Take a field trip to Phoenix, Arizona while sitting safely in your house! The Musical Instrument Museum features more than 7000 instruments from over 200 countries.
First, we’ll have you watch a really wonderful and brief introductory video about the Musical Instrument Museum. Then, after you watch the introductory video, you can enter the museum and start looking around. See if you can find some of the museum’s oldest instruments:
In the Orientation Gallery is a paigu goblet drum that dates back to China’s Neolithic period. Found in Banpo village near Xi’an, the capital of Shaanxi Province, the drum is estimated to have been created between 5000 and 4000 BCE. The drumhead, possibly made of snake or frog skin, would have been tied to the hooks around the rim of the drum for tension.
In the Guitar Gallery, among Western instruments at MIM, the 10-string guitarra española is the oldest. Instruments resembling the modern guitar first appeared in the late 1400s, and among the early guitars still in existence, this one made in Portugal circa 1590 is considered the oldest full-sized example.
Once you’ve watched the video in the link above, you’re welcome to enter the museum. Here’s a hint! When the above link first opens, instead of going straight into the Europe room right away, look around in the hallway first—there’s lots of rooms to go into! Use your cursor to look and move around.