A small two-room museum dedicated to the Catalan cellist Pablo Casals, who moved to his mother's native Puerto Rico in 1956 at the age of 79 and spent his last seventeen years here. Casals founded the Festival Casals, the conservatory, and the island's symphony orchestra — three institutions that anchor classical music in Puerto Rico to this day.
The collection is modest: his cello, manuscripts, photographs, video clips of concerts, a personal letter or two. The museum is on Calle San Sebastián next to the San José church and works as a thirty-minute stop on the way to Casa Blanca. Even if you do not know Casals' music, the museum is a reminder that San Juan has long been a destination for Europeans who wanted to settle somewhere warm with a serious cultural life.