MATTEO MELIOLI
THE FORM OF SOUND
AN INVESTIGATION ON ZAHA HADID BACH PAVILLION
Melioli Matteo
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NOTE
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La collection Architecture et Musique, transdisciplinaire, suscite de nouvelles réflexions sur les relations entre espace et son. Que ces angles d’approche soient artistiques, pédagogiques, sociologiques, anthropologiques, historiques, politiques, il s'agit de cerner ces liens que nous entretenons, développons, ou créons avec l’espace sonore et architectural. Cette série est inaugurée par Espace-Sons-Sociétés, qui témoigne de la diversité des thématiques, des pratiques et des champs de connaissance impliqués dans cette perspective. Le présent ouvrage est divisé en cinq sections, définies selon des thématiques essentielles à la mise en lumière des relations entre architecture et musique, ainsi qu’un livret central contenant des illustrations originales. La première section aborde les relations entre espace et son dans les sociétés traditionnelles, et montre l’importance et l’inhérence des ces associations. Le second chapitre, Lieux et Musique, plus discursif pose la question des appropriations de la musique par l’architecture et la réciprocité des incidences du son sur l’espace dans ses différentes échelles. Dans la section trois, Langages et Matrices compositionnelles, les auteurs examinent la notion du spatial dans les processus de création musicale. Section quatre : deux auteurs nous expliquent la naissance du paysage sonore, et développent sur les processus d’appropriation de l’espace public, ainsi que ses problématiques en terme de mise en œuvre. Cette avant dernière section est ainsi développée dans la dernière partie, ou une interview met en exergue les relations qu’entretiennent création, architecture et musique dans le contexte des politiques culturelles et immobilières.
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THE ACOUSTIC PAVILION, A SHORT INTRODUCTION
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In 1958 Edgar Varese and Iannis Xenakis, under the artistic guidance of Le Corbusier, designed an exhibition Pavilion for the Brussels World’s Fair. Inside the Pavilion music was played using hundreds of loudspeakers positioned at specific points on the walls and ceiling. Le Corbusier believed that the music should be ‘projected’ inside the space thus creating an acoustic-visual event where architecture and sound coincided, and if we study Varese’s musical composition we can define clear analogies between the musical composition and the shape of the building. Le Corbusier’s concept of the pavilion was that of a continuous fluid space without any distinction between the walls and the ceiling. In sonorous terms this continuity is obtained by distributing the sound evenly along the walls – the sound is free to flow thus melding the architectural and acoustic space[1]. Fundamentally the driving force behind the design of the Philips Pavilion is the bond between architecture and sound, in fact Xenakis himself explains that the loudspeakers placed on the walls are to be considered as punctiform sources in the three dimensional surrounding space, which is equivalent to stating that these ‘sonorous points’ define the space just as ‘geometrical points’ of stereometry do, and this is equivalent to stating that the laws expressed referring to Euclidean space can be transferred to acoustic space[2]. By saying this we are also affirming that sound has a physical extension: this is a crucial step because designing a space for sound is like momentarily taking sound away from music in order to ‘freeze’ it into an architectural shape.
Twenty years after the World’s Fair in Brussels the composer Luigi Nono and the architect Renzo Piano worked together in the production of Prometheus (1984-85), a musical composition for orchestra, soloists and chorus. Piano conceived the opera for performance inside a ‘container’ or ‘structure’ positioned inside San Lorenzo Church in Venice (GUER 26). The audience is seated in the centre and the stage spreads out along the four sides of the church, on three galleries placed at different levels. The acoustic verticality of San Lorenzo is thus manipulated by the ark structure in what Nono called a ‘differentiation of sonorous layers’: that is to say the sound acquires spatiality by ‘absorbing’ the characteristics of the walls within the boundaries of which it moves, creating layers which the composer conceives as bands of colour suspended above the audience. The verticality of the acoustic space is enclosed by the church vaults and the floor of the ark itself, underneath which Nono positioned many diffusers. The use of electronic equipment and the musicians who change places during the execution of the opera are all part of the plan to intentionally de-localise the perception of the sound, creating the sensation of being in a fluid and elastic space.
THE BACH PAVILLION BY ZAHA HADID ARCHITECTS
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The avant-garde musical compositions of the last century imply that sound is much more than a simple oscillatory phenomenon. Sound, as conceived by Varese and Nono, is comparable to an acoustic body that can be built around the listener or moved away from him; just like a tangible object it can be shifted from one place to another, like a piece of architecture, the acoustic space is created by assemblage, combining and superimposing. Along with sound, the avant-garde also question the traditional concept of ‘listening’, endowing it with ‘the power – almost the function – to explore unknown territory’ (BART 246). Listening to music nowadays requires spaces which are not merely containers for the sounds but which are, on the other hand, places specifically designed around the music.
This is true of the pavilion designed in 2009 by Zaha Hadid for the Manchester International Festival and which was entirely dedicated to the execution of solo pieces by Johan Sebastian Bach. The pavilion is a circular chamber music hall, installed within a previously existing art gallery. The space is dominated by a voluminous ribbon, which, unfolding upon itself creates an intimate and cosy area inside which the stage and audience are situated. Zaha Hadid and Patrik Schumacher describe the pavilion as follows:
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It was interesting to create a space for music and to create it within an art gallery. This also shows how music can transform the space and allow a different kind of program. In terms of music, Bach has a sense of endless flowing and repetition, therefore we had the idea to design a spiral-like ribbon that moves around the space, transforming, modulating and enveloping the audience and the performer[3],
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Image 1,2,3.. The image shows one of the first digital prototypes of the pavilion. Using 3D software it is possible to change the inclination and curvature of the walls. These parameters in turn influence the acoustics of the room and the form of the load bearing steel structure in. Image courtesy of Zaha Hadid Architects.
Image 4,5. The pavilion's long elevations. In order to control the acoustics some of the walls have been designed concave, others convex. The former are situated near the musician and have the function of concentrating the sound thus avoiding its dispersion outside the pavilion. The convex walls, on the other hand, have the opposite function and diffuse the sound towards the audience creating an even sound field. Another aspect to note is that the acoustic shell has been designed both to control the internal acoustic space and to screen off the background sound coming from the room itself. Image courtesy of Zaha Hadid Architects.
If we observe the plan of the pavilion the ribbon in fact appears to envelop the entire space, the audience and the performer’s stage. The intimacy of the architectural design is paralleled in the delicate sonority of the hall which recalls the atmosphere of the chamber music rooms of the 18th century. This means, therefore, that “the reverberation time is not too long as this blurs notes and the music can lose its intricacy; in the same way it should not be too short as the room loses responsiveness and causes the music to sound overly dry”[1]. Chamber music was composed for a small group of instrumentalists, trios, quartets, quintets, and was usually performed in the rooms of stately homes. The limited size of the rooms and the wall coverings (tapestries, stuccowork, thick velvet wallpaper), enhanced the sound with a clear and softened timbre (GEORG 123). The desire, therefore, to recreate the acoustic of an 18th century chamber music hall inside the pavilion, influenced the shape of the space and the materials used. The ribbon consists of a translucent fabric membrane articulated by an internal steel structure, partially suspended from the ceiling, and partially resting on the gallery floor. The exterior of the ribbon with its smooth and polished effect is in contrast with its interior side producing a soft and waving appearance, a fabric material with a surprising dual personality. Hidden in the fabric membrane and suspended above the stage a series of transparent acoustic panels help to reflect and disperse the sound.
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Image 6a: plan of the pavilion. Courtesy of Zaha Hadid Architects. mage 6b: Circulation diagram and point of access. Image courtesy of Zaha Hadid Architects
Our perception of sound depends upon the materials present in a specific place, but it also depends greatly upon the geometric shape of the room in which the sound is produced. It is well known that sound and light are simply vibrations, and that they depend entirely on space as a medium through which to travel and interact (GORM 47). An acoustic image is, therefore, characterized by the completely absorbing experience of a particular space, because a unique interaction is created between the listener, the sound and the containing space. With each interaction, the architectural space transfers part of its geometrical features to the incident wave, which the sound transmits elsewhere, reflection after reflection, acting as a sort of dynamic spatial memory (MEL 45). By virtue of this relationship, it becomes clear that the complex space in the Manchester Pavilion generates very particular acoustical fields. The uniqueness of such a space consists in the broad central void surrounded by curved walls: the sound travels from the stage to the audience, it reaches the walls of the pavilion where its movement ends in countless reflections, ‘decanting’ and acquiring a soft and warm timbre.
This description recalls the words of Edgard Varèse [1], when he compares sound to a material body, to a presence that inhabits a space and that moves inside it. The notion of ‘interior space ’ here refers to, and contains both acoustic and semantic aspects, because on the one hand it allows the reflection of the sound, while on the other it represents its movement, rhythm and form. The interior space conceived by Zaha recalls in fact the metaphor of a sonorous body which oscillates, settling around the axis of its own equilibrium. The rhythmic process embodies not only the undulatory nature of sound but also reminds us of the narrative structure of Bach’s music. If we maintain that rhythm is in time what symmetry is in space, we can understand why Sebastian Bach’s profound yet fantastic melodic structures have been compared to the endless flowing of the pavilion walls.
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SPACE, TIME AND SOUND
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Le Corbusier and Piano’s ‘spaces’ were designed specifically to ‘contain’ sound: in these spaces music and architecture co-exist while, however, remaining independent from one another. The idea behind the pavilion designed by Zaha, on the other hand, is to create a continuum between the two artistic fields so that the architectural space of the room is a representation of the music played inside it. The space becomes a ‘volumetric score’, a series of three-dimensional representation inspired by Bach’s solo compositions. According to Melodie Leung, the Project Architect, the Installation is, in fact, designed to ‘reflect the simultaneous and layered relationships of Bach’s music. Rather than literally translating a specific set of mathematical proportions from one of Bach’s works, the design process involved architectural considerations of scale, structure, and acoustics to realize a dynamic formal dialogue inseparable from its function as a chamber music hall. Moving beyond simply imitating of the rich Baroque ornamentation, the installation seeks instead to capture and represent the fluidity and coherence of Bach’s creative works’.
Transferring a musical concept into an architectural structure may appear to be easy, but why should we represent sound? Why should we discuss its form or movement when these are attributes of visible bodies? The answer is perhaps due to the fact that both Sound and Architecture share the same notion of space. However, the significance of this statement needs to be explained, and we must take a look at the numerous works that, in the recent past, have covered subjects such as the visualization of sound and the representation of its movement[2]. We know that the transmission of energy via pressure waves, as in the case of sound, and via electromagnetic waves, (for light and, therefore, for sight), are very different phenomena, however once they are decoded and inserted in our sensorial system they become elements which our organism can compare and assimilate, and perhaps superimpose. It must be this innate connection between various sensations that enables us to move easily from one topic to another, lexically and metaphorically[3]. Therefore we can jump easily from the description of a bright yellow flash of light, to a tune in G major, from the concave shape of a wall to a sonorous wave, from the roughness of a surface to talk of dissonance. If we take into consideration the fact that the field of knowledge that studies the processes which allow us to assimilate sonorous and electromagnetic waves is a relatively recent one, whereas the metaphorical language which links light and sound goes back centuries, it is obvious that the linguistic expressions used will not derive exclusively from our knowledge of biophysics, which has increased greatly only in the last few decades allowing experts to connect many facts and events. However, the fact that these metaphors were formed, and that our language has preserved many of them, must surely mean that a bridge between acoustic perceptions and those related to light has always existed[4].
However, if on the one hand there is an unquestionable link between sight and hearing, on the other it is also right to remember that architecture and music both have their own specific language. The same can be said of visual space and sonorous space; although they both share the same criteria of succession, symmetry and rhythm one cannot substitute the other. Zaha Hadid is well aware that a direct translation of sound into images is impossible, and it is for this reason that her design concentrates on ‘transferring’ the richness of the musical language into plastic forms which represent its movement, rhythm and fluidity. If we take into consideration the musical style or structure typical of Bach’s music, such as the polyphonic arrangements or the fugue and counterpoint, Zaha strips the sonorous phenomenon to its bare essentials, to the laws that govern impressions. This method recalls the work of Paul Klee, for whom abstraction consists in ‘pushing oneself critically backwards, in the direction of a formative stage from which a subsequent one grows’(KLEE 58).
The formative stage which Klee refers to is the ‘form’ which precedes what is visible and audible, it is the imperceptible structure that binds music and architecture, and it is precisely this that Zaha Hadid skilfully captured while maintaining its inherent temporal and dynamic nature.
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Image 7,8. The Pavilion during the stage of assemblage. The tubular steel structure is in part hooked onto the ceiling and in part rests on the floor of the gallery. The steel frame is divided into modules, each one corresponding to a section of the 3D model. Image courtesy of Zaha Hadid Architects.
Image 9,10. The east side of the pavilion, the entrance is situated at the anterior (to the left of the image). The public enters the pavilion following the direction painted on the floor in white. Image courtesy of Ruud Van Gessel.
CREDITS:
Commissioned by:
Alex Poots of Manchester International Festival in January 2008
Co Commissioned by:
Holland Festival and Abu Dhabi Music and Arts Festival Design
Zaha Hadid Architects
Design Team
Melodie Leung, Gerhild Orthacker
Acoustic Consultant
Sandy Brown Associates
Tensile Structural Engineer
Tony Hogg Design Ltd
Fabricator
Base Structures
Fabric
Trapeze Plus Lycra )
Lighting
DBN Lighting Limited
BIBLIOGRAPHY
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George H. William, The Acoustics of the Chamber Music Room, in The Musical Times Vol. 72, 1931.
Barthes Roland, The Responsibility of Forms, trans. Richard Howard, Hill and Wang. New York, 1985.
Guerrero Jeannie, Non-conventional planar designs in the works of Nono and Tintoretto, in Music Theory Spectrum, vol. 32 , University of California, 2010.
Gorman Michael John, The Angel and the Compass: Athanasius Kircher's Geographical Project, Stanford University, 2002.
Melioli Matteo, Inhabiting Soundscape: Architecture of the Unseen World in In The Place of Sound : Architecture, Music and Acoustic, edited by Colin Ripley with Marco Polo and Arthur Wrigglesworth, Cambridge Scholar, London, 2007.
Edmund Carpenter, Eskimo Realities, New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston, 1973.
Treib Marc, Space Calculated in Seconds, Princeton University, 1996.
Kandinsky Wassily, Concerning the Spiritual in Art, reprint, Kessinger, 2004.
Boulez Pierre, Il paese fertile. Paul Klee e la musica, Leonardo, Milano 1990.
Klee Paul, Esperienze esatte nel campo dell’arte (1928), in Id., Confessione creatrice e altri scritti,
NOTES
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[1] Varese defines the movement of sound as routes sonores (TREIB 188), that is acoustic waves that flow inside a structure and are generated by, for example, a sound that moves in succession from one loudspeaker to another. A ‘cinematic setereophony’ is thus created, a type of sonorous gesture which creates a connection between the passing of time and the movement of the sound inside the pavilion.Music is therefore a concept that reflects dynamism and its architectural embodiment is the fluid shape of the pavilion.
Treib, Marc, Space Calculated in Seconds: The Philips Pavilion, Le Corbusier, Edgard Varèse, Princeton University Press, Princeton, NJ, 1996.
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[1] This position brings to mind the installation of the sound artist Bernhard Leitner ‘In Serpentinata’. A series of loudspeakers are positioned along a metallic structure and the sound emitted from each loudspeaker transforms the whole sculpture into a sonorous object, an object that is at the same time space and sound.
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[1] For the interview refer to the web page:
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[1] “...The designers therefore looked at achieving a reverberation time of 1.4 to 1.7 s at mid-frequencies (500-1000 Hz) with a higher reverberation at lower (bass) frequencies to provide a warm room response”. Excerpts from the Acoustic Report by Mark Howarth (by Sandy Brown Associates).
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[1] See note 1.
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[1] I am referring to the writings of Wassily Kandisky on the acousttic value of sounds (KAND 32) Kandinsky, Wassily, Concerning The Spiritual in Art, English translation by Michael Sadler, Kessinger Publishing, Whitefish, MT, 2004. and those of Paul Klee on the form of sound (BOUL 37). Boulez, Pierre, Il paese fertile: Paul Klee e la musica, Edizioni Leonardo, Milan, 1990. During the 20’s and 40s Walter Ruttmann and Oskar Fischinger worked on cinematic experiments concerning the visualisation of sound which culminated in the Disney film Fantasia.
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[1]Synaesthetic description is when we talk of a typical perceptive experience related to one organ of sense in particular but use terms of reference which are usually associated with a different sensorial system, (for example saying that a colour is warm, a sound is high, a painful vision of life, and so forth). Synaesthetic language exemplifies a general characteristic of sensorial experience, that is to say that it depends in a transversal way on various modalities. In fact perceptive experience is based upon a neural ‘architecture’ which is extremely interconnected and which functions both on a uni-modal and cross-modal level at the same time.
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[1] In recent times experts have come to understand the significance of the so-called ’intermodal’ condition during the stage of a child’s cognitive development, that is the zone of our perceptive system which seems to move horizontally between different sensorial channels, connecting them, sometimes in a rather astonishing way, in spite of their apparent incompatible differences.