Did You Know?

Fun and Random Music Facts:

1. A grand piano can be played faster than an upright piano
2. A piano covers the full spectrum of instrument tones, from below the lowest note of a double bassoon to the above the highest note of a piccolo.
3. On a standard 88 key piano, the bottom key is an A and the highest key is a C.
4. Beethoven was deaf when he composed his 9^th Symphony.
5. None of the Beatles could read music.
6. Leo Fender, the inventor of the Stratocaster and Telecaster, couldn’t play the guitar. He was a saxophone player.  
7. According to worldwide sales data, the harmonica is the world’s best-selling instrument.
8. American composer, John Cage composed in 1952 a work called 4’3” which contains 4 minutes and 33 seconds of silence.
9. In 2000, Frank Sinatra was named entertainer of the century.
10. In a concert grand the string tension is almost 30 tons.
11. A boxed Steinway Model D weighs 1400 lbs.
12. The piano is known as “The King of Instruments”.
13. The world’s largest piano is 11 feet long, weighs more than a ton and has a total string tension of over 30 tons.
14. Although a piano has strings, it is considered a percussion instrument.
15. There are 12,116 individual parts that make up a Steinway Grand Piano.
16. Jimi Hendrix’s tombstone has a Fender Stratocaster carved into it.
17. The Fender Factory produces nearly 90,000 strings a day.
18. The world’s smallest guitar is 10 micrometers long with strings 50 nanometers wide.
19. When you get chills from listening to music it’s caused by dopamine being released in your body. 
20. Your heartbeat really does beat to whatever music you are listening to.
21. Our music choices can predict our personality.
22. Music training can significantly improve our motor and reasoning skills.
23. Classical music can improve visual attention.
24. Music heals.
25. Make music not war: Monaco’s national orchestra is bigger than its army.
26. Mozart was five years old when he wrote his first piece.
27. There are over 12,000 parts in a piano, 10,000 of which are moving.
28. The piano was invented in 1698 by Bartolomeo Cristofori.
29. On a standard piano keyboard there are 88 keys, 36 are black and 52 are white.