Voice, music and sound design for the new Money Museum in Frankfurt a.M.
After closing for two years for a major revamp and enlargement, the Bundesbank’s new Money Museum is now open for the public. The museum brings the topics cash, book money, monetary policy and global money to life with various multimedia approaches and especially targets a younger audience. On behalf of Berlin based agency xailabs, HearDis! produced music, sound design and voice-overs for the Money Museum.
Installations and Surround Productions
In the entrance area of the museum we realized the four-channel sound installation "What is Money" with thirty voice-over artists in eight languages, including Chinese, Arabic and Russian. We arranged more than 400 individual phrases and words to four speakers across the room, combined with generative sounds of coins and cash registers. Accompanied by ambient music, we created an atmospheric soundscape that welcomes the visitors and asks the main question of the exhibition: "What is money?"
The central 360° cinema of the Geldmuseum shows three elaborately produced movies that approach the subject "money" with animations, spectacular camera drone footage and interviews. In close cooperation with Xailabs, we composed two music pieces, developed a complex sound design and took care of audio post production. The soundtracks were mixed in Dolby 4.1
Voice-Over, Feedback Sounds and Post Production
One of the numismatic highlights of the museum is the only remaining golden Brutus Aureus, an ancient Roman coin in remembrance of the assassination of Caesar. We produced a bilingual short audio drama that vividly explains the historic background of the special coin.
We created feedback sounds and music for all touchscreens and 13 interactive games, including a race car game and quizzes. To achieve a consistent acoustic appearance throughout the museum, we established a homogenous sound aesthetic for all games and touchscreens.
We created bilingual voice over recordings, music, sounds, audio post production or audio restoration for more than 38 other productions within the museum, including short documentaries, radio features, testimonials, historical footage and a three-dimensional model projection.
Technical Challenges
From structure-borne sound converters installed behind wooden or glass panels and handheld earphones to conventional speakers or a six-channel sound system with woofers: The numerous loudspeaker systems and monitoring situations of the museum have been a special technical challenge. To ensure optimal sound quality and speech intelligibility, we intensely tested the speakers in our studio, tailor-mixed each production and adjusted it on-site.
Bilingual Voice-Over Ensemble
We casted a bilingual voice-over ensemble that achieves vocal recognisability and rich variety at the same time through a system of rotating voices for off commentary and voice over dubbing. Experienced professional voice-over artists ensure an adequate presentation of the partially sensitive issues addressed in the historic sections of the exhibition. To increase the speech intelligibility in many-voiced productions, the casted voices do not only harmonize well with each other, but are also clearly distinguishable by timbre.
