Hasta La Ideas

Austrian firm Coop Himmelb(l)au has completed a major new concert venue and music school in the Danish city of Aalborg, which claims to be “one of the quietest spaces for symphonic music in Europe” (+ slideshow).

Located on the edge of the Limfjord – the body of water that bounds the city – the House of Music was designed by Coop Himmelb(l)au as a cultural hub that accommodates both a 1300-seat performance venue and a music college.

The architect worked closely with an acoustic consultant to develop a curvaceous auditorium that will offer exemplary acoustics. This is encased within a U-shaped volume that contains the classrooms and rehearsal areas of the school.

“The idea behind the building can already be read from the outer shape. The school embraces the concert hall,” said Coop Himmelb(l)au principal Wolf D. Prix.

Externally, the building’s facade is a composition of boxy volumes, undulating roof canopies, circular windows and latticed walls of glazing.

According to Prix the design is intended to represent the unity between music and architecture: “Music is the art of striking a chord in people directly. Like the body of musical instruments this architecture serves as a resonance body for the creativity in the House of Music.”

Visitors enter through a five-storey-high atrium with a concrete staircase winding up through its centre. This provides access to different levels of the auditorium, but also leads to an observation area facing out over the fjord.

Windows within the interior offer glimpsed views into the auditorium from the surrounding spaces. There are also three smaller performance spaces located underneath the foyer.

Water-filled pipes run through the concrete floor slab to provide heating in winter and help keep the building cool in summer. This will be controlled as part of an intelligent building management system.

The House of Music opened with a thirteen-day extravaganza of concerts, performances, film and fireworks.

Scroll down for the project description from Coop Himmelb(l)au:

House of Music as a creative centre for Aalborg

After four years of construction, the “House of Music” in Aalborg, Denmark was ceremoniously opened on March 29, 2014 by the Danish Queen Margrethe II.

This cultural centre was designed by the Viennese architectural studio Coop Himmelb(l)au as a combined school and concert hall: its open structure promotes the exchange between the audience and artists, and the students and teachers.

U-shaped rehearsal and training rooms are arranged around the core of the ensemble, a concert hall for about 1,300 visitors. A generous foyer connects these spaces and opens out with a multi-storey window area onto an adjacent cultural space and a fjord. Under the foyer, three more rooms of various sizes complement the space: the intimate hall, the rhythmic hall, and the classic hall. Through multiple observation windows, students and visitors can look into the concert hall from the foyer and the practice rooms and experience the musical events, including concerts and rehearsals.

The concert hall

The flowing shapes and curves of the auditorium inside stand in contrast to the strict, cubic outer shape. The seats in the orchestra and curved balconies are arranged in such a way that offers the best possible acoustics and views of the stage. The highly complex acoustic concept was developed in collaboration with Tateo Nakajima at Arup. The design of the amorphous plaster structures on the walls and the height-adjustable ceiling suspensions, based on the exact calculations of the specialist in acoustics, ensures for the optimal listening experience. The concert hall will be one of the quietest spaces for symphonic music in Europe, with a noise-level reduction of NR10 (GK10). Thanks to its architectural and acoustic quality, the concert hall is already well-booked: there will be concerts featuring the Royal Philharmonic Orchestra with violin soloist Arabella Steinbacher and the Danish National Radio Orchestra with soprano Mojca Erdmann in April.

The foyer

The foyer serves as a meeting place for students, artists, teachers, and visitors. Five stories high with stairs, observation balconies, and large windows with views of the fjord, it is a lively, dynamic space that can be used for a wide variety of activities.

The energy concept

Instead of fans, the foyer uses the natural thermal buoyancy in the large vertical space for ventilation. Water-filled hypocaust pipes in the concrete floor slab are used for cooling in summer and heating in winter. The concrete walls around the concert hall act as an additional storage capacity for thermal energy. The fjord is also used for cost-free cooling.

The piping and air vents are equipped with highly efficient rotating heat exchangers. Very efficient ventilation systems with low air velocities are attached under the seats in the concert hall. Air is extracted through a ceiling grid above the lighting system so that any heat produced does not cause a rise in the temperature in the room.

The building is equipped with a building management program that controls the equipment in the building and ensures that no system is active when there is no need for it. In this way, energy consumption is minimised.

Planning: Coop Himmelb(l)au, Wolf D. Prix & Partner ZT GmbH
Design Principal/ CEO: Wolf D. Prix
Project Partner: Michael Volk
Design Architect: Luzie Giencke
Project Architect: Marcelo Bernardi, Pete Rose
Design Architect Interior: Eva Wolf

Local Architects: Friis & Moltke, Aalborg, Denmark
Acoustics, Audio-Visual & Theatre Design and Planning Consultant: Arup, New York, USA
Landscape Architect: Jeppe Aagaard Andersen, Helsingør, Denmark
Structural Engineering: Rambøll, Aalborg, Denmark;
B+G Ingenieure, Bollinger und Grohmann GmbH, Frankfurt, Germany
Mechanical, Electrical and Fire Engineering: Nirás, Aalborg, Denmark
Cost consultant: Davis Langdon LLP, London, UK
Lighting Design Consultant: Har Hollands, Eindhoven, The Netherlands
Interior Design Consultant: Eichinger Offices, Vienna, Austria

The post Coop Himmelb(l)au’s House of Music
invites orchestras to Aalborg appeared first on Dezeen.

This shell-like concrete structure with triangular slices is an auditorium designed by Luxembourg studio Valentiny HVP Architects for an annual music festival in the Brazilian town of Trancoso (+ slideshow).

Nearly complete, the Teatro Mozarteum Brasileiro will provide a performance venue for the Música em Trancoso, a week-long music festival that takes place every March in the popular beach town on Brazil’s Bahia coast.

The festival was founded by architect François Valentiny of Valentiny HVP Architects, with partners Sabine Lovatelli, Reinold Geiger and Carlos Eduardo Bittencourt. Now in its third year, the event will have its own permanent auditorium capable of hosting indoor and outdoor audiences.

Two large triangular openings in the curved concrete facade provide entrances for the two separate seating areas. These are positioned alongside one other and can accommodate up to 1100 people each.

A neighbouring structure, known as the facilities building, houses ancillary spaces, including rehearsal rooms, meeting areas and a bar.

The triangular windows of this building are decorated with engraved bronze panels, created by Brazilian artist Maria Bonomi.

“The engravings refer to both the local nature with its impressive cliffs and the birth of the Brazilian nation,” said the studio.

Photography is by Jean de Matteis and Valentiny HVP Architects.

Here’s a project description from Valentiny HVP Architects:

Música in Trancoso Festival

The Música em Trancoso 2014 Festival, to be held March 15th through March 22nd, the third grand event that celebrates arts, promotes education and transforms music as a tool for social integration, announces this year’s wide range of activities.

After two years of meticulous planning, the first Música em Trancoso Festival was held in March 2012. It was the result of the dream of four friends, music lovers and social activists who wanted to create an event to bring together young musicians and established artists while at the same time promoting the natural beauty of the Trancoso region and stimulating economic and social development.

The Festival’s critical and popular success was immediate and can be measured by the outstanding performances of more than 200 musicians before 10,000 spectators.

Every year for eight days in a series of free concerts and accompanying musical events between Carnival and Easter, the village of Trancoso welcomes performers and soloists of international recognition in classical music as well as the greatest names in Brazilian popular music.

Its founders are Sabine Lovatelli, president of Mozarteum Brasileiro, one of the most acclaimed associations devoted to the diffusion of classical music in Brazil; Reinold Geiger, president of the L’Occitane group; Carlos Eduardo Bittencourt, entrepreneur from Trancoso, Bahia; and the Luxembourgish architect François Valentiny, internationally known for designing theatres and cultural venues.

Música em Trancoso has three interrelated activities, which take place throughout the event:
– Performances at the Teatro Mozarteum Brasileiro.
– Masterclasses in the “Facilities” building, adjoining the theatre
– Music Initiation Classes for children and teens from public schools in the Trancoso and Arraial d’Ajuda region

The Mozarteum Brasileiro Theatre

From the bold design by architect François Valentiny, the Mozarteum Brasileiro Theatre has two different overlapped audiences, one indoor and one outdoor, each with 1,100 seats.

Design as well as acoustics of the theatre, are in charge of Valentiny architects, Luxemburg, known for their designs of cultural venues including the Concert Hall Saarbrücken (Germany), the House of Mozart – Kleines Festspielhaus Salzburg (Austria) and the Luxemburg Pavilion Expo 2010 in Shanghai.

In the future, the theatre will house various cultural and socio-educational activities, becoming a permanent centre of cultural production.

The Mozarteum Brasileiro Theatre also includes an annex, “The Facilities” building, with eight rehearsal rooms, spacious bar and meeting rooms. With a design which contrasts curves with triangular openings, totally integrated with the natural environment of Trancoso, the building brings imposing panels, etched in bronze, from the renowned Brazilian artist Maria Bonomi. The engravings refer to both the local nature with its impressive cliffs and the birth of the Brazilian nation.

The post Concrete auditorium by Valentiny HVP Architects
built for Brazil’s Música em Trancoso festival appeared first on Dezeen.

Israeli studio SO Architecture added this auditorium and gallery to a hilltop war memorial in Nesher, Israel, and tilted it upwards so that it faces towards the sky (+ slideshow).

SO Architecture designed the concrete auditorium building as an extension to the existing structure, which commemorates Israeli soldiers that died in the 1948 Arab–Israeli War but previously was only used once a year on the country’s national memorial day.

The new building provides a community hall for events, film screenings and other activities, as well as an exhibition gallery charting the history of the site, which served as a guarding post during the war.

The exhibition space, called the Remembrance Gallery, is filled with photographs of fallen soldiers. These cover boxes installed along the walls, where victims’ families can store items that preserve the memories of their loved ones.

In the auditorium, rows of ascending timber bleachers provide seating, while a large window fills the space with light and offers a view out over nearby Haifa Bay.

Dark grey paint covers the exterior of the extension, uniting it with the existing memorial. A concrete plaque adorns the side of the old tower, and a golden Star of David is positioned at the top.

“The concrete relief was made in the 1950s by the artist Michael Kare as part of the transformation of the building from guarding post to a memorial,” added the architects.

Stepped landscaping and a viewing platform have been added to the south of the site, joining an existing limestone square and a children’s playground.

SO Architecture also designed the Yehiam Memorial Hall at Kibbutz Yehiam – another building that commemorates the 1948 Arab-Israeli war.

Photography is by Shai Epstein.

Here’s a project description from SO Architecture:

Nesher Memorial

Nesher Memorial was built on a basis of an historic preservation building that was used in the past as a guarding position. In ’48 war the position’s used as protection to the residents of Giv’at Nesher. The building is located in the heart of a quiet neighbourhood, on a hilltop, surrounded by a large square and a children’s playground.

Prior to the construction works, the building was neglected and was used in favour of the public only once a year – in the National Memorial Day, then it was open for a tour and impression of memorial pictures, as a part of the public ceremony for the memory of the fallen.

Nesher municipality asked SO Architecture office to expand the square surrounding the building so it will enable multiplayer events, and to redesign the building and add functions to it, so that it can serve the public throughout the year as a gathering space.

The main architectural idea was to add to the existing building an auditorium structure that could be used for different kinds of public activities such as lectures, film screenings, activities of youth groups, etc., along with preservation of the historical memory.

The auditorium

The auditorium reveals its insides geometry to the park and the city surrounding, by its inclined façade. This geometrical act has an additional meaning in creating a symbolic geometry that communicates with the memorial concept, and the function of the building as a monument.

A large window is located at the edge of the auditorium, facing north and thus brings a soft light into the auditorium and enables a breathtaking view at the landscape of Haifa bay. In a poetic allegory to reality, the window function as a bright ending to the inner space, and thus symbolises the balance between the bereavement pain and the light and hope in the living world.

The memory space

A box for each fallen, with its picture on it, is hanged on the wall of the memory area inside the building. Inside it, there is a room for storage of memorial personal belongings that the family and the municipality can put. In the space itself there is a place for seating and communion with the memory books and the memory of the fallen.

The centre of the memory space is lighted by long and narrow windows that were the shooting slits in the original guarding position, and by upper skylight windows from the original historic building. The memory space was designed in a modular manner, so that if necessary, it will be possible to add additional boxes without any difficulty.

Finishing materials

The original building contours regarding to the addition, are marked and highlighted through aluminium bars that were sediment in mortar and emphasise the contours of the old building regarding to the new addition.
The materials that we used in the building are simple.

The floor in the memory space is a concrete floor. The ceiling along the whole building is covered with oak planks, so that it creates a warm atmosphere. The auditorium area was also covered with wood, and sponge padded seats. An access to disabled was also arranged.

The square

The gatherings’ square on the front of the building, was designed on the basis of the existing square. The works in it included suitability and accessibility to the disabled, creating grandstand steps in the edges to enable a more comfortable viewing, and an addition of another viewing site at the southern end of the square. The finishing material of the square is a visible concrete that delimits the steps, and grey concrete blocks.

Architects: SO Architecture www.soarch.co.il
Planning team: Shachar Lulav , Oded Rosenkier , Alejandro Feinerman , Tomer Nahshon, Samer Hakim.
Site Area: 1100 Sqm
Building Area: 118 Sqm
Year: 2013

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by SO Architecture appeared first on Dezeen.

Japanese architect Tadao Ando has added an auditorium with a curving concrete interior to the Palazzo Grassi – a contemporary arts centre inside an eighteenth-century palace in Venice (+ slideshow).

The Teatrino is the third phase of Tadao Ando’s renovation of the Palazzo Grassi, which is now owned by luxury goods tycoon François Pinault. After converting both the main building and the accompanying Punta della Dogana into contemporary art galleries, Ando added this extra building as a venue for conferences and performances.

Curving concrete walls separate the 220-seat auditorium from reception areas, dressing rooms and storage areas, providing a blank canvas for hanging artwork or film projection.

Lighting fixtures are tucked around the edges of a suspended ceiling in the main lobby, while triangular skylights offer a source of daylight.

The Teatrino occupies a space that once served as the palace’s garden. More recently it had functioned as a theatre, but has been closed to the public since 1983.

Only the facade of the original building remains, with the new structure erected behind.

Another designer to have worked on spaces at the Palazzo Grassi is Philippe Starck, who completed the adjacent Palazzina Grassi hotel in 2010. See more stories about Venice »

Other recent projects by Tadao Ando include a school of art, design and architecture at the University of Monterrey in Mexico. See more architecture by Tadao Ando »

Photography is by Orsenigo Chemollo.

Here’s a project description from the design team:

The Teatrino of Palazzo Grassi

The François Pinault Foundation is strengthening its implementation within the artistic and cultural life of Venice. A new site, created for conferences, meetings, projections, concerts, etc., will be added to the ensemble of Palazzo Grassi-Punta della Dogana-François Pinault Foundation: the Teatrino, which will open its doors to the public in June 2013.

After the restoration of Palazzo Grassi in 2006, followed by that of Punta della Dogana, inaugurated in 2009, the rehabilitation of the Teatrino in 2013 constitutes the third step of François Pinault’s broad cultural project for Venice. Conceived and conducted by Tadao Ando in close collaboration with the Municipality of Venice and the competent authorities and services (including the Superintendent of Architectural Assets and Landscapes of Venice), this restoration will maintain the spirit of architectural continuity of the preceding renovations. Work will begin in summer 2012 and last ten months.

Spread over a surface of 1,000 square meters, the Teatrino will be equipped with an auditorium of 220 seats, completed by reception areas and spaces for technical equipment (boxes, equipment for stage management and simultaneous translation, etc.). Thus, it will provide Palazzo Grassi-Punta della Dogana-François Pinault Foundation with optimal technical conditions (including acoustics) in a comfortable setting, in order to develop more fully the cultural dimension of its activities: meetings, conferences, workshops, lectures, concerts, performances, research, … with an emphasis on the moving image (cinema, artist, films, video, video installations, …). It will also reinforce the Foundation’s role as a forum of exchange, meeting, and openness towards the city.

Located on the Calle delle Carrozze, alongside Palazzo Grassi, the Teatrino was conceived in 1857 to serve as the palace’s garden. A century later, it was transformed into an open-air theatre, which was renovated and covered in 1961. It was abandoned in 1983 and has been closed to the public ever since.

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by Tadao Ando appeared first on Dezeen.

Paris firm Moussafir Architectes have blanketed the roof of this concert hall in Tours, France, with a synthetic material that looks more like a quilt.

Named Le Temps Machine, which translates as The Time Machine, the venue contains two auditoriums that burst up through its roof, one displaying a glowing digital clock.

The glazed facade and entrance are sheltered beneath a canopy of projecting eaves.

The walls of the remaining elevations are exposed concrete, as are those in the corridors of the building.

Above: photograph is by Benoît Faure

We’ve featured quite a few concert halls on Dezeen. You can see them all here.

Photography is by Jérôme Ricolleau, apart from where otherwise stated.

Here’s some extra information from Moussafir Architectes:

‘Le Temps Machine’, Concert Venue, Joue-Les-Tours, France

The former Joué-lès-Tours youth centre was a blocky, opaque, inward-looking building that failed to interact with the surrounding public space and no longer met current standards and requirements. The architectural design for the new music facility responds to a three-fold objective: to open the building up to its surroundings, to improve the way the opaque block integrates with existing buildings, and emphasise the festive dimension of the facility by making a unique architectural statement.

Above: photograph is by Luc Boegly

We chose to situate the new building where the old one stood, and to reinterpret some of the latter’s salient features (such as its prow-shaped auditorium) while offering the space a radically new image by opening it up to its context.

With its generously glazed street-side entrance, the building’s exterior features deep projecting eaves and a strongly cantilevered auditorium providing both an impression of lightness and a sense of hospitality vis-a-vis the public space and dwellings nearby.

To improve its contextual integration, we have divided the structure into two parts functioning in different registers: a determinedly horizontal 2m50 tall concrete and glass base housing a fluid, open interior space, and a roof with the three main components of the design brief (the two performance areas and the resource centre) bursting through it like opaque excrescences.

This duality is emphasised by the use of contrasting materials: hard on the outside (raw concrete, glass, stainless steel) and soft on the inside (membrane stretched over exterior insulation materials).

With its complex volumetrics and textured outer surface, the new building stands out like a beacon in the urban landscape.

The contradictory image we were aiming at is one of a unique yet familiar object that is challenging and yet invites appropriation: a sculptural design that refers to nothing that already exists, but which users can easily engage with, both in functional and symbolic terms.

Client: TOUR(S) PLUS (Tours City Council)
Address: 49, rue des Martyrs, 37300 JOUE-LES-TOURS

Above: photograph is by Benoît Faure

Brief: Concert facility to replace the existing youth centre, including a concert space for a standing audience of 650, a 150-seat cabaret-style space, a resources centre, and 3 rehearsal studios with service areas.

Materials: Colourwashed raw concrete, solvent- and plastics-free FPO roofing membrane by Sika Sarnafil, glazed stainless steel, Fibracoustic panels of wood fibre and rockwool, door/windowframes aluminium (exterior), steel and wood (interior).

Budget: 5,300,000 €. ex tax.

NSA: 1,753 sq m.

Architects: Jacques Moussafir avec Nicolas Hugoo, Alexis Duquennoy, Narumi Kang, Sofie Reynaert, Jérôme Hervé and Virginie Prié

Partner engineers: A&T (stage designers), Ayda (acoustic designers), Batiserf (structural engineers), LBE (mechanical engineers), Bureau Michel Forgue (quantity surveyor).

Contractors: DV Construction (general contractor), AMG Féchoz (stage machinery), Bideau (stage electrics), VTI (wooden stage flooring), Edmond Petit (stage fabrics).