1] "Janissary" or "janizary" refers to the Turkish military band that used instruments including drums, cymbals, and bells, among other loud, cacophonous instruments. Owing to the desire of composers and players to imitate the sounds of the Turkish military marching bands, piano builders began including pedals on their pianos by which snare and bass drums, bells, cymbals, or the triangle could be played by the touch of a pedal while simultaneously playing the keyboard.^[2]

Up to six pedals controlled all these sound effects. Alfred Dolge states, "The Janizary pedal, one of the best known of the early pedal devices, added all kinds of rattling noises to the normal piano performance. It could cause a drumstick to strike the underside of the soundboard, ring bells, shake a rattle, and even create the effect of a cymbal crash by hitting several bass strings with a strip of brass foil."^[2] Mozart's Rondo alla Turca, from Sonata K. 331, written in 1778, was sometimes played using these Janissary effects.^[3]

— English Wikipedia article “w:en:Piano pedals#Janissary or Janizary pedals”

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