La Salvia Musuem

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Argentinian Barrel Organ Museum La Salvia - Goal

In the second half of the twentieth century, Osvaldo -one of Pascual La Salvia (II)'s sons and the pioneer's great grandson- spent his teens trying to recover antique instruments built by his own family which served different purposes. They allowed him to form a varied collection of the different models built in the past which, in turn, encouraged the later creation of the Museum introduce herein.

The main goal of the Museum is to preserve the barrel organ as a cultural event belonging to Buenos Aires city and Argentina as a whole, based on the following reasons:

Historic testimony: Nowadays we have modern compact discs and DAT where the 1melodies we like are recorded and which we are able to reproduce and listen in our living-room or public places with different amplification volume. Using other technology, we formerly had vinyl long plays and still back in time we found the legendary 78 rpm paste discs. From several decades we also have radiophony. But when the twentieth century began these conveniences did not exist. So, in order to enjoy music we had to go to "live performances", either by solos or orchestras, or to "machines that made music", that is, instruments which reproduced melodies mechanically. Within the latter, barrel organs had a prevailing role.

Singularity of its building in Latin America: Undoubtedly, the integral building and creation of its own designs and models is a distinctive feature in La Salvia's workshop.

This singularity made some occasional visitors in Argentina, upon knowing about the existence of this art, entrust the building of some special models in which they requested the incorporation of traditional melodies as well as those coming from their own country.

Period music's witness and protagonist, at its height: Actually, the barrel organ spread the fashionable period melodies and even constituted the support of non-registered scores in other media.

Its link to Buenos Aires and tango: Barrel organs were the primitive spreading channel of tango's melodies in the city slums and downtown in Buenos Aires They were protagonists in tango's songs: from "Organito de la tarde" ("Afternoon barrel organ") and "El último organito" ("The last barrel organ") to "Balada para un organito loco" ("Ballad for a mad barrel organ").

Writers' and poets' subject: Evaristo Carriego, Homero Manzi, and Jorge Luis Borges, just to mention three of the best known ones, place the barrel organ as a protagonist in some of their most famous works. The workshop stopped performing commercial activities in 1984. Nowadays it is only in charge of the maintenance of the museum material. Original and antique machines and tools belonging to the workshop hope they'll be exhibit in public together with the instruments.


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