Admiring the beauty of Rome through magnificent music is an engaging and original experience of traveling in the Eternal City.
The itinerary takes you on a historic and evocative journey through the main Capitoline music venues that host bigevents and talents of opera and symphony, pop, gospel, and jazz. From the historical Teatro Argentina to the old Conservatory of Santa Cecilia, from the Anglican Church All Saints' to the imposing Auditorium Parco della Musica, up to the refined House of Jazz.
In Via di Torre Argentina you can admire one of the oldest and most noteworthy city theatres located where once stood the ancient Curia Pompeii, the place in which Julius Caesar was killed.
Inaugurated on 13 January 1732, this historic building has a 19th-century neoclassical facade where you can read 'To the arts of Melpomene, Euterpe and Terpsichore,' a dedication to the muses of tragedy, music, and dance. Inside, the horseshoe-shaped room with five beautiful tiers of boxes. The gold and the red blend together create the perfect atmosphere for an unforgettable experience lovers of the great classical and contemporary theater can enjoy.
To learn about the history and curiosities of the theater, we recommend a visit to the small museum housed in the attic, a real gem that tells the story and activity. Divided into three sections, with topographical material, remains of the ancient structure and previous decorations, costumes, posters, drawings, and portraits of artists embellished by a panoramic terrace with magnificent views of the Sacred Area of Largo Argentina.
Conservatorio di Santa Cecilia
The place where great music originated and young talents perfect themselves was an idea by Giovanni Sgambati. The musician decided to use a small room obtained in concession to carry out free piano lessons in 1869.
Inside is the great Academic Hall with perfect acoustics, inaugurated in the late 19th century as the largest concert hall in Rome. Here, you can admire the Great Organ Walcker-Tamburini, built in 1894 and still the protagonist of prestigious concerts.
The splendid Biblioteca Musicale Governativa Santa Cecilia boasts a heritage of 300,000 texts, including eight incunabula, 312 16th-century editions, 10,000 manuscripts, over 300 periodicals, and a sound library of about 4000 LP discs, CDs, audio and video cassettes.
Today, the Conservatory is one of the world's oldest musical institutions hosting festivals, concerts, and exhibitions. It is daily animated by thousands of students from all over the world, whose notes resonate in Via dei Greci, between the central Via del Corso, and Via del Babuino.
Halfway down Via del Babuino stands the Anglican place of worship built at the end of the 19th century by the English architect George Edmund Street. This church is characterized by a strong presence of artists, British poets, and writers residing between Piazza di Spagna and the surrounding streets.
Characterized by an English Neo-Gothic style, the church presents a red exterior of bricks curtains of Siena. The interior has a charming Victorian atmosphere and is richly decorated with Italian polychrome marble, round mosaic, colored glass, and rose stone of Arles.
It is one of the most evocative venues for classical music concerts and the most famous opera arias taking place in the concert season, during which soloists and musical groups from all over the world are hosted.
In the Flaminio district, you can find the grand building designed by the star architect Renzo Piano, born in the early 2000s as a multifunctional structure to host concerts, festivals, and artistic and cultural events of all kinds.
The Auditorium is home to the concerts of the prestigious Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia. It is renowned for the events of classical music, rock, pop, jazz, contemporary and popular, for theater festivals and meetings with authors hosted in its three large halls - Santa Cecilia, Sinopoli and Petrassi - and in the evocative open-air Cavea.
Do not miss the Museum of Musical Instruments of the Accademia Nazionale di Santa Cecilia, one of the most characteristic rooms of the complex, where the most characteristic and significant pieces from the world of Italian music and beyond are staged.
Located near the spectacular Baths of Caracalla, the Casa del Jazz was founded in 2005 in Villa Osio, a charming building of the thirties surrounded by a large park.
Managed by the Fondazione Musica per Roma, the complex hosts live performances by the most famous Italian and international musicians and young emerging talents of the jazz scene, Jazz history lessons, listening guides, presentations of new recordings, and editorials, reading and film reviews.
It’s a reference point for artists, professionals, and music lovers: inside belongs a recording studio of absolute sound excellence, a library open to the public, and an audiovisual archive with multimedia stations where you can immerse yourself in the Jazz history and relive concerts, interviews, and events.
