Barra de Tijuca is a new town in Rio de Janeiro's southern outskirts. It is a long plain that lacks strong architectural events and urban marks. The Cidade da Musica, situated in the center of two crossing highways imagined by Lucio Costa, will be the heart of the new town. The Cidade da Musica is placed on a vast public terrace, ten meters above a garden designed by Fernando Chacel, that gives access to all concert rooms, movie theaters, rehearsal rooms, restaurant, library, shops, and the headquarter of the Brazilian Symphonic Orchestra. Between the two horizontal plates of the roof and the terrace the shapes of the concert rooms are set in an interplay of volumes and voids. Hollows between the blocks allows one to look through the building. Seen as a large house on stilts, a great veranda above a garden with ponds, shade and trees, the Cidade da Musica is also an homage to an archetype of Brazilian architecture. The architecture also responds to the mountain curves of the Siera Atlantica and the line of the sea, guaranteed to be a major landmark of the greater Rio. Concrete walls rise to a height of 30 meters to support the building.
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minutillo, March 21st, 2011