Arquitectura Sonora, Santiago

Arquitectura Sonora was a large scale immersive listening event held inside the Basilica of Lourdes in Santiago, Chile, transforming the historic site into a focused performance environment through a spatialised playback of Arvo Pärt’s Tabula Rasa delivered over a full Void Acoustics system. 

The event took place in one of Santiago’s most architecturally and acoustically demanding heritage spaces, the Basilica of Lourdes. A Gothic-Byzantine church constructed between 1929 and 1958, featuring a dome rising to seventy metres, operating as an active temple still today. 

The project was delivered by TheLoftMusic, including the deployment of a complete Void Acoustics sound system and full technical production for the event. Led by Patricio Salinas, CEO of TheLoftMusic.com and Void Acoustics distributor in Chile, the system was designed to deliver clarity, power and control while preserving the natural character of the basilica.

The Basilica of Lourdes presents significant acoustic challenges due to its scale, height and reflective architecture. Large cathedral style spaces typically produce long reverberation times that can affect clarity and definition if sound systems are not carefully designed and aligned. 

To address this, the system design focused on strategic loudspeaker placement, centre reinforcement and calibrated delay positions. Using measurement and alignment tools, the system was tuned with delay and phase correction to ensure coherent sound coverage and maintain intelligibility throughout the main nave.

A complete Void Acoustics system was deployed to deliver controlled sound propagation across the basilica. The configuration combined a main PA, centre reinforcement, and distributed delay elements to maintain clarity and definition over long distances. The system included: 

Main PA:

• 2 × Tri Motion 

Centre reinforcement:

• 2 × Stasys Xair 
• 1 × Venu 14 V2 

Tops:

• 2 × Air 8 

Delays: 

• 2 × Airten V3
• 1 × Venu 215
• 2 × Air 8 

Amplification:

•  2 × Bias Q1+ 
• 2 × Bias Q2+ 
• 1 × Bias Q5

The completed system delivered powerful, evenly distributed sound across the basilica’s expansive interior, allowing audiences throughout the space to experience a clear and immersive spatial presentation of Tabula Rasa. 

By combining Void Acoustics’ high performance loudspeaker technology with expert system design and acoustic alignment, Arquitectura Sonora demonstrated how large heritage venues can host modern live music experiences while preserving their architectural character.