Kircher's cat piano (piano gatuno...)

Athanasius Kircher first described the cat piano in his landmark 1650 work Musurgia Universalis.

In order to raise the spirits of an Italian prince burdened by the cares of his position, a musician created for him a cat piano. The musician selected cats whose natural voices were at different pitches and arranged them in cages side by side, so that when a key on the piano was depressed, a mechanism drove a sharp spike into the appropriate cat’s tail. The result was a melody of meows that became more vigorous as the cats became more desperate. Who could not help but laugh at such music? Thus was the prince raised from his melancholy.

En 1650 una publicación, Musurgia Universalis, trajo a la luz el invento de un Jesuita Alemán, de nombre Athanasius Kircher -casi eh- quien se dedicó a seleccionar gatos cuyos maullidos y aullidos poseyeran diferentes tonos y grados de agudeza. Ordenándolos según esta característica los dispuso en una estructura con forma de piano. El singular sistema entonces entraba en su macabro funcionamiento dotado de una afilada aguja que pinchaba la cola del gato al presionar una tecla. A medida que avanzaba la melodía la desesperación de los gatos aumentaba incrementando así el nivel de maullido de estos. Las obras eran confeccionadas en base a esta característica, y su propósito era sacar de la depresión a un príncipe.


Encontrado en Anfrix