100 Years of Musical Traces

Doctor of Philosophy, collector of folk music and poetry and general music enthusiast Otto Andersson was appointed as the first professor of musicology and folklore at Åbo Akademi November 27th, 1926. The new professor’s work included teaching, research and collecting all kinds of music-related material. From there on, the Collections of Musical History at Åbo Akademi, which was to be known as the Sibelius Museum, began to accumulate.

100 years of musical traces celebrates the Sibelius Museum and its collection’s hundred-year-long history from 1926 to 2026. The exhibition presents phases of the museum from the past 100 years, sheds light on agents that impacted and still impact the museum and features artefacts from the museum’s collections spanning from the earliest instrument donations to peculiar finds, music from the museum’s archives, as well as photographs and posters from past decades – traces of music and music culture which, as such, are impossible to musealise.

The exhibition is open 29.1.2026–3.1.2027.