Walking back to my hotel in downtown Calgary after visiting Studio Bell, I reflect on the experience. Part museum, part music hall of fame (four of them, actually), part ode to the power of music in society, and part interactive music lesson, the place was larger and more varied than I had expected. And yeah, more meaningful.
Even my eighteen year old nephew, for whom this was part of his graduation present from me along with hiking in Banff and some awesome steak dinners, remarked during the walk that Studio Bell was “much cooler than [he] thought it would be”. That’s glowing praise in his terms.
And while we both had totally different expectations – and totally different experiences, as it turns out – it just reinforces the main principle behind a place like Studio Bell and the Canadian National Music Centre. Music is for everyone. Music can reach everyone. And the power of music is truly universal.
The Canadian National Music Centre has been around for decades (and the Canadian Music Hall of Fame dates to 1978), but this iteration, Studio Bell, is its wonderfully modern building in Calgary is recent, opening in 2016. Its five floors include a couple of performance spaces, a ton of exhibition rooms, and some rather stunning geometry for those who enjoy that sort of thing.
A visit can be done quickly in an hour and a half or so, or can take most of a day, depending if one reads all of the signage, watches all of the videos, and interacts with all of the interactive components. Of course, one’s musical preferences will also determine which portions hold the most personal relevance and interest. The Canadian Country Music Hall of Fame and ADISQ (Québécois music) Hall of Fame, while interesting, hold less meaning for me personally, for instance, although honoring Celine Dion is something I take a few minutes to do. What a voice!
The Canadian Music Hall of Fame is the easy highlight of Studio Bell for me. Its “main” room includes the plaques of its inductees, memorabilia, and looping videos of acceptance speeches, which are joyous, tearful, and in many cases hilarious. While some are names I expected, from Alanis Morissette and Barenaked Ladies to Shania Twain and Bryan Adams, others are either surprises to me that they are Canadian (Leonard Cohen and Joni Mitchell, for instance, although I probably should have known) or new to me entirely.
Subsequent rooms are devoted to specific inductees, like 2026’s Nelly Furtado (another I didn’t realize was Canadian) or 2025’s Sum 41 (ditto for them). I sing along to In Too Deep in that room, much to my nephew’s chagrin. But hey, as someone who won’t have kids of my own, embarrassing someone else’s has always been a life’s goal.
While I smile at some of my favorite artists and read more about their lives, my nephew busies himself at the myriad of interactive stations. Studio Bell is full of areas where visitors can don a headset and learn to play a musical instrument (with its sound removed outside of the headset) from a Canadian legend via video. He tries several guitars, drums, a synthesizer, and even a ukulele, all taught by masters of their crafts.
Other interactive components allow visitors to just choose different music tracks to play, to test their knowledge of Canadian songwriters (not my strong suit, as I find out) in the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame, or to take the parts of an old pipe organ that once provided the sounds to silent pictures in a movie theatre and listen to each one separately.
One of the largest rooms in the Hall of Fame section is dedicated to pianist Oscar Peterson, the first inductee in 1978. He would have been 100 years old in 2025, so this exhibit honors his legacy. Winner of eight Grammy awards and more accolades than can be easily shared (some of which are on display), my biggest takeaways are his trailblazing as an African-Canadian and his philanthropy. My nephew busies himself learning piano from Peterson himself, while I immerse in videos of “The Maharaja of the Keyboard” playing favorites like Over the Rainbow.
Of course, Studio Bell is more than “just” the four Halls of Fame. A long hallway holds a cool collection of old or meaningful instruments, the private collection of the National Music Centre. An old painted harpsichord from 1679 sits alongside Elton John’s actual piano he used to compose his first couple decades of hits, signed by both him and lyricist Bernie Taupin.
Other rooms around this area talk about different families of instruments and their evolutions. One even discusses the electrification of music. And yes, my nephew gets to play with some of that equipment, as well.
The last few (descending from the top to bottom of the building) rooms are dedicated to music’s role in culture, in science, and other aspects of life. Looping interviews ranging from a researcher who discovered that music can help treat Parkinson’s to a native Canadian First Nations storyteller talk about music from these standpoints. I find it both fascinating and incredibly meaningful, showcasing the power of music beyond simple enjoyment.
Walking back to our hotel together, my nephew and I reflect. At first take, it would seem we saw two completely different places and had experiences totally at odds. I learned; he played. I honored legends with whom I’ve had an emotional attachment for decades; he watched videos of people he had never heard of.
But as we talk, it becomes apparent that we had the same experience, just in two different manners. Because that is the power of music. It is subjective, and reaches people in different ways. But here at Studio Bell, the Canadian National Music Centre, and the Canadian Music Hall of Fame, music reached both of us, it inspired both of us, and it brought joy to both of us. And that is a pretty cool thing.
Thank you so much to Studio Bell for hosting our visit, and for offering an experience that those generationally apart can all enjoy.
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