The Keyboard Institute was established in 2005 by Dr Geoffrey Lancaster and is thought to be the largest accessible and playable collection in the southern hemisphere. It includes authentically old instruments and modern copies of old instruments, charting trends and developments over more than 200 years.

"Musical instruments at that time were like the computers of today in terms of the technology that went into them, and you can see the technological developments of these instruments as they went on," Davie, who now oversees the collection, says.

This content was originally published by ANU TV.