Fast track your entrance into this beautiful Art Nouveau building full of... well, musical instruments. Just like the name says. The Musical Instruments Museum is the place to see and learn about old and rare instruments from around the world. It has four engrossing floors and more than 1,000 instruments on exhibit!
This Brussels' must-see all began with the first director of the conservatory, François-Joseph Fétis (1784-1871) and his private collection of 172 instruments. Since then the collection has swelled, like the string section of an orchestra, to literally thousands of instruments.
See ancient ones, like the Jew's harp, which may date back to the 16th century. Learn the story of keys and keyboards in the Western world, browse classical music from late medieval and renaissance times right up to the end of the 19th-century.
Other highlights include the harmonica donated by Belgian-American jazz musician Toots Thielemans, and don't miss the componium, an orchestrion from the 19th-century that composes an infinite array of music, automatically!
