Ethnic Music Museum of Busot

Dr Alan P Newman (Atlas Obscura User)

What this museum lacks in size, it makes up for in quality. The Ethnic Music Museum in the small municipality of Busot is based on a private collection donated by Carlos Blanco Fadol, a long-time resident of Busot originally from Uruguay.

Fadol’s collection consists mainly of musical instruments acquired during his trips to five continents. However, several non-instrument exhibits are also worthy of note, like a machine that was used to imitate the sound of wind and storms in a Valencian theater, and a sound-generating tribal sculpture of a pregnant woman used to announce the birth of a child.

Among the instruments themselves are two examples of a kirar or kar, a lyre-like Ethiopian stringed instrument, with a sound box constructed from a human skull. As this instrument would normally have a bowl-shaped wooden sound box, it has been suggested that the skull versions are 19th-century tourist pieces made as bizarre souvenirs.

Aside from the artifacts, displays include high-quality photographs of the instruments in use in their traditional environment. Many exhibits have QR codes that can be scanned by phone to generate a short sound file of the instrument being played.

Know Before You Go

The museum is closed on Mondays. It is open from 11 A.M. to 2:30 P.M. and from 3:30 P.M. until 6 P.M. on other weekdays, and until 7 P.M. on Saturday and Sunday. Admission is €2.50, or €1.50 for seniors.

If driving, it is best to park close to the Busot Medical Center. By public transport, you can take a bus from Alicante to Muxtamel (line 23) which runs frequently, and then from Muxtamel to Busot (line C-51), which runs four times per day. It is also possible to take a combination of tram and bus from most of the northern Costa Blanca coastal strip, changing at El Campello, but these buses only run five times per week.