The Museum of Imaginary Musical Instruments, by Deirdre Loughridge and Thomas Patteson, will be available April 13 in the UK, July 6 in the US.
It’s a history of fictional, fantastical, and speculative musical instruments, from ancient myth to science fiction to contemporary art. Many of your favorites from this website are in its pages, joined by instruments you haven’t encountered yet. Come visit, and you may find that the line between what humans have dreamed up and what they’ve actually built is thinner and stranger than it appears.
Available for order:
or wherever you purchase books
Hear us discuss the book
interview on New Books Network with Dr. Miranda Melcher
August 15 in Philadelphia at the Free Library of Philadelphia with musical guests
September 28 in Boston at The Square Root, hosted by Rozzie Bound Books, with musical performance by The Wiggly Tendrils
September 29 in Boston at Northeastern University
November 13 in Chicago at the Seminary Co-op Bookstore
What people are saying about the book
“Hugely enjoyable and endlessly stimulating, The Museum of Imaginary Musical Instruments takes readers on a captivating journey through centuries of musical invention, both real and imagined. Every page is infused with deep scholarship and a palpable sense of wonder.” —Alexander Rehding, Fanny Peabody Professor of Music at Harvard University
“Visiting (and revisiting) Loughridge and Patteson’s The Museum of Imaginary Musical Instruments immerses you in the sonic, visual and philosophical delights of ‘fictophones’ from across space, time and astral planes. This slim encyclopedia is brilliant, hilarious and erudite.” —John Tresch, Professor of History of Art, Science, and Folk Practice at the Warburg Institute, University of London
“The Museum of Imaginary Musical Instruments makes tangible – and page-by-page, more fantastical and curious – the elusive question of what music is, and what we wish it could be.” —Elizabeth Hellmuth Margulis, Professor and Director of the Music Cognition Lab at Princeton University
“In this fascinating book, Deirdre Loughridge and Thomas Patteson…demonstrate conclusively that, despite the dazzling range of existent instruments, there is in human culture an appetite for musical forms that cannot be heard.” —David Toop, musician, writer and Emeritus Professor
“A beguiling catalog for fans of historical curios” –Kirkus Reviews
“The book is endlessly playful, if not playable. It’s also a delight, and at a time when so much debate around creativity is taking place on the parched playing fields of AI the book is a reminder of how unbounded and irrepressible the imagination – which is to say, the possible – really is.” –The Broken Compass
“This book is a highly entertaining account of artistic playfulness from ancient times to today; it also constitutes a serious study of the natures and meanings of music.” –Café Américain Magazine
“Equal to the descriptions and analyses of so many fictophones are the illustrations of preposterous devices throughout this lavish and pleasing book…Despite the richness of content, it is neat and light to handle, colourful, accessible and entertaining. The authors close by expressing their “joy and wonder”, which has been brilliantly communicated throughout.” –Leonardo Reviews