Arkansas

Chris Climer wanted to play the piano and organ when he was 16 years old.  He did not have the money to purchase an instrument so he made an arrangement to work in a music store in Arkansas to earn the money to make the payments –and he has been in the industry ever since!  He learned to deliver and service pianos before he was given the opportunity to sell the instruments.  Chris took a liking to the process and relocated to Dallas in 1969 to work for Goodman Music.  In 1980, Chris and his wife opened the Family Music Center in Dallas and designed the website www.worldwidepianos.

Ben Jack was born and raised in Arkansas, so it was no surprise that the passionate steel pedal guitarist would open up a string of successful stores in and around Fayetteville. As one of the leaders of music retailing in the state, if not the country, Ben pioneered many of the American built instruments in their heydays, such as Fender and Peavey. In fact, Ben Jack Music is the oldest Peavey dealer still selling the product today.

Glendower Jones loves to unearth vocal music that is out of print yet sought after by a singer or choral group.  With a vast collection it's likely he already has what you are looking for and if so he takes pride creating a clean and easy to read edition.  He grew up in Louisiana, where his father was a Methodist minister.  Glendower was exposed to a wide range of music and soon discovered he had great passion for classical vocal music and the category he refers to as contemporary art songs.  In 1987 he formed Classical Vocal Reprints in New York, but he moved the company some yea

Paul Shuffield opened a small mom and pop music retail store with his wife in 2008, just a few weeks before the bottom fell out of the American economy and retailing suddenly became much different.  Paul reacted quickly to the challenge and soon offered services and products he didn’t originally think about, but he followed the need.  First he installed a large church PA and soon after filled the need for instrument rentals.  As a result his business continues to grow and he has provided our industry with a wonderful success story!

Darren Speir often reflects back on the Texas music store his uncle and his father opened.  His father was a piano technician and helped build the store's customer list based on his attention to detail and the care he put into each piano tuning and repair.  After working in his father's piano store moving and tuning pianos, along with selling used pianos, Darren purchased the Dallas Piano Warehouse building that Walt Burchfield had started years earlier, and changed the name to Metroplex Piano Warehouse.  Today the company has ten locations, with its most recent addition in Little