The Brussels Musical Instruments Museum was established in 1877 as part of the Brussels Royal Music Conservatory. Its original collection was already owned by the Conservatory at that time, but was greatly expanded by its first curator, a man named Victor-Charles Mahillon. Expanded enough so that it didn’t really fit into the space that had originally been allocated for it. Buildings were expanded, and others acquired to make space for storage, display and administration of the collection, which grew further under succeeding curators. Eventually it was decided that the museum was too fragmented, and in 1978 two buildings once owned by the Old England department store were purchased for the museum. One of these buildings was a neoclassical building on the Place Royale. But the building to be used for display of the collection had been built in 1899 in the art-nouveau style according to a design by architect Paul Saintenoy. The building had been vacated in 1972 and had fallen into a certain amount of disrepair. But it was large enough for the envisioned display space, and a careful restoration would make for a very attractive building. This is eventually what happened, but it took awhile. The Musical Instruments Museum (or "mim") in its present form was opened in the year 2000.

The displays in the museum mostly have placards describing them. There is good news, in that the placards are bilingual. But the bad news is that the languages are French and Dutch. Fortunately visitors are given audioguides in chosen languages on entering, which describe some of the exhibits and in some cases actually play examples of what the instruments sound like (some of this is also available on the museum’s website). And a good thing, as the sound and the description are often less than obvious. We weren't allowed to keep the audioguides, though, so some of the descriptions and captions below may be imprecise.

As we walked through the displays, we saw exactly what one would expect from a Musical Instruments Museum – a large number of conventional musical instruments.







But on closer inspection (and helpful descriptions from the audioguide), some of the instruments were not exactly what they seemed to be. For example, the instrument below, known as a "Hardanger fiddle", is a Norwegian instrument that appears to be an elaborately decorated violin. This is partly true, but beneath the usual set of strings there is a second set of strings that resonates with the melody strings to produce a more complex sound (you can hear a short sample on the website).

Some of the displayed instruments were reflective of the technology available at the times in which they were created.



Some such instruments were used for street entertainment. For example, the following is a mechanically animated tableau called "The Dentist", that tells a comical and highly politically incorrect story while music plays from the barrel organ on which it is mounted.

Other instruments looked unfamiliar, often because they were from another part of the world or from an earlier time.





Some instruments ranged from imaginative to just bizarre.




One display had us puzzled for awhile, as there didn’t seem to be any possible way to play it. There were some other instruments nearby called "serpents", which were roughly tubular wind instruments that were bent in places so as to appear snakelike. As it turned out, this display wasn’t an instrument at all, but rather a chandelier made up of repurposed serpents.

The museum also displayed many keyboard instruments, some of which were also works of visual art. There were several beautiful harpsichords, for example. A harpsichord makes sounds by plucking strings inside of it when the keys are pressed, rather than striking them, as in a piano. A virginal is a smaller, simpler variety of harpsichord.



Again we came across an instrument that wasn’t quite what it seemed. In this case the instrument looked like another harpsichord, but was instead a Spanish instrument called a Geigenwerk. This instrument is played by two people – the one playing the keys, and another one who furiously turns a crank to keep wheels inside the instrument spinning. When the keys are pressed, the strings inside the instrument are brought into contact with the spinning wheels, resulting in a violin-like "bowing" sound.

There were other beautiful keyboard instruments as well, mainly pianos.




One piano had its top open to display an unusually complicated interior. This is the only piano in the world that contains a functioning "luthéal" mechanism. The luthéal mechanism, patented in 1919, can be placed inside a grand piano and adjusted to change the timbre of the piano’s sound, making it sound like other instruments such as a harpsichord or a harp. In this age of electronic instruments this might not sound that impressive, but at the time it was an impressive feat, being accomplished solely by mechanical means.

Another piano caught our attention because it had two full keyboards. As it turns out, the top keyboard is reversed, with low notes on the right and high notes on the left. The idea was that a musician could play both high and low notes with the same hand, making certain types of performances easier (if one could get past the learning curve of mastering a backwards keyboard). Also, it was possible to get more fingers on high notes or low notes at the same time, yielding a sound density usually only available in duets. Again, this is the only one of these in the world.

Finally, an instrument known as a "glass harmonica" was on display. This instrument consists of a set of nested glass bowls, mounted on their side in a wooden cabinet and free to spin like a lathe (through use of a foot pedal). Those who have run wet fingers along the rim of a crystal wine glass can imagine the type of sound that is produced by applying wet fingers to a glass harmonica. Multiple notes can be played at once, depending on the number of fingers applied. After the instrument was introduced in the late 18th Century, it was popular for a time, until people decided that it could cause epileptic seizures. You can hear a short selection for yourself on the museum website if you’re so inclined, but don’t say you weren’t warned.

After looking at the instruments, we went upstairs, past a small concert hall to the bar at the top of the building. We weren’t thirsty, but we were interested in the view of the Lower Town.

This completed our visit to the Musical Instruments Museum, and we headed back down the hill to the Lower Town. On the way we passed an interesting looking clock, to the right of the Albertina Park, known as the Clock of Citizens. This clock is a Jacquemart clock, meaning there’s a figure at the top that strikes a bell, and there are twelve other figures mounted in the wall around the clock face, each pointed to by an hour. The clock was built in 1959 for the Brussels World’s Fair.

We returned to the hotel and relaxed for awhile, eventually going out and getting some dinner. We returned to the hotel by way of the chocolate store installed in its ground level.

We tried some of the chocolate but weren’t that impressed. Maybe we selected poorly. We resolved to resume our quest for Belgian chocolate later. If we were to find it the next day, we’d have to find it in another city, though, as we were planning to take a trip to the city of Bruges.