Casa del Jazz

Along Viale di Porta Ardeatina, a splendid park of about two and a half hectares (open every day from dawn to dusk) is the seat of the Casa del Jazz. It is a unique place in the heart of Rome, created with the aim of stimulating the diffusion of jazz music, attracting a transversal public in terms of age and interests, and constituting a reference point for music lovers, artists, producers and critics.

Villa Osio, the complex in which it is housed, was built in the late 1930s when the banker and lawyer Arturo Osio commissioned engineer Cesare Pascoletti, a collaborator of Marcello Piacentini, to build it. The result was a sober and elegant structure, with an arched entrance portico on the eastern side. Landscape architect Pietro Porcinai was entrusted with the landscaping of the park, with a series of trees and shrubs delimiting the perimeter of the complex and accompanying the pathways into the villa. The original appearance of the villa and the park was, however, distorted by the many interventions and building abuses carried out when ownership was transferred in the 1980s to the Banda della Magliana boss Enrico Nicoletti. Seized and then definitively confiscated in 2001, the villa was assigned to the Municipality of Rome and reopened in 2005 as the Casa del Jazz - House of Jazz at the end of an articulated historical-architectural recovery plan. At the entrance, a plaque created in collaboration with Don Ciotti’s Libera association bears the names of the 683 mafia victims from 1893 to 2005, testifying to the victory represented by the return of the property to its citizens.

The Casa del Jazz is today a multifunctional center consisting of a complex of three buildings housing different activities (concerts, cultural and educational events). Inside the main building, a 150-seat auditorium is used from September to May for live concerts by Italian and international artists, screenings, lectures and meetings. A sophisticated recording system allows for the production of top-quality recordings of concerts and events. The same building also houses a large audiovisual archive, which can be consulted via multimedia stations, a library open to the public, a bookshop and a cafeteria. The two secondary buildings house rehearsal and recording rooms, a guesthouse (exclusively for the use of the artists involved in the concerts) and a restaurant. During the summer months, it is the park of the villa that is transformed into a scenic backdrop for performances by world-famous artists and young musicians still little known to the public.

Check out the calendar of events on the official website.