Can Musical Instruments Have Rights?
Written by Carlos Traginer and Xia Vélora
For centuries, the law hasreserved the status of legal personhoodfor human beings and the organizations they create. But inrecent years, this boundary hasbegun to crack. Rivers, ecosystems, animals—and even artificial intelligences—are entering the debate over who can beconsidered a subject of rights (Constitutional Court of Colombia 2016; Constitutional Court of Ecuador 2022; BOE 2022). An unusual question—can a musical instrument have rights?—nolonger sounds entirely absurd when legalsubjectivity becomes an expandedspace, where the living, the symbolic, and the artificial come into relation.
Nature with Its Own Voice
In countries such as New Zealand,Colombia, Ecuador, and Spain,certain natural entities have beenrecognized as legal subjects. Thecase of the Whanganui River in NewZealand is paradigmatic: in 2017, Parliamentpassed the Te Awa Tupua Act, grantingthe river legal identity and legal voice, represented by two guardians—one from the government and one from the Māori people. Colombia was a pioneer in LatinAmerica: Constitutional Court RulingT-622 of 2016 recognized the AtratoRiver as a subject of rights. Ecuador enshrined the Rights of Nature in its 2008 Constitution and, in 2022,extended this framework in the case of the monkeyEstrellita, recognizing that wildanimals have their own rights. Spain has also taken an important stepwith Law 19/2022, granting legal personality to the Mar Menor lagoon (BOE 2022; El País 2024
Animals as Subjects of Rights
India and Argentina have explored similar paths.In the Indian state of Uttarakhand,rulings such as Narayan Dutt Bhatt v.Union of India and Others declared allanimals to be legal subjects,with citizens as their guardians (High Court of Uttarakhand 2018; Shinde and Junker 2019).In Argentina, court decisionsrecognized the orangutan Sandra andthe chimpanzee Cecilia as “non-human persons”, ordering theirtransfer to sanctuaries through thefigure of habeas corpus (Pardo 2023).
What If Musical InstrumentsHad Rights?
In this context of expandinglegal subjectivity, the question sharpens: Could a musical instrument—especially a hybrid one with artificialintelligence—be considered a subjectof rights? In 2017, the EuropeanParliament proposed exploring the creation of “electronic personhood” for certain advanced AIs (EuropeanParliament 2017). Artists suchas Holly Herndon already work with AIs they consider active collaborators: her project Spawn participates in compositionsand is credited as co-author on thealbum PROTO (Herndon 2019).
Heritage Instruments as Proto-Legal Subjects
Certain historical instrumentshave been the object of legaldesignations placing them in an intermediatecategory between object and protected entity. The “Boissier–Sarasate” violin was declareda Cultural Asset in Spain in 2014 (BOCM 2014). The “Messiah”violin, preserved at the AshmoleanMuseum, has remained untouchedsince the 18th century. The “Vieuxtemps” violin was acquired by a patron who loaned it for life under the condition that it never be sold.
Instruments as Living Entities in TraditionalWorldviews
These legal intuitionsresonate with worldviews that, for centuries, have conceived of musical instruments as beings with spirit and memory. In Mozambique, the Chopi tradition considers timbilaxylophones part of a living orchestrawhere each instrument represents an ancestral voice (UNESCO 2005). In Vanuatu,tamtam slit drums are regarded as spiritual guardians (Vanuatu Cultural Centre 2015; Metropolitan Museum of Art 2020). Inthe Mapuche people, the kultrún drum is treated as an embodiment of the universe and is usedin ceremonies led by the machi (Museo Chileno de Arte Precolombino 2021; Smithsonian National Museum of the American Indian 2020). In the Himalayan region, Tibetan singing bowls are used in Buddhist rituals and, today, also in healing and meditationpractices (Rubin Museum of Art2017). In Japan, Shinto recognizes that noble and long-lasting objects can house a kami, and farewellceremonies are held for them, such as those performed for AIBO robots (National Geographic 2018).
What If It’s Not So Strange?
In Switzerland, the Federal Ethics Committee on Non-HumanBiotechnology concluded in 2008 that plantspossess dignity and must not be harmed without ethical justification. In Bangladesh,the Supreme Court ruled in 2019 thatall rivers possess legal rights (Dhaka Tribune 2019). At the 2022Sydney Biennale, rivers and ecosystems participated as “exhibitors” with their own voice through human representatives (Biennaleof Sydney 2022). In Saudi Arabia,the robot Sophia was granted symbolic citizenship in
2017. The Universal Declarationof the Rights of Mother Earth (WorldPeople’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth 2010)and the Cambridge Declaration onConsciousness (2012) have served as ethicalframeworks for thinking about the expansionof the moral community beyond the human.
References Cited
➜ Biennaleof Sydney. 2022. rīvus – Biennale ofSydney 2022. Accessed August 10, 2025. https://www.biennaleofsydney.art/rivus.
➜ BOCM.2014. “Declaración del violín ‘Boissier–Sarasate’ como Bien de InterésCultural.” Boletín Oficial de laComunidad de Madrid, no. 232 (October 1, 2014).
➜ BOE. 2022.Ley 19/2022, de 30 de septiembre, para elreconocimiento de personalidad jurídica a la laguna del Mar Menor y su cuenca.Boletín Oficial del Estado, no. 237(October 3, 2022).
➜ CambridgeDeclaration on Consciousness. 2012. Cambridge, UK, July 7, 2012. http://fcmconference.org/img/CambridgeDeclarationOnConsciousness.pdf.
➜ ConstitutionalCourt of Colombia. 2016. Judgment T-622/16. Bogotá: Constitutional Court.
➜ ConstitutionalCourt of Ecuador. 2022. Judgment No. 253-20-JH/22, Case Estrellita.
Quito: Constitutional Court.
➜ DhakaTribune. 2019. “HC Declares All Rivers Living Entities.” July 1, 2019. https://www.dhakatribune.com.
➜ El País. 2024.“El Constitucional avala la ley que otorga personalidad jurídica al Mar Menor.”April 17, 2024.
➜ EuropeanParliament. 2017. Resolution of 16 February 2017 with recommendations to theCommission on Civil Law Rules on Robotics. 2015/2103(INL).
➜ Herndon,Holly. 2019. PROTO. 4AD. Album notesand interviews with Mat Dryhurst.
➜ High Courtof Uttarakhand. 2018. Narayan Dutt Bhattv. Union of India and Others. PIL No. 43, July 4, 2018.
➜ MetropolitanMuseum of Art. 2020. “Slit Drum (Tamtam).” Accessed August 10, 2025. https://www.metmuseum.org.
➜ MuseoChileno de Arte Precolombino. 2021. “Kultrún: Tambor ceremonial mapuche.”Accessed August 10, 2025.
➜ NationalGeographic. 2018. “Japan’s Aibo Robot Dogs Get a Buddhist Send-Off.” April 26,2018.
➜ Pardo,María Cecilia. 2023. “Legal Personhood for Animals: Has Science Made Its Case?”Frontiers in Psychology 14: 1162783.
➜ RubinMuseum of Art. 2017. “Tibetan Singing Bowls and Ritual Instruments.”
➜ Shinde,Mrinalini, and Kirk W. Junker. 2019. “Horse before the Cart: Discussing theLegal Fiction of Animal Personhood in India.” Bharati Law Review 7 (3): 1–13.
➜ SmithsonianNational Museum of the American Indian. 2020. “Kultrun Drum.”
➜ UNESCO.2005. “Chopi Timbila Dance.” Representative List of the Intangible CulturalHeritage of Humanity.
➜ UNESCO.2008. Constitution of the Republic ofEcuador (extracts on Rights of Nature).
➜ VanuatuCultural Centre. 2015. “Tamtam: Guardianes espirituales.”
➜ WorldPeople’s Conference on Climate Change and the Rights of Mother Earth. 2010.
Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mot