MUSITECTURE

“Music in the building will follow by the act of nature which will turn the building alive.” This was what was my first thought about “Musitecture” was. (The term I would like to use for Music + Architecture). How can we make a building sing? Dose the music theories will also be applicable in the making of music in the building and if so how? We all know the basic similarities between theories of music and architecture, like rhythms, harmony, contrast etc. Music is a sound which soothes our ears and mind, we all know if ears is to music then eyes is to architecture. But can we it also make it ears is to architecture? We have of course done it, if not us then our ancestors have defiantly so as result of which we have for example Hawa Mahal, and even in the modern times we have architects and designers who are trying to explore the same. But in the dust of various factors which become a hurdle for the designer to design a green building the same has also been the case with Musitecture. Every building has a tune of its own. We love a hear some musicians while some not, the reason lies behind the composition layers which include factors like scales, timing, organizing etc.

If we happen to compare between these two subjects then maybe the columns will represent rhythm or the scales, its depends on how the architects wants to showcase the elements. This representation of the music has to be felt from inside and not from the ears. So we may conclude music along with architecture can result in two forms one which is directly related to our hearing sense and the other by the visionary which in turn will induce a music in our mind. Few of the questions that may rise in our mind are like: We are already surrounded with so many sounds or call it noise, so the point in creating a space that also creates sound? The answer lies in the question itself. We are not producing sound but music. And by definition music is something which soothes the ears. But how can we grantee it? Rock is a type of music but I never get soothed when I hear them? Now this is a tricky one. Just like a single elevation maybe admired by many it is not necessary the same admiration will come from all, it varies from person to person. But a structure like the Taj Mahal, where almost all or say 98% people will admire its beauty we can call it a success. Same is the case here, we are striving for a situation where almost all the people will able to sense the music, feel it, feel good about it and get a sense of relaxation. By now another question that one can have is, we can do it by listening to a music CD why the building? So here the question is true in many cases but let us imagine an office. The modern office works for about 9 hrs in a day, in between which the employees gets a break for about 1hour. A person after having his lunch if he listens to the mp3 player, he/she may get relaxed or feel better but can’t we have a space where the stress is kept to a minimum due to a specific kind of design may be Musitecture can. The least developed sense of our sensory organ is hearing and the most developed is the vision. A person can also feel stimulation by the other sense like vision or touch, but the only way to induce a stimulation while working or doing something else is by hearing.(The statement is open for debate). It also depends on what activity the user is doing. But to really feel the music one must devote his mind to the source and to the notes. In doing all these one of the major problem which we have to face is the noise factor. The noise is just opposite to music. It’s the sound that we don’t like to hear or something that induce a negative stimulation. We many a times get angry upon our neighbors or to the street below our house, the reason are due to the unwanted sound we are hearing. Many a times we use trees and heavy plantation on cut the noise, which is also a better option regarding the environment. 

The reason we are discussing this is, we are trying to find a solution to this via Musitecture. It will be discussed later like how we can overcome the noise disturbance using various techniques. Many ancient medications have used music an instrument to cure diseases. Many stress relief techniques also use music to help the people. Architecture has been able to use various elements from other subject to create a harmonious space, for example lights from electronics, texture from material engineering and many other. Including music may or may not make a big difference in the current stream that will of course be judge at the end of this project. One of the things that we have to keep in mind is the excessive use of materials that is not available in abundance just for the sake of acoustic enhancement purpose or else it will cause for an environment problem. Rise in nano-technology may well cut the cost and risk of using various materials but that is still a long way to go. to be continued...