The historic Lohnhof now houses Switzerland’s largest collection of musical instruments. The exhibition features some 650 instruments from five centuries of music-making spread over three storeys. The 24 cells of the former prison serve as exhibition cabinets in which visitors can use an interactive on-screen program to choose from more than 200 music samples and obtain further information. The presentation is structured according to the overriding themes of European music history and so places each exhibit in its larger musical and social context.
Musikmuseum
History pf the Building
The Lohnhof housing the museum perches above the Barfüsserplatz in Basel’s medieval city centre. It is part of a complex whose oldest structures date back to St. Leonard’s Convent, a monastery for Augustinian canons. The 11th century Church of St. Leonard’s, which is thought to have been built between 1060 and 1070 and was enlarged in 1492, also forms part of the historic ensemble. Although seriously damaged in the great earthquake of 1356, the monastery was painstakingly restored. War, plague, and famine in the 1440s ushered in a period of decline from which it did not recover until later in the century. While the Reformation of 1529 put an end to the monastery, St. Leonard’s Church became one of the four parish churches in Basel to embrace the Reformed faith. In the 17th and 18th centuries, however, it was used as a municipal depot where workers were paid their wages (Lohn), and so came to be known as the “Lohnhof” or “wages yard”. Between 1835 and 1995, the erstwhile monastery was used as a prison.