Changing spaces of music – from acoustic and live to virtual and hybrid

​When the pandemic forced concerts to remove themselves from halls and clubs to a virtual space, everyone involved found themselves in a completely new situation: listeners, performers, venues and concert producers. At the time of writing, concerts are slowly returning to physical venues around the world, but many things have changed and many more things are in a state of flux. Many things that we were forced to learn under these exceptional circumstances will continue to affect the way we do things even after the pandemic is over.

Quarries and ravines, repurposed industrial facilities and world-class auditoriums: music occupies an incredibly diverse range of spaces in Finland. How are these needs shifting with technological and social changes?

As the pandemic fades in Finland and live gigs resume, what have we learned from the abrupt leap into the virtual space? And where do we go from here? Is live streaming here to stay – or just the first step?

During the last year, music consumption has been confined inside the four walls of individual homes, but at the same time it has expanded with the help of streamed concerts which give access to performances from around the world.

"The resilience of our industry has been weighed in the balance and found to be sound. We will pull through this, but it will require us to accept that the change is permanent and to respond to that change," writes Annamaija Saarela in her FMQ column.

The wooden architecture of the new Sibelius Hall in Lahti provided both traditional and modern support to the Lahti Symphony’s performance of Sibelius’ Finlandia at the hall’s debut on March 9th [2000].The hall’s intriguing combination of proven and new should also help efforts to export Finnish wood-construction expertise and design. Externally, the hall was almost completed in time for the inaugural concert, but it will still take months to “tune” the acoustics. The New York firm Artec and its acoustics team want to polish the hall's timbre to its utmost.