MUZ (Musikhaus)

Long term work in progress.

The MUZ is a unique music-social project aimed at large scale venues in capital cities (eventually around the globe), with a main focus on ‘celebrating music’.

Think of a museum, a cinema, a theatre, a concert hall. Of course, in the case of the more ‘static’ arts, people idiomatically enter a venue in order to have direct access to a certain work of art. However, we think of music, we only have the live performance option: the same applies to theatre, dance, and indeed all the performing arts.

The MUZ as a form a new way to experience music. Its main focus will be the recorded aspects of sound itself. Audiences will enter the space in order to experience one or more of the multiple themed rooms: dedicated to a specific type/style of music, for instance an electronic music room, a contemporary classic music room, rooms for rock, pop, ethnic, and so on. These rooms will feature a daily programme where the public will access in order to simply enjoy music. Each of the rooms are to be designed by a different designer or architect.

Apart from the themed rooms, there will also be an auditorium for daily
performances, masterclasses, or even recordings (so the live musical aspect will also be here maintained). The MUZ would provide record launch events, as a specialised venue, second to none. A cocktail bar will have regular DJ listings. The audience who has access to the multiple venues will pay by time usage in the rooms, together with an ordinary entry fee for the auditorium, and will also have the option of utilizing his/her own portable music device with headphones so that personal tracks can be played at will.

The visitor of our MUZ could be: the business man/woman on the lunch break wanting to listen to his/her favourite track; the music lover who cannot afford to let pass the birthday of Ravi Shankar; a group of tourists; a group of teenagers wanting to meet up in one place where they can enjoy the music they want, without the strictures of home/bar/club life. Each will enjoy music in a dedicated space, but in a social manner, and not individually. Most importantly the MUZ venue(s) has the potential to become a site for events like the launch of new albums and music projects from widely different aesthetics.

I may risk that this venue will change the way we relate to music. MUZ will  be firstly tested in Berlin and, in case of success, will be brought to other cities. A new type of cultural venue is about to born into our society, one exclusively dedicated to the ‘use of music’ itself.

jld©2013