Taipei Pop Music Centre by Reiser + Umemoto

Pop music is a global phenomenon, but its popularity is almost always region-specific (with a few exceptions, in the case of Elvis Presley, Michael Jackson and the like). This is no more so apparent than in Taiwan’s pop music scene, where global languages and inspirations are fused to create a truly unique local pop music genre. New York-based Reiser + Umemoto’s Taipei Pop Music Centre serves as a physical forum for the celebration of this hyper-realistic, hyper-tech creative musical art.

Taiwanese pop, or T-pop (not to be confused with that other T-pop, Thai pop) is sung in the local Min Nan language, and has been growing in popularity over the past few decades, often proudly distinguished from the larger mainland Chinese/Mandarin C-pop industry. As such, the Taipei Pop Music Centre (TPMC) is not just a hub for the creation of music, it will also become a staging point used to broadcast Taiwanese pop music on a global scale.

Scheduled for completion in 2014, the finished complex will be a 24-hour entertainment precinct, with shops, markets, cafés and restaurants alongside indoor and outdoor performance spaces and multimedia features. The elevated pedestrian zone connects all the attractions within TPMC, but also connects the Centre to the rest of the city and, by corollary, to the world at large. It also connects the Centre’s key attractions: a triumvirate formed by the Main Concert Hall, the Hall of Fame, and the Outdoor Amphitheatre. Not that “headliners” will be the only ones to enjoy a captive audience here.

Key to the master plan is the concept of nurturing up-and-coming artists as well as well-established artists. As such, the outdoor performance spaces in TPMC are compositioned in such a way that high-end high-demand performances will play out alongside smaller artists – an approach that also, in theory, fosters the creation of new music forms, encouraging collaboration and cross-pollination.

A 3000-seat auditorium forms the main performance space at the heart of the Main Hall building, which is pinpointed within the complex by a dramatic tower structure. The hybrid theatre and tower combination has been conceived as an “incubator” bringing together music creation, performance and communication within one structure. The Hall of Fame is designed to be a walkthrough of the industry’s ongoing history, complete with a main exhibition space, digital media space, two lecture theatres and the Skyview Lounge, which gives impressive views of the whole zone. When supplemented by performances, induction ceremonies, outdoor spaces and media projections, the Hall of Fame will perhaps be the most striking reminder of the close connection between T-pop and national pride.

Adjacent to the Hall of Fame, a row of live houses provide smaller venues and a sense of vibrant street life that is carried through into the Outdoor Amphitheatre. A “hybrid of circus and city”, the amphitheatre also includes The Robot Theatre – a mobile stage – and an overall capacity of 16,000, making it a completely versatile space for mass audience events and various other public uses. The Outdoor Amphitheatre is surrounded by a “technological net” supplying LED lighting and solar screening, and serving to connect and unite the outdoor space with the Hall of Fame, Robot Theatre and Main Hall.

Reiser + Umemoto are not new to the contemporary cultural scene. They entered a design for New York’s New Museum (the realised design was that of SANAA, who took out this year’s Prtizker Prize). Past designs include a proposed New York Museum of Art and Technology and a unique Music Theater in Graz, Austria. One could almost say they’re playing by heart, at this stage.

Reiser + Umemoto have said that if Hollywood is the heart of global (not just American) modern cinema, then the Taipei Pop Music Centre is the heart of Asian (not just Taiwanese) pop music. Not just a harmony of buildings and open spaces; mindblowing experimental architecture and stunning multimedia integration; artistic hub and urban environment; the TPMC is also a symphony of technology and art that will, at the very least, sing Taiwan’s praises as a locus of international standard architecture and music. +

IMAGES Courtesy of Reiser + Umemoto

1 & 2. As envisaged, the Taipei Pop Music Centre will be to Taiwan’s pop music as Hollywood is to modern international cinema: a hub from which to produce and broadcast this distinct music genre. 3.The Centre will operate 24 hours, with performance spaces, restaurants, shops, walkways and cafés. 4. The TPMC will subvert traditional special roles, using outdoor as well as indoor amphitheatres as primary performance spaces. 5. Walkways are designed to encourage pedestrian enjoyment, and also to connect the site to the city beyond.