Billy Shaw

 Billy Shaw and his wife Donna opened Desert Piano in Palm Springs after working in a series of piano sales jobs, including one at Colton Piano where the couple met.  Billy is well known in the industry as a creative salesman and the inventor of the Piano Bar, which was introduced in the 1980s.  He also created a series of promotional programs and sales campaigns, several of which are still being used by piano retail stores around the country.  One of his most noted programs was based on the Three Bears story and relating it to a range of keyboard products he was selling.  Billy began playing drums as a toddler and was an organist by the time he was a teenager.  His father ran the Lowrey Organ Company, where young Billy fell in love with keyboard instruments.  Donna was a music teacher for Colton Pianos when the two met.  Their NAMM Oral History interview was completed on November 26, 2007