Adolphe Sax (1814-1894), who worked in Brussels and then in Paris, built up his own collection as part of his activities as a musical instrument maker. This collection went up for sale when his company went bankrupt in 1877.
Originally his collection consisted of 467 instruments from different periods and geographical areas, but the instruments got dispersed. One of the buyers at the 1877 sale was Victor-Charles Mahillon, curator of the Musée instrumental du Conservatoire that was founded in the same year.
Today, 33 instruments from the private collection of Adolphe Sax are kept at the...
Adolphe Sax (1814-1894), who worked in Brussels and then in Paris, built up his own collection as part of his activities as a musical instrument maker. This collection went up for sale when his company went bankrupt in 1877.
Originally his collection consisted of 467 instruments from different periods and geographical areas, but the instruments got dispersed. One of the buyers at the 1877 sale was Victor-Charles Mahillon, curator of the Musée instrumental du Conservatoire that was founded in the same year.
Today, 33 instruments from the private collection of Adolphe Sax are kept at the MIM. Among them are four instruments collected by Guillaume-André Villoteau (1759-1839) during Bonaparte's expedition to Egypt, which are among the oldest preserved Arabic instruments. In addition to the non-European instruments, the collection includes Sax specimens from his own workshops, those of his father Charles-Joseph, and those of competing builders.
