(FORTUNE Magazine) – True audiophiles know that even a $200,000 stereo (and they do exist) can't match the sound of a live performance. So, for those folks for whom high fidelity just isn't high enough, QRS Music offers the nation's widest selection of self-playing musical instruments.

In January the Buffalo-based company introduced its $10,000 Virtuoso Violin, the world's first self-playing fiddle. Designed by a former NASA engineer, the Virtuoso draws its bow across the violin's strings via a carefully concealed roller mechanism. If that seems creepy, it is. If that seems excessive, it is. But if you're at the point of buying robotic instruments, chances are, you're not particularly self-conscious. So enjoy it!

If you prefer duets, the Virtuoso even has a partner: the $5,000 QRS Pianomation system. More accurate than those charming yet old-fashioned player pianos (which QRS also sells, starting at $6,000), the Pianomation system plays more than 200 specially designed CDs that allow the "ghosts" of long-gone performers ranging from Art Tatum to Liberace to "play" your piano. For optimal effect, stick with solo tunes: Orchestral accompaniments are piped out of conventional speakers, somewhat diminishing the seance-like effect.

If that's unacceptable, then you might be interested in an $18,000 QRS Nickelodeon, an upright piano with a 12-piece self-playing band--including a triangle, a cowbell, and a glock-enspiel--inside its case. And Nickelodeon's "musicians" can play the whole gamut of musical styles: gospel, Dixieland, show tunes, country, rock & roll, whatever.

So, who's listening to all that simulated Dixieland jazz? QRS customers include quarterback Joe Montana, sportscaster Frank Gifford, CBS Sunday Morning host Charles Osgood, and CEOs Jack Smith of General Motors and John Chambers of Cisco Systems. But the company hasn't exactly been a cash cow for owner Dick Dolan, who enjoyed great success in the chemical business before he went out and bought QRS. "I figured out how to make $1 million in the music business," he says. "You start with $1 billion."

--Ed Brown