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Royal College Of Music Centre For Performance History, London

 

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The Centre For Performance History at London''s Royal College of Music is an amalgamation of two museums, the Department of Portraits and Performance History, and the Museum of Instruments.

The Museum of Instruments holds a collection of musical instruments dating from the fifteenth century. One of the earliest folk instruments used by civilisations all over the world consisted of a wooden box, rather like a coffee table, with strings fixed across it. There were many varieties, but they all had the same basic form, and were all played by running the fingers across the stings. Of course using a plectrum was more comfortable. Even better would be a mechanism to pluck the strings for you. From experiments to achieve a mechanism of this kind, keyboard instruments began to evolve. Musical instruments in which strings were plucked via a keyboard date to the fifteenth century. The oldest surviving keyboard string plucked instrument in the world, known as a clavicytherium dating to 1480 is kept in the Museum of Instruments collection. It looks like an upright harp in a case with a keyboard attatched. Hundreds of musical instruments in the Museum of Instruments collection then illustrate the course musical history took over succeeding centuries in Western Europe.

The Department of Portraits and Performance History includes 340 original portriats of musicians, along with 10,000 prints and photographs related to music. There is also a collection of 600,000 concert programmes dating from 1720 to the present day.

 

Opening Times:

The Museum of Instruments:

Open to the public during term times, and during the summer college holiday, Tuesday to Friday, 11.30am - 4.30pm. On March 15th the museum closes at 2pm. Check before you visit using contact details below.

The Department of Portraits and Performance History:

Open to the public by appointment only.

 

Directions:

Museum of Instruments:

On Prince Consort Road in west London. Nearest Underground Stations are South Kensington and Gloucester Road. Click here for an interactive map centred on the Museum of Instruments.

Department of Portraits and Performance History:

Just off the A402, Goldhawk Road in Shepherd's Bush. The nearest Underground station is Goldhawk Road.

 

Address:

Museum of Instruments:

Royal College of Music, Prince Consort Road, South Kensington, London SW7 2BS

Department of Portraits and Performance History:

220 - 238 Goldhawk Road, Shepherd's Bush, London W12 9PL

 

Access:

Museum of Instruments:

Level access at the Eastern Entrance on Prince Consort Road, but level access is not possible to some of the collection. Adapted toilet facilities available.

Department of Portraits and Performance History:

There is level access. Adapted toilet facilities are available.

 

Contact:

Museum of Instruments:

telephone: 020 7591 4842

e-mail: museum@rcm.ac.uk

web site: http://www.rcm.ac.uk/Research+and+Collections/Collections/Museum

Department of Portraits and Performance History:

telephone: 020 7591 4340

e-mail: portraits@rcm.ac.uk

web site: http://www.cph.rcm.ac.uk/InformationRC.htm

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