Azerbaijan State Museum Of Musical Culture

The Azerbaijan State Museum of Musical Culture was established in 1967. The main purpose and mission of the museum are the collection, preservation, research, and promotion of materials related to the history of Azerbaijani music.

More than 63,000 exhibits are preserved in the museum’s collection. Among them are national musical instruments such as the tar, kamancha, saz, gaval, gosha-naghara, zurna, and ney, as well as unusual instruments including the asa-tar and asa-saz. The museum also houses restored Eastern musical instruments that were widely used in the Middle Ages and have been returned to musical practice. Musical instruments of various peoples of the world are presented in a special collection.

The museum preserves original manuscripts of musical scores, letters, personal belongings, posters, programs, photographs, works of visual art, sheet music, books, and other exhibits belonging to prominent performers of mugham and ashig art. It also holds materials related to leading representatives of the national professional composition school including Uzeyir Hajibeyli, Gara Garayev and Fikret Amirov, as well as figures such as Bulbul, the founder of the Azerbaijani vocal school, Shovkat Mammadova, and the first Azerbaijani ballerina, Gamar Almaszade.