ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
There was a time when many middle-class American homes had a piano. That's been changing for decades, especially with acoustic pianos. Digital piano sales now outnumber those of acoustic pianos 10 to 1. KERA arts reporter Marcheta Fornoff tells us about how that happened.
JON SUDER: Watch this. Look at this. This is Van Cliburn, Chopin "Ballade No. 3" in 1959.
(SOUNDBITE OF VAN CLIBURN'S PERFORMANCE OF CHOPIN'S "BALLADE NO. 3 IN A-FLAT MAJOR")
MARCHETA FORNOFF, BYLINE: Jon Suder is showing off the Steinway Spirio grand piano in his Fort Worth home. It's a souped-up acoustic player piano.
SUDER: There's a computer built into the board, and it's connected to the Steinway server in New York. So I have access to anything Steinway has.
FORNOFF: Including Bruce Springsteen.
(SOUNDBITE OF PIANO INSTRUMENTAL OF BRUCE SPRINGSTEEN'S "BORN TO RUN")
FORNOFF: Suder, an intellectual property lawyer, is one of a dwindling number of Americans buying new pianos. More than half the pianos in the world were once made in the United States, but that was back in 1896.
HANNAH BECKETT: Most people around the '50s, '60s, having a piano in the home was super-common. Everybody did it. It was, like, a primary source of entertainment.
FORNOFF: That's Hannah Beckett. She's a piano technician, and she publishes a consumer guide called the Piano Buyer Press.
BECKETT: Around the '70s and '80s, that started to change.
FORNOFF: Radio, TV and electronic keyboards all chipped away at the piano's foothold. Last year, fewer than 18,000 acoustic pianos were sold in the U.S. compared to 188,000 digital pianos. So who's buying acoustic pianos? - professional musicians, concert halls and music schools.
(SOUNDBITE OF CAROL LEONE'S PERFORMANCE OF HAYDN'S "PIANO SONATA IN C MAJOR, HOB. XVI: 50")
FORNOFF: Carol Leone is chair of piano studies at Southern Methodist University. That's her playing the piano. She says Americans are still studying piano, but in smaller numbers.
CAROL LEONE: Parents of American students believe that music is not going to be a lucrative profession for their children, and therefore, even though they might advocate for them to study the piano, it's seen as a supplement to their education.
FORNOFF: And often, when kids' interests shift, they sell their pianos. Eleonora Grokhovskaya grew up playing the piano in Ukraine. She lives in North Texas now, and purchased a piano 10 years ago for her daughter.
ELEONORA GROKHOVSKAYA: When we reached out to a piano teacher, she said that she would not accept us as students if we only have keyboard.
FORNOFF: Now, Grokhovskaya is trying to sell her Yamaha baby grand on Facebook Marketplace.
GROKHOVSKAYA: This piano was, since then, the most expensive piece of furniture in my house, and now, since she moved to college, I decided I was going to sell it.
FORNOFF: It's hard to track how many instruments are changing hands via secondary sales, but these exchanges keep Diane Bolton busy. She and her husband Gordon own Piano Movers of Texas. The company moves about 1,600 pianos a year. Most are family heirlooms. Clients might be downsizing their home, upgrading their instrument or storing it temporarily. Whatever the reason, moving a piano can be emotional.
DIANE BOLTON: Pianos are more than instruments. They're family members, and they're memories.
FORNOFF: Suder agrees. Yes, he bought that fancy new Spirio, but he also kept the 1922 Steinway that he and his siblings took lessons on as kids.
For NPR News, I'm Marcheta Fornoff in Dallas.
(SOUNDBITE OF EVELYNE DUBOURG'S PERFORMANCE OF BEETHOVEN'S "BAGATELLE IN A MINOR, WOO 59 FUR ELISE") Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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