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Prince's piano awaits auction in Austrian cellar

The Local Austria
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Prince's piano awaits auction in Austrian cellar
APA Screengrab

An innovative prototype piano that had been made for Prince by Austrian piano makers for his European tour is set to go under the hammer.

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The €40,000 purple piano had been built for superstar Prince by Austrian piano manufacturers ALPHA Piano for his tour last year, which ended up being postponed following the Paris attacks.

The European tour had been set to begin again this year, before the star’s sudden death last month. Now Prince’s management team have confirmed that the Alpha Grand instrument - the first of its kind - will be auctioned off.

“It is a very mixed feeling. We were very proud to be able to make something for him at all,” CEO Mario Aiwasian said, speaking to APA.

“Now that the whole world talks about his death and we had his piano in our workshop, it is a very weird feeling. But we are in a way happy that we could be part of the story.”

The specialist company’s pianos - hybrids between classical and digital instruments - are popular with some of the world’s biggest musicians.

As well as Prince, pop stars Lady Gaga and Lenny Kravitz are also said to be fans of ALPHA pianos, due to the fact that they take the components of classical grand pianos and update them with modern technology, making them suitable for digital performances without sacrificing quality.

The company's patented technology includes pressure sensors that hammers inside the piano strike instead of the strings used in regular pianos.

The instrument chosen by Prince for his upcoming European tour was a brand new model recently released by the company.

“We published that model at the end of the year,” said Aiwasian. “We managed to do it quickly so it could be used on his tour.”

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