Both girls not only were accepted by all six conservatories, but they were offered full-ride scholarships by five of them and a half-tuition by Juilliard. After consulting experts, they chose Juilliard, reasoning that the school's prestige would guarantee a professorship or command high private-instructor fees.

With their father unable to afford half their tuition at Juilliard, where costs were well more than $20,000 annually, the girls took out student loans. After one semester at Juilliard they urged their siblings to join them. The other three children auditioned for Juilliard's pre-college program, and all three were offered full scholarships.

"Usually kids arranged to have guardians there, but we wanted to be with them," Keith says. "We had two choices: Turn down the scholarships or pack up and leave."

The Browns packed up their five pianos and moved to New York.

This was financial insanity. The Browns had long ago mortgaged their future for their children's music, paying for private lessons, Steinway pianos, travel to contests, home schooling, sheet music, piano tuning and maintenance, all multiplied by five. They were paying more for piano lessons each month ($1,000) than for rent ($850).

"We were nearly broke when we left Utah," Lisa says. The situation worsened in New York, where their cost of living tripled. They burned up their scant savings to pay moving expenses and survived by maxing out credit cards. Keith, who had sold exotic automobiles in Utah, sold Steinways in New York to augment his income.

The family was united in New York, but that lasted only three years before they ran out of money and returned to Utah.

"It broke us," Keith says. By then, Greg and Melody were old enough to be admitted to Juilliard while their parents and Ryan returned to Utah, where Lisa's father offered them a rent-free house and a job.

But money was still flying out the door. Ryan continued to attend Juilliard's pre-college program by commuting to New York. For two years he flew the redeye from Salt Lake City to New York every Friday, attended consolidated classes on Saturday and flew home Sunday night.

Then fame found the Browns. The BBC learned there were five siblings attending Juilliard — two in the master's program, two in the undergrad program, one in the pre-college program. What were the odds?

Geri Halliwell (aka Ginger Spice) showed up with a camera crew to do the story. This started a run of herd journalism. The London Telegraph did its own story, then the New York Times, "Oprah," People Magazine, "60 Minutes" and more than two dozen other major news agencies. The camera crew from "60 Minutes" followed the Browns around Juilliard for five months.

"We thought it was a 15-minutes-of-fame deal," Keith says.