Keyboard maestro

At Yamaha she creates the digital pianos of the future. The gleaming grand piano looks like others I've seen. But with utmost politeness, Hiroko Ohmura informs me that I'm mistaken. With that, she attacks the keys, and the notes of Beethoven's Sonata No. 8 in C minor, the famed "Pathetique," fill the vast auditorium. I'm entranced. When she's finished, she points inside the ebony cabinet: There are no strings; the sound comes from an array of speakers.