Collaborations and licensing deals involving musical instruments mostly fall into the realms of guitars, amps, and accessories, as well as drum kits and related products. Pianos and digital keyboards are not as common as a focus of collaboration deals. But these types of agreements regularly come to light, typically yielding very limited quantities of instruments created in partnership with musicians and venues; designers, architects, and artists; brands associated with quality craftsmanship; and occasionally other properties. Most feature unique colors, images, signatures, or materials. Others go beyond that with a more thorough redesign of the form of the instrument. A few offer player-piano experiences with digital playback of music related to the IP.
The most active company involved in such collaborations is Steinway & Sons. Last month, it introduced an edition of 50 pianos in collaboration with Carnegie Hall that celebrated the two organizations’ long working relationship, dating back to 1891 when a Steinway piano was used in the very first performance in the Hall. The special edition’s design is inspired by the architecture of the venue, featuring gold-leaf motifs, and is available in black and white colorways.
In October 2025, Steinway paired with Bentley Motors for a collection of 52 grand pianos in Ultra Black and Ultra White; Bentley produced a complementary Flying Spur Speed sedan in the same color scheme. In 2023, the piano maker released a numbered edition with French sculptor, interior designer, and product designer Noé Duchaufour-Lawrance, who worked with the color, veneers, and form of the piano to create a unique instrument available in ivory white, burgundy red, or midnight blue. The same year, the company released 25 Mickey Mouse pianos to mark Disney’s 100th anniversary. The white grand piano was hand-painted with an all-over image by Italian artist Elena Salmistraro that integrated the character in several ways. In addition, the “black” keys on the piano were a gradated blue, with light blue keys in the lower register progressively darkening to a deep blue in the higher register. The instrument also functioned as a player piano, with a regularly updated music library.
In 2020, Steinway paired with musician, pianist, and designer Lenny Kravitz for an edition of 10 pianos priced at $500,000, with a portion of proceeds benefitting the Harlem School of the Arts. The design, crafted in materials including black ebony and bronze, was inspired by African art and the 1920s Paris art scene. In 2019, the company debuted a limited replica of John Lennon’s white grand piano, complete with a sketch by Lennon on the music rest and a few bars of “Imagine” near the strings. Other Steinway collaborators over the years have included fashion designer Karl Lagerfeld, furniture designer Dakota Jackson, visual artist Paul Wyse, glass sculptor Dale Chihuly, concert pianist Lang Lang, and more than a half dozen performance venues around the world, among others.
While Steinway is by far the most active in this space, other piano and keyboard makers also enter into collaborations from time to time:
- Bösendorfer, which is currently touting a piano featuring the classic public-domain artwork The Great Wave off Kanagawa by Katsushika Hokusai, has produced collector’s editions over the years, including some collaborative instruments. Recent examples include an edition of 12 pianos with Oscar Peterson’s estate, with a player piano component that features 40-year-old original performances by the jazz master, to a 12-piece Artist Series edition with the estate of French writer, artist, filmmaker, and designer Jean Cocteau featuring a Cocteau silkscreen image of Orpheus.
- Rhodes Music, a maker of electro-mechanical pianos, collaborated in the fall of 2024 with U.K. abstract artist Nicolas Dixon on an edition of 40 brightly colored MK8 pianos, 20 each of two designs — dubbed Tequila Sunrise and Moon Boogie — plus one unique hand-painted instrument that was auctioned off for charity. A portion of the income from the rest of the edition was also donated.
- Yamaha created a series of signature red pianos for Elton John starting in 2005, inspired by his The Red Piano residency in Las Vegas, which ran from 2004 to 2009 and featured a custom red Yamaha piano. The special edition, released in two batches of 30 and 20 units, respectively, included a signature in gold on the music rest, rounded side edges on the black keys to yield a more robust style of play, and a player piano mode with five exclusive preloaded songs featuring John’s piano and vocals.
- Casio Music U.K., a maker of digital keyboards, paired with artist Romero Britto in 2022 for a limited edition of its Casiotone CT-S1 model. The collaboration celebrated the philosophy common to both partners: that art and music-making, respectively, should be accessible to more people. The compact model featured speaker fabric across the top sporting Britto’s colorful art style, with the pattern inspired by his experience of listening to music.
Piano makers — including those listed here as well as others such as Kawai, Fazioli, C. Bechstein, and Blüthner — also regularly offer special-edition collections that are not produced through collaborations. Both the collaborative and in-house created limited editions appeal to collectors and high-end consumers who want something unique, or nearly unique, in their homes. They also generate significant awareness and interest that helps promote the respective brands to a wider pool of consumers and potential consumers of pianos and keyboards in general.
Thanks to Ira Mayer for calling our attention to Steinway’s Carnegie Hall edition and prompting the idea for this post.
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