Museo de la Música Puertorriqueña (Calle Isabel at Calle Salud, 787/290-6617 or 787/848- 7016, www.icp.gobierno.pr/myp/museos/m15.htm [1], Tues.–Sun. 8:30 a.m.–4:20 p.m., $1) is a tribute to the rich history of Puerto Rican music in a lovely neoclassical home built in 1912 for the Serrallés family, founders of the Serrallés Rum Distillery.
Designed by architect Alfredo Wiechers Pieretti of Ponce [2], the home’s stained-glass windows, stone tiles, and brass-embossed walls are reason enough to tour the museum.
Each room is dedicated to a different musical style and the vintage instruments used to create it. In the danza room are cellos, violins, and French horns; in the salsa room are bongos, bells, maracas, trumpets, trombones, timbales, and güiros (gourds); in the bomba y plena room are tambourines, güiros, and accordions.
There’s also a room devoted to Taíno ceremonial instruments, including a drum made from a tree trunk, wooden maracas, conch shell horns, flutes made of royal palm and bamboo, and ocarinas (seeds made into flutes). Another room is devoted to the art of making bongos from wooden barrels. Free classes in bongo-making are held in June and July.
Links:
[1] http://www.icp.gobierno.pr/myp/museos/m15.htm
[2] http://www.moon.com/destinations/puerto-rico/south-coast/ponce