The Grammy Museum Shares Music History
by Cherie YurcoLast year, while marking its 50th anniversary, The Recording Academy opened a 30,000 square-foot Grammy Museum in Los Angeles’s L.A. LIVE Entertainment District. The museum uses more than 30 original films and two-dozen interactive exhibits to explore the enduring legacies and creative process behind all forms of music.
"Through the lens of the Grammy Awards, the Grammy Museum tells the story of making music in a new and exciting way,” says Robert Santelli, the museum’s executive director. “Our exhibits and programs explore the process of music making—from songwriting to recording—while celebrating the interconnected histories of all genres of music.”
From the entrance, visitors are whisked to the fourth floor where the interactive tour begins with a tunnel of bold graphics and music opening into a gallery space filled with films, artifacts, and interactive exhibits to capture the legacy of recorded music and its place in social and cultural history. More than 160 genres of music are explored through imagery and song.
Moving downward, the third floor is dedicated to the art and technology of the recording process, from its history to a hands-on studio experience. The voices of musicians, producers, and engineers tell visitors what it takes to create a legendary song. An Everything Grammy exhibit explores the history, glamour, and excitement of the awards, through exhibits showing everything from memorable outfits to how the winners are selected and how the live telecast is put together each year.
The second floor includes a 200-seat Grammy Sound Stage that features a film taking a backstage look at the awards show. A special exhibit’s gallery is home to temporary exhibits shown on a rotating basis. Elvis at 21: Photographs by Alfred Wertheimer, a new Smithsonian exhibit will debut at the Grammy Museum on what would have been Elvis’s 75th birthday, January 8, 2010, for three months. These striking images give a glimpse of Elvis just before he became famous.
The museum complements its exhibits with public programs inviting adults, children, and families to explore music through artist interviews, live performances, film screenings, lectures, artists in residence, and classes.
The Grammy Museum is open seven days a week and admission is $14.95 for adults, with discounted prices for senior citizens and youth. Children under the age of five are free.
