Can Your Piano Do This?

You're sitting, looking at your tax rebate check and wondering what you are going to spend it on to help jump start the economy. Well, wonder no more. Get 42 other friends together and buy the new Yamaha Mark IV Disklavier. For around $42,000 ($150,000 or more if you want a concert grand size) you can own the first internet capable piano. That's right, iTunes has come to the 19th century.

The Disklavier has always been an oddity in line with the old player-pianos that used piano rolls. It produces acoustic music with the touch of composers and master pianists without the owner having to do anything, not even hire a pianist. While player pianos and disklaviers have been a boon for composers interested in tempo relationships normal humans could never muster, for the general public they have remained the province of hotel lobby bars where ghostly fingers playing "Moon River" elicit as much notice as the pastel paintings of birch trees adorning the walls. But now, the possibilities are mind-blowing. Owners can download songs from the internet for their piano to play and can even set their piano to act as an alarm clock, playing their favorite melody every morning at 6:00. You can download piano parts to favorite albums so you can imagine Billy Joel sitting in your living room playing along to "Piano Man." It can even record your own voice and play it back in harmony with what you are playing so you have backup singers.

Ok, so some of the options are a little creepy, but still, the options for pedagogy are endless and might even get some early students to practice a bit more. Especially once they figure out how to download their favorite game and play it on the computer.