Musikmuseum stands on a hill above the Barfüsserplatz in the medieval heart of Basel. It belongs to a complex that dates back to St. Leonhard’s Convent, a monastery of the Canons Regular of Saint Augustine. The Church of St. Leonhard, thought to have been founded between 1060 and 1070, is part of the same ensemble. Like so many other buildings in Basel, the convent was severely damaged by the great earthquake of 1356 and had to be repaired at considerable expense. The 15th century brought further troubles as a result of war, plague and famine, and not until the end of that century was there a change for the better. The arrival of the Reformation in Basel in 1529 put an end to its monastic activities once and for all, while the Church of St. Leonhard was named one of Basel’s four Protestant parish churches. In the 17th and 18th centuries, the complex was used as a builder’s yard and since the yard also doubled as the place where the Lohnherren, or employers, paid out wages, it came to be known as the Lohnhof (lit. «wage yard»). This is how things stood in 1821 when the police moved in.

From 1835 to 1995, the former convent was used as a prison and when that, too, closed, the Basel-based architects Morger & Degelo converted the former library and cell tract into a museum of music. The building housing the Musikmuseum will soon be a thousand years old and its history has remained visible to this day.