It is well known that the instrumentation of eighteenth-century chamber music was highly flexible; composers
frequently adapted their own works for a variety of instruments, and players often used whatever combinations
they had available. One type of arrangement little used today but attested to in both verbal description
and musical manuscripts of the period is that of trios and other chamber works adapted for two keyboard
instruments. Players often executed such keyboard-duo arrangements on instrumentswith differentmechanisms
and timbres – for example, harpsichord and piano together – thus capturing something of the variety of timbres
available in a mixed chamber ensemble.
Keyboard duos were often played by members of a single family, or by teachers and students together, a
practice that allowed for the construction of a sense of ‘sympathy’ – mutual understanding through shared
experience and sentiment – between the players. These players shared common physical gestures at the
instruments, which reinforced the emotional content of the music; this fostered the formation of a sympathetic
connection even as players retained their individual identities
