Robbie has asked me to write about a new museum for self-playing
musical instruments in Speyer.

Speyer is a romantic town at the river Rhine not far away from
Heidelberg. In the centre you will find a big Cathedral.
Not far away from the Cathedral (10 minutes to walk) you reach the
"Technik Museum". It had a department for self-playing musical
instruments known under the name "Musiksalon".  The "Musiksalon"
was closed a while ago for sometime and was established newly in
the "Wilhelmsbau" - an outstanding historical building and museum.
It's a building out of the WW1 with a diversified history.
I estimate, it has an exhibition area between 12.000 and 15.000
square feet over 3 floors.

The museum organizers thought - the visitors want to see more -
not only some music boxes. So you will find the ambience of the time
one hundred years ago with furniture, fashions, uniforms,
accessory, old toys and dolls.

Two month ago Mister Gotthard Arnold invited me to stay with the
opening party for the 16th of March 2000.  Mister Arnold is the
restorer of the musical instruments. We know each other because we
have exchanged a lot in the past. We - my wife and I - planned the
journey, but one day before we got a letter with a new invitation
date for the opening party a month later middle of April.
Something was wrong I thought - so I rang Mister Arnold. A big SORRY
came over - he had forgotten to inform us in time, that the
celebration is delayed to the middle of April.

He offered us a generous compensation. He invited us for the next
day to have a look into his workshop in Bad Schoenborn and after that
an exclusive  walkaround with him through the Wilhelmsbau in Speyer.
That was great - much more we could dream of - and we accepted it with
enthusiasm.

If you want to know more - please let me know. May be something
about the history of the Wilhemsbau, information about the restorer,
Mister Arnold and his crew. The photos we have taken are still not
developed. So you will have to wait a little bit for part 2 of a
continuation report.

In the Internet you will find something about the "Technik Museum"
under "www.technik-museum.de". The English version is not up to date.
In the German version the Wilhelmsbau is introduced under
"www.technik-museum.de/home-wilhelmsbau/index.html".

Kind Regards from Hauke Marxsen (Germany)

It follows a section out of the catalog of the museum
(Robbie and Jody, I have the permission of the Technik Museum
for publishing that part):

The "Wilhelmsbau"

With the "Wilhelmsbau", situated in the grounds of the Technik
Museum Speyer just a few steps from the "Liller Halle" building,
a unique museum was created that takes visitors back to the turn
of the century era. The high, lavishly decorated rooms with their
stucco ceilings, parquet flooring and wainscoting are conveying
an air of the glamour and noblesse belonging to an epoch whose
elegant lifestyle was material in forming our picture of the
"good old times".

The spectrum of the exhibition shown on three levels is truly
outstanding. The main focus theme of the ground floor is a
collection of mechanized musical instruments. Long before the
phonograph came into existence these marvels of mechanized
music, activated by cylinders, metal plates or paper tapes, pro-
vided musical entertainment in cafes, restaurants and drawing-
rooms of the middle-classes. The finest and most noble models,
like the reproduction pianos by Messrs. WeIte of Freiburg, were
reserved for a limited, privileged class of wealthy music fans,
who were able to enjoy concert hall-quality performances of the
most famous pianists of their time with this instrument. To see
and hear one of these instruments in action is an unforgettable
experience.

Then the imposing stairwell is taking us up to the middle level
with an exhibition in painstakingly arranged display cases, each
of them a small time capsule in itself, showing historic fashion,
contemporary accessories, toys of the time and many items of
everyday life of the middle-classes. Many of the fashion garments
are draped on artists' dolls, 50 lifelike that you would
expect to see them move around any moment.

Another highlight is the world-wide unique collection of dolls
from the United States comprising several thousand dolls of all
periods and styles, which are also on exhibit on the middle level
of the museum. Classic porcelain dolls are shown here as well
as many characters from fairy tails ranging from Cinderella to
Alice in Wonderland. Particularly interesting for hunters is the
"Jagdzimmer" (huntsmen's room) which shows numerous
hunting trophies from all parts of the world.

The tour of the building culminates in the Winkler collection
in the upper floor of the Wilhelmsbau. Exhibited in valuable,
masterfully illuminated mahogany show-cases the glory of Old
Prussia is coming back to life. Besides uniforms, helmets, medals
and decorations, insignias, sabers and other things military the
exhibition includes rare items of historic fashion, reflecting the
spirit of those times in a most impressive way
With the "Wilhelmsbau" building the collection of the Technik
Museum Speyer could he extended by notable elements and we
hope that our visitors will enjoy their tour of this exhibition as
much as we did creating and arranging the museum.

The Wilhelmsbau building is housing one of the largest collection
of mechanized musical instruments, from the tiny musical
box up to the wardrobe-sized orchestrion. The range of instru-
ments on exhibition is unique and reaching from the beginning
of music boxes, like the serinettes and flue-work clocks of the
late 18th century up to the perfected reproduction pianos and
automatic violins of the twenties. There is hardly any other
museum offering the visitors an opportunity to observe the tech-
nological development of this singular class of instruments as
closely as this. The elaborately furnished rooms as the "Black
Room"  the "Room of Big Organs", the "Clock Cabinet", and the
"Hall of Orchestrions" are not only lending a particularly
beautiful setting to the exhibition but also convey to the
visitor an impression  of those times in which mechanized
musical instruments were at the height of their popularity.