Musical Instrument Museums as Sources and Resources in Contemporary Debates
Since 2021, Fañch Thoraval (MIM-RMAH/INCAL-UCLouvain) has been carrying out the MaHiOn project, which investigates the processes of acquisition, circulation, and interpretation of non-European instruments during the long nineteenth century, taking as its starting point the collections of the former Musée instrumental of the Royal Conservatoire in Brussels.
The building of these collections involved many different kinds of actors (producers, intermediaries, collectors), whose respective status, interests, musical cultures, and mindsets often differed greatly. As a result, the selection of...
Since 2021, Fañch Thoraval (MIM-RMAH/INCAL-UCLouvain) has been carrying out the MaHiOn project, which investigates the processes of acquisition, circulation, and interpretation of non-European instruments during the long nineteenth century, taking as its starting point the collections of the former Musée instrumental of the Royal Conservatoire in Brussels.
The building of these collections involved many different kinds of actors (producers, intermediaries, collectors), whose respective status, interests, musical cultures, and mindsets often differed greatly. As a result, the selection of instruments, their identification, and sometimes even their construction were significantly shaped by factors unrelated to their original context. Likewise, the understanding of these instruments was conditioned by fragmentary and mediated information, by historically situated worldviews, as well as by objectives shaped by scientific aspirations or exotic representations.
Through the study of musical instruments brought to Europe during the 19th century, the MaHiOn project seeks not only to document the history of musical traditions that have undergone major transformations or have even disappeared. Based on a methodology combining archival research, organological observation, and musicological investigation, it also aims to outline a history of international relations in which musical knowledge was elaborated within a field of forces defined by commercial, diplomatic, ideological, and scientific concerns.
To date, the project’s main achievements include:
- a reassessment of Victor-Charles Mahillon’s instrumental classification (1877) and its connections with Indian traditions and research into acoustics;
- the discovery of a worldwide phonographic collection (1899), unique and contemporary with the major sound archive projects launched in Paris and Vienna, but until now largely overlooked;
- the rediscovery of instruments collected by the Mission de Chine (1843–1845), which had disappeared after the return in 1846 of the agents sent to China to advance French commercial interests;
- the reconstruction of the Musée des échanges (from 1886 onwards), an unofficial collection created to exchange instruments with other museums.
