Music Machines & Me

From 15 April, the museum will transform into a place where you don’t just look and listen, but above all get to make and do things yourself. Inspired by the extraordinary music machines from the museum’s collection, visitors aged 8 and over can explore the technology behind these instruments. How do these clever mechanisms ensure that a tune suddenly starts playing? In Music Machines & Me, you will find out for yourself and, step by step, grow into a true creator! As you unravel the secrets of the historical instruments, you will work towards creating your own digital music machine.

Gears & grooves, bells & beats

The entire first floor is being transformed into an interactive music and technology lab. You are invited to turn everything, test things out and press buttons! During your journey of discovery, you will encounter remarkable inventors and robotic narrators who will help guide you. They will show you how technology is all around us, even in the things you use every day.

You will experiment with mechanical technology such as gears, crankshafts and levers. By testing things yourself, you will see step by step how movement can turn into rhythm, sound and ultimately music. You will also experience how musical instruments from all over the world sound, how to programme music and how to play it live.

How does your music machine sound?

At the end, it’s your turn: like a real inventor, you’ll create your own digital music machine. You will choose, combine and programme, and watch your creation come to life. This music machine will be saved in an online repository: this way, you’ll help build the collection of the future!

Not finished creating yet? In the Maker Space, you can take part in workshops and continue experimenting with technology and music. The workshops are available during the school holidays upon registration.

“We then went upstairs to the new interactive exhibition and had such fun!”

Here is one of the first reviews we received for Music Machines & Me (and the museum):

‘We couldn’t believe how amazing the museum is! The collection of instruments is wonderful, beautifully displayed and the tour given by the young lady was excellent. Her talk really gave us a great understanding of how the instruments worked and were used in their time.’

‘We then went upstairs to the new interactive exhibition and had such fun! Again the display was very well thought out and helped with our understanding about how the instruments worked. We particularly enjoyed the “create your own” items.  As a primary school teacher, I could imagine children would gain a great understanding in a fun way. Again we felt very lucky that we had arrived in time to visit this section of the museum. Your museum is defintely one of the “must dos” in Utrecht! And in fact one of the best museums we have visited!’

You can can find the entire review here on Trip Advisor.