Uploaded August 2026 | Updated September 2026, 3 weeks ago
Full article livingpianos.com/articles/the-piano-keyboard-that-was-too-logical
CHAPTERS:
2:01 The Problem With the Traditional Keyboard
4:20 Paul von Janko’s Radical Idea
5:33 How the Janko Keyboard Works
7:07 The Same Fingering in Every Key
8:39 Why This Could Be More Ergonomic
10:16 The Keyboard Was Not Perfect
11:15 The Sight-Reading Problem
12:26 The Loss of Tactile Landmarks
13:16 The Existing Pianist Problem
14:30 The Janko Keyboard Creates a Network-Effect Problem
15:49 It Did Attract Serious Interest
7:06 Why it Never Became Standard
18:34 Was the Janko Keyboard Actually Better?
19:56 The Idea Did Not Completely Disappear
21:12 the Bigger Lesson
Welcome to LivingPianos.com. I'm Robert Estrin. Have you ever wondered why the piano keyboard looks the way it does? Why are some keys raised while others are not? Why do the same scales and chords require completely different fingerings when you move from one key to another? And why does playing higher or lower passages often require your hand to make large sideways leaps across the keyboard?
In 1882, Paul von Jankó designed a radically different piano keyboard that addressed many of these issues. It featured six staggered rows of keys, gave every scale the same fingering in every key, kept chord shapes consistent when transposed, and made large intervals easier to reach with smaller hands. It seemed like a remarkably logical solution. Yet today, almost nobody uses it. Was the Jankó keyboard a bad idea, or was it simply too logical for the world that had to adopt it?
Full article livingpianos.com/articles/the-piano-keyboard-that-was-too-logical
CHAPTERS:
2:01 The Problem With the Traditional Keyboard
4:20 Paul von Janko’s Radical Idea
5:33 How the Janko Keyboard Works
7:07 The Same Fingering in Every Key
8:39 Why This Could Be More Ergonomic
10:16 The Keyboard Was Not Perfect
11:15 The Sight-Reading Problem
12:26 The Loss of Tactile Landmarks
13:16 The Existing Pianist Problem
14:30 The Janko Keyboard Creates a Network-Effect Problem
15:49 It Did Attract Serious Interest
7:06 Why it Never Became Standard
18:34 Was the Janko Keyboard Actually Better?
19:56 The Idea Did Not Completely Disappear
21:12 the Bigger Lesson
Welcome to LivingPianos.com. I'm Robert Estrin. Have you ever wondered why the piano keyboard looks the way it does? Why are some keys raised while others are not? Why do the same scales and chords require completely different fingerings when you move from one key to another? And why does playing higher or lower passages often require your hand to make large sideways leaps across the keyboard?
In 1882, Paul von Jankó designed a radically different piano keyboard that addressed many of these issues. It featured six staggered rows of keys, gave every scale the same fingering in every key, kept chord shapes consistent when transposed, and made large intervals easier to reach with smaller hands. It seemed like a remarkably logical solution. Yet today, almost nobody uses it. Was the Jankó keyboard a bad idea, or was it simply too logical for the world that had to adopt it?
