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11 Useless yet amusing facts all Piano related.

October 22, 2006 at 3:19 AM

It was fun making the violin related facts blog a few months ago, so I thought I would make a piano related blog. Becuase most of us are pianists too.

1. There are over 18 million non-professional pianists in the United States alone. The ratio of Women to men is aprox. 3:1. (that means one out of every 20 people is a pianist.)

2. There are over 30 million pianos in the United States (thats almost 2 pianos for every pianist!)

3. The highest price ever paid for a piano was $1.2 million. It was for a Steinway built in 1884. Named after Alma-Tadema, a painter who supervised its decoration.

4. The largest piano ever built weighed nearly 3000 lbs and was 11 feet 8 inches long.

5. The total amount of string tension inside a concert grand piano is almost 30 TONS!

6. 40 out of the 43 U.S presidents owned a piano, harpsicord, or pianoforte.

7. In 1870 Daniel Beatty rosewood grand pianos sold for only $255.

8. There are about 7500 working parts inside a piano.

9. Studies indicate that epileptic patients that listen to Mozart's Piano Sonata can dramatically decrease their chance of a seizure

10. And finally to end all debates (hopefully) about the classification of a piano, the piano is a chordophone under the subcategory struckboard. So the piano is not a percussion instrument, it is in the same family as the violin (a violin is a chordophone (a.k.a. stringed instrument).

11. Today is Franz Liszt's Birthday!

From Pauline Lerner
Posted on October 22, 2006 at 5:38 AM

Richard, your earlier blog on interesting facts about the violin was so interesting that it got me reading about violinists and the brain, which I wrote about in my recent blog. Thanks for your inspiration.

From Richard Hellinger
Posted on October 22, 2006 at 2:50 PM

Your welcome :)! I tried to find some similar medical facts (preferablly about the brain) about pianists. But all I could find was about the epilepsy. My 10th grade research paper (assuming my teacher allows me) is going to be on the subject of the connection of musicians and math. I have found some interesting stuff about the subject so far so I can't wait!

From Maura Gerety
Posted on October 22, 2006 at 7:41 PM

And the 11th useless fact: you posted this piano stuff on Franz Liszt's birthday! :)

From Richard Hellinger
Posted on October 22, 2006 at 9:22 PM

Lol thanks Maura, I added that one! I had no clue!

From Maura Gerety
Posted on October 23, 2006 at 12:10 AM

Yeah, I'm a specialist in useless facts--especially if they're about Hungarian musicians. :)

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