The Basel collection contains some important witnesses of municipal representation: on the one hand, two city trumpets by the Basel instrument maker Jacob Steiger from 1578 - they are also the oldest bugle-shaped trumpets still in existence-, on the other the oldest dated drums from 1571 and 1575.
Also exhibited is the drum on which the city drummer and town crier Jakob Beck accompanied himself at the announcement of the general mobilisation in 1870.

Cities with a social and political reputation often accompanied their secular and ecclesiastical ceremonies with music played on specific instruments. Special pieces of music were assigned to each part of the ceremony.