The Musical Museum, Brentford

 

The Musical Museum, Brentford

Music has always been my first love, and I've known about the museum in Brentford for a number of years. So, on a lovely warm Friday morning I took the bus to The Musical Museum in Brentford. What an amazing place!

Music is the oldest form of entertainment. Humans have been making music since the beginning of time, a bit like art. Back in the early 1500's Italy had organs powered by water and the inventions kept coming.

The tour of the Musical Museum was given by a gentleman who volunteers there. He really knew his stuff. He gave demonstrations of a good many of the player instruments. For this is a place of self-playing instruments. The collection was put together by Frank W Holland MBE. The first museum was housed inside St George's Church in Brentford in 1963, but the collection outgrew the premises and they were not ideal premises for instruments. With some funding a purpose-built place was opened in 2007, not far from its original home. The tall blue museum sits opposite the River Thames, a couple of stops from Kew Bridge.

The first player instruments came from clock makers with music boxes and metal cylinders with teeth set apart which combed over would produce simple tunes. Soon more sophisticated music boxes were developed using rolls of music that could be changed. In the beginning different companies had different specifications, so you had to buy the right rolls for the instrument. Later there was more regulation and more variety of music.

The oldest self-players

Player piano

Self-playing organ

Player pianos are amazing instruments. I remember my brother and I giggling over watching a piano play itself, as if the notes were pressed by a ghost, though not all player pianos do that. Some of these pianos can be played normally and then switched to play themselves. I never realised how sophisticated these instruments were. They have the ability to read the paper rolls and offer the pianist the chance to change loudness and rhythm by following the lines on them, a bit like reading music. By pumping the pedals and using levers, you could change how the piano sounded while it played. And I just thought you turned it on and let it run! Well, you could do that, but more fun to follow the lines on the roll.

There are also players that can convert a normal piano to a player. You just roll it in front of your piano and start it up. This was demonstrated by our guide. I hope from my short video you can see the little hammers playing the piano. I had come across these before, but I'd forgotten about them.

It seems there were no limits to this form of entertainment. Remember back then pianos or concert going (or a barrel organ on the street) was all there was. Family entertaining was gathering around a piano and singing. Now people could hear whole instruments playing. Self playing organs, violins and orchestras were developed in boxes and larger cabinets. You could now change the rolls with songs and classical music. Think of the music at fun fairs on some of the rides. They are self players.

Eventually, cylinder phonographs were invented, followed by gramophones with records in hard, breakable material I remember as 78's, which we had a home. We had my aunt's old wind-up 'record player' and my brother and I loved messing around with it, speeding up the record and then letting it wind down. Yes, I'm old enough to remember all this. Eventually, the first proper record players came out the Dansette in 1952. I remember our Disc Jockey record player taking a while to heat up. We could see the valves behind the speaker and I can still recall the smell of them warming. Ah, nostalgia. Vinyl replaced the shellac material and since then, technology has gone at such a pace.

There is a room in the museum following the more modern history of music - the cassette Sony Walkman, MiniDisc, and CD players, iPod and iPhone. Now music can be streamed online and we can listen to it at any time and anywhere.

Here you can see a close up of the grooves in this record

HMV and Nipper

Jukebox

There were demonstrations of many of the player instruments, including the Theremin, as used by Bill Bailey in his live shows and used in the Doctor Who theme tune and Good Vibrations by The Beach Boys. But the biggest and best was saved until last. Upstairs in the concert room is the Wurlitzer Organ, the play-all instrument. I remember these as rising up from the floor of a concert hall, but I had no idea they could play themselves. In days gone by, before films had sound, the piano or organ was used to create atmosphere. The pianist never had a script and basically made it up as he/she went along. How about that for thinking on your feet?

My brother still has his reel-reel recorder

Theremin

There was a demonstration of what the Wurlitzer could do. Behind panels in the wall are all the instruments it plays. I was blown away. You could add your own touches as well. What an amazing instrument.

After the tour, we were free to wander around and see things for ourselves. I was drawn to one of the earliest Jukeboxes and the making of the music rolls. There was a piano with synthesiser attached that people were encouraged to play. My days of playing one fingered are a decade away, so suffice it to say, I was terrible, but did manage to hammer out the bass line rift of Smoke on the Water by Deep Purple, even if I did make mistakes!

There is a room dedicated to synthesisers and mixers, which I devoured. I have no idea how to use them, but would love to learn.

The shop has some delights. Of course I bought some things! On the second floor there is a cafe overlooking the road and river, and of course the all-important loos. The museum is open Friday to Sunday and for some special events on other days.

I learned a lot on this visit and particularly how inventive people were in creating these wonderful instruments. A lot of these instruments were originally saved from demolition and brought back to working order. The museum still restores, keeping as many original parts as possible. Thank goodness for Mr Holland. Without him, these instruments may have been lost forever. I had a thoroughly good time learning about player instruments and hearing them in all their glory.