Museum of Musical Instruments

We visited the Museum of Musical Instruments a while back... and I'm just now blogging about it. Oops.

One of the first things we saw was this rock with petroglyphs (I think it's a recreation of the real petroglyphs found in Kazakhstan).
I love the Kazakh family in traditional costumes with various instruments.
Chris with some of the instruments...

These stone markers were placed around burial mounds and are found all over Kazakhstan.
For the high price of $4.00 we had a private concert. This woman played four different Kazakh instruments for us. I was able to get pictures of her while she held/played three of the instruments, which you can see below:

Here's that instrument being played (the video is dark so this is for listening, not viewing, purposes):

I'm pretty sure this is the song she played to protect Addie from the evil eye and bad spirits (again, this is for listening, not viewing, purposes):

After our private concert we finished our tour of the museum. Here's a quick look at the type of instruments we saw displayed:


This lovely instrument is made from an animal bladder.

Chris and Addie by the huge drum.
(In case you wondered how long it has taken me to get to this post, take another look at Addie. She was about four months old here...!!!)

More instruments...


The instruments in the two pictures below have some really cool woodcarving. If memory serves... the instrument that looks like a bow and arrow is a harp--Pretty cool.

There were a few woman working at the museum and they were all enthralled with Addie. We were told we needed to get a pin for Addie (with the evil eye bead on it) to protect her, and on our way out one of the ladies spit on her. And I mean she really spit on Addie (we promptly used our antibacterial stuff on her forehead and my hand). While she meant well, it was certainly gross.