Cristofori, Bartolommeo di Francesco (1665–1731)

Italian harpsichord maker, inventor of the piano. In 1709 he constructed a gravicembalo col piano e forte (‘harpsichord with softness and loudness’), consisting of a harpsichord frame with a new action mechanism: hammers hitting the strings instead of plucking them, allowing for the first time a gradation of soft to loud.

He worked first in Padua and then in Florence. Three of his pianos survive, dated 1720, 1722, and 1726.