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The Music Museum : one of the richest collections in the world

With its collection of over 4,000 instruments – one of the largest in the world –, its reference holdings and its temporary exhibitions, the 3,000-sq.m Museum showcases a constantly changing musical heritage that is at once ancient and turned to world cultures.

A main focus of the Museum is to embrace major cultural movements. In addition to its collections tracing the history of instruments from Baroque Italy to the period of grand opera and lyrical drama, not to mention the music of Versailles, the Museum also presents the history of instruments from three non-Western geographic areas: the Middle East, Asia and Africa.

In an attempt not to limit its audience to specialists, the strategy adopted was to complement the collection with temporary exhibitions alternating between more “academic” subjects (the musical traditions of China, Baroque Passions, Northern India, music and the Third Reich, etc.) and themes that would appeal to the general public (Pink Floyd, Jimmy Hendrix, Brazilian popular music, John Lennon, etc.), while endeavouring to present all of the musical practices in the world. This strategy has proved its worth since attendance is steadily on the rise, with a yearly average of 150,000 visitors.

Refurbishment of the permanent collections, which began in 2006 (to be completed in 2009) to make way for new exhibition spaces on 20th-century popular music and world music, shares this desire to strengthen intercultural exchanges through a mutual understanding of one another’s values.

Recognized as a national and international benchmark, the Music Museum is often called upon to provide selective or more in-depth expertise. In France, as head of the network of musical instrument collections, the Music Museum naturally plays the role of consultant for other museums in a wide variety of areas such as acquisitions, preventive conservation and museology (e.g. finalizing appraisals for
the restoration of instruments held at the Château and Musée de Blois; consultation on the catalogue project for the Tissier collection harps held at the Alpes Maritimes departmental archives, etc.).

Foreign museums often appeal to its expertise. Since 2006, for example, it has worked on the creation of the Museum of Musical Instruments scheduled to open in 2010 in Phoenix (USA). It also regularly teams with various institutions to hold exhibitions (Musée d’art et d’histoire in Geneva, Schloss Neuhardenberg, Caixa Catalunya in Barcelona, Australian Centre for the Moving Image in Melbourne, Experience Music Project in Seattle, etc.).