Auditorium Parco della Musica

This project consists of three halls, of different capacities (2800, 1200 and 700 seats) and characteristics (principally in their flexibility of use), as well as an open-air amphitheatre for 3,000 people. The auditorium is a multi-functional complex, dedicated to music that enriches the already vast cultural heritage of the city. The project is characterised by the three ‘music boxes’ that appear to be flying above a sea of vegetation.

The site chosen for the auditorium is in the plains between Tiber and the hill of Parioli, between the Olympic Village, built for the 1960 Games and the Palazzetto dello Sport and the Flaminio Stadium planned by Pierluigi Nervi. This decentralised site had the advantage of being able to accommodate and manage large numbers of people, due to the existing infrastructure. Also to build on this site meant occupying a space that had, for long, been a sort artificial fracture, a gap in the city.

The auditorium is composed of three separate giant bug-like halls whose forms are inspired by musical instruments. Positioned around an open air amphitheatre, the halls look like three enormous ‘music boxes’, whose colours and materials recall those of the domes dotting the urban landscape of Rome. Each concert hall differs from the other in terms of dimension and functions.

Aside from the dramatic, lead-shrouded roofs, the materials are chosen to be traditionally Roman: gracefully-thin red brick, travertine floors (continuous between inside and outside) and orange paint. While this mix is used consistently over most of the complex, the interiors of the three halls, or "music boxes" as Piano calls them, are dominated by bright red seating and dark, wood paneling.

Many claims are made for the acoustic properties of the three halls, achieved through the "natural acoustic" of the materials chosen. This shows in, for example, the deliberately uneven brick work on the walls at the front and back of the middle hall, with different sound-absorbing properties than a smooth brick wall would have.