jdowning - 10-29-2008 at 12:41 PM
This museum has a wide ranging and important collection of instruments - East and West. The website offers high resolution images of instruments in
the collection for study by researchers - as well as museum drawings of the instruments for the benefit of luthiers - among other, many facilities.
Great site.
http://mediatheque.cite-musique.fr
Peyman - 10-29-2008 at 02:32 PM
There is some interesting instruments in there. Amazing to see. Thanks for the heads up. The only drawback is that sometimes the website crashes on
me. Not sure why.
gregorypause - 10-30-2008 at 05:04 AM
They have a nice Georges Nahat oud.
It is also interesting to follow the development of instruments, like the guitar from the 16th century to the current times. Thanks for the link.
jdowning - 10-30-2008 at 11:58 AM
Hmmm - it looks as though the link to the Museum collection of instruments previously posted no longer works! I have checked the Museum web site by
another route and confirm that access to the 'catalogue of the collection' is not possible - at least at present.
There is a message on the site stating that "the permanent collections are closed to the public (museum re-organisation) until 03 March 2009 - only
the temporary exhibits are open".
So perhaps the on-line facility to access data and images about the instruments in the collection is now also being re-organised? I may just have been
fortunate in getting access a day or two before they shut down for maintenance. Pity - if that is the case - but something to look forward to for next
year.
So, if you are visiting Paris, take note that the Museum is temporarily closed except for a current temporary exhibition Gainsbourg 2008.
jdowning - 10-30-2008 at 12:37 PM
..... tried again with success!! http://mediatheque.cite-musique.fr/masc/
On the left panel click 'Collections du Musee' and then 'Instrument et Ouvres d'Art' type in instrument type (Mot-cle) or maker (facteur) etc. and
click on the 'find' (Rechercher) button. Lets see for how long this works!
Peyman - 10-30-2008 at 05:44 PM
I think the website crashes a lot. If you stay patient, you can check back and see it working again.
jdowning - 10-31-2008 at 06:25 AM
You are right Peyman - sometimes it works, sometimes not. Hopefully, this is something the Museum will fix.
Exploring the site in more detail, I was unable to determine if the Museum operates a retail outlet for sale of copies of listed plans, books and
documents. For example I have working drawings, by Pierre Abondance, of the the Grobert guitar, cat. E 375 C 278 in the collection. This was purchased
some 20 years ago from the publisher "Societe des amis du musee instrumental - du conservatoire national superieur de musique de Paris" The museum -
as it is today - lists the drawing in its collection of documents but perhaps only retains a copy for reference?
Danielo - 12-8-2008 at 04:58 AM
I just realised - it is possible to listen to my teacher playing on the Nahat 
http://mediatheque.cite-musique.fr/masc/?url=/clientbooklineCIMU/to...
("Instruments du Monde" section )
As an aside, I found on the Museum's webpage this 1779 Egyptian oud:
are you aware of any oud older?
suz_i_dil - 12-9-2008 at 10:40 AM
I heard they found a kind of lute in excavation of a pharaonic grave. But this is just a remember and don't have more information about, it may be
wrong.