Piano Performance Museum

The Piano Performance Museum, Main Street, Hunter, NY, under the auspices of the Catskill Mountain Foundation, is the home of the Steven E. Greenstein Piano Collection, a one-of-a-kind assemblage of more than 25 historic pianos and related artifacts. What is virtually unique about the Museum is that visitors can ‘perform’ during their visits. That is, they can sit at most of the pianos and play their favorite pieces. The collection includes early and modern keyboard instruments, including 200-year-old historic European pianos as well as American pianos built in the 18th and 19th centuries. The collection shows the development of the instrument from clavichords, harpsichords and the fortepiano to the modern piano. The Museum also houses a unique collection of miniature pianos and includes tuning tools and repair kits; tuning forks, hammers—everything that would allow a technician to bring a piano back to maximum performance standards. The goal of the Piano Performance Museum is to provide visual, audio, and educational programs documenting the musical history and technical development of the piano, an essential instrument in performance, accompaniment and composition. After all, no musical education is complete without understanding the piano’s important role in musical development.