Turn it up music exhibition comes to London’s science museum

London’s Science Museum will from next month host an interactive exhibition exploring the science behind music’s emotional impact. Turn It Up: The power of music will open at the Science Museum from 19 October following a successful run at the Science and Industry Museum in Manchester.

Until 6 May 2024, the exhibition will offer visitors the opportunity to explore the impact of music on human behaviour and emotion through interactive installations, music-making opportunities and inventions, and testimony from musicians. The exhibition will include contributions from classical music organisations including the Royal Northern College of Music, English National Opera, Manchester Camerata and Sheku Kanneh-Mason as well as a new commission created in collaboration with the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra and children’s mental health charity, Place2Be.

Exhibition co-curator Emily Scott-Dearing said: ‘We're thrilled to be bringing Turn It Up: The Power of Music to London, giving more visitors the chance to immerse themselves in this playful, yet powerful exhibition. At the Science Museum, our exhibition space will be alive with music of many genres, from pop to classical, and packed with extraordinary musical instruments and moving stories about music's power over us.’

As well as information collated from more than 30 research studies, the exhibition will feature unusual instruments such as the 19th century Pyrophone organ powered by flames and the MiMU gloves invented by Imogen Heap and used by Ariana Grande and Kris Halpin, which create music from the wearer’s gestures.

Younger visitors will get the chance to play with beat, melody and harmonies in a specially commissioned ‘musical playground’ (pictured above) while adults will have the playground all to themselves when the museum will be open after-hours for a Music Late event on the exhibition’s opening night.