Skip to content
The Great Britain Guide

Museums · London

Musical Museum

ModernPaid admission♿ Wheelchair accessible

Musical Museum — music museum in London, United Kingdom.

Musical Museum, museums in London

Wikimedia Commons contributors — see linked file page for photographer and licence licence

Plan your visit

Typical visit
1.5 h–3 h
Best time of year
Year-round
Nearest railway station
Kew Bridge · 0.4 km
  • Paid entry
  • Family-friendly
  • Wheelchair accessible

About

Musical Museum is a museum in the United Kingdom. Records date its origin to 1963. Wikidata describes it as: "music museum in London, United Kingdom". Coordinates: 51.4879°, -0.2931°.

Photo gallery

From the Wikipedia article

The Musical Museum is a charity, museum and concert venue located in Brentford, London Borough of Hounslow, a few minutes' walk from Kew Bridge railway station. Its stated purpose is to conserve, preserve, and develop nationally important collections related to the history of music reproduction; inform, engage and entertain the public regarding the evolution of music reproduction; and conserve, preserve, promote and present the theatre pipe organ as an instrument with a significant role in the development of light music on radio and in the cinema and as a musical art form. The Musical Museum contains a significant collection of self-playing musical instruments, and one of the world's largest collections of historic musical rolls. The museum houses rare working specimens of player pianos, orchestrions, reed organs, and violin players. The largest exhibits include a fully restored Wurlitzer theatre organ (attached to a roll-playing mechanism and Steinway grand piano) and a 12-rank roll-playing residence pipe organ. The instruments and exhibits are arranged in four main galleries. The building also houses a concert hall which doubles as a cinema that seats up to 240 people, and a cafe. Mostly run by volunteers, the museum is open on Fridays, Saturdays, Sundays and Bank Holidays. Guided tours are available, which include live demonstrations of the instruments. The museum also stages regular concerts and events, dances and screenings of both contemporary and silent films, often featuring their Wurlitzer Cinema Organ. Many of their events are broadcast live to their YouTube channel: Musical Museum Live.

Excerpt from Wikipedia under CC BY-SA 4.0. See the source article linked in Sources below.

Background

History

The Museum was founded in 1963 by Frank Holland MBE (1910 1989) as The British Piano Museum, who believed that self-playing musical instruments should be preserved and played. In 1975, he was interviewed for the TV Show 'Going Places', in which he reminisced about reading an article about there being about eight-hundred abandoned churches in London, so he decided to find a suitable one to house the instruments, 'St.George's', Brentford. He later wrote of his experiences in the book 'A Boxful of Rolls'. The Museum moved to a new purpose-built building nearby in 2009. In September 2024, the museum opened the Korg Gallery which contains a collection of synthesizers and other electronic musical…

Description

One of the four galleries in the museum contains a collection of electronic musical instruments whose original production dates from the 1970s through to the present day. This room is known as the Korg Gallery and its exhibits include various vintage synthesizers made by the Japanese company, Korg, such as a miniKORG 700 and a rare, wall-mounted Korg MS-20 Blackboard synthesizer. Guided tours of the Korg Gallery are usually available and typically include demonstrations of some of the vintage synthesizers in the collection. Some of the synthesizers in the gallery may be played by visitors.

Sourced from Wikipedia under CC BY-SA 4.0.

Coordinates
51.4879, -0.2931
District
Hounslow
Parish
Hounslow, unparished area
Postcode
TW8 0HA
Parliamentary constituency
Brentford and Isleworth
Phone
+44 20 8560 8108
Established
1963
Nearest railway station
Kew Bridge0.4 km
Opening
Mo-Su 00:00-24:00

Sources

Other places nearby

Loading nearby places…

Nearby

Other museums from this era

More museums in this region

Frequently asked questions

Where is Musical Museum?
Musical Museum is in London, United Kingdom (postcode TW8 0HA), in the parish of Hounslow, unparished area.
When was Musical Museum built?
Built or established in 1963.
How do I get to Musical Museum?
The nearest railway station is Kew Bridge, about 0.4 km away. Drivers can navigate to postcode TW8 0HA.