Unique Opportunity

There are dozens – perhaps a few hundred – of privately owned record collections of significance around the world. They are not accessible to the public.

There are a handful of Public Institutions around the world with large holdings of recordings, but public access and resources to bring their holdings to life are lacking.

CMRMC will be uniquely accessible to the general public through its museum, website, partner exhibits, roadshows, outreach programs and immersive
productions.

CMRMC will be uniquely accessible to individuals through its digital technology, enabling new ways of sharing the stories that flow from our personal emotional connection to recorded music.

Unique Need

As late as 1960, English Canadians bought almost no Canadian music…So little was available outside of small batch country, fiddle, Quebecois, and the odd offering. We had no meaningful musical industry.

At the time serious Canadian musical talent had to go to the U.S. hoping to be recorded by a company that could break them out in a material way in the U.S. and as an afterthought, Canada.

Just over 25 years later Canada had become an emerging powerhouse in the musical world. Telling the many stories of how this great Canadian cultural success occurred is one of the primary missions of CMRMC

The CMRMC has an awesome record collection. But it has so much more than records:

Publicity photos, posters, release sheets, flyers, magazines, books, catalogs, toys, models, trinkets and promotional ephemera of almost every type.

These so-very-rare assets add to the context and colorful experience that CMRMC physical and virtual visitors can expect.

The Vision

Art brings generations, families and communities together.

CMRMC will combine the right space and the right technology with our unique world-class collection to create exciting new personal experiences that inform and inspire.

The Canadian Museum of Recorded Music and Culture will be based in Calgary and will be accessible from coast to coast to coast through our digital portals, travelling exhibitions and many partnerships throughout North America.

CMRMC will be as exciting, relevant and accessible to international audiences and visitors as to all Canadians.

The Experience

Creating a beautiful museum to house the art form most enjoyed by Canadians — recorded music – will be a Unique  Attraction that will draw visitors from home and abroad.

Here is a small sample of the exhibits CMRMC is developing to bring to the world:

Making to Learn

  • Kids of all ages will Sing-A-Song, Tell-A-Story, Recite-a-Poem/Rap, Tell-A-Joke, Throat Sing…
  • We will then record the short performance to a large Custom-Made acoustic disc, electric disc, a wax cylinder, mono vinyl, Stereo vinyl and MP3.
  • Visitors will then make their own “Album Cover” for their very own recording session.
  • Visitors will then hear their performance played back on the various media

Jukebox Alley: “Coinbait” to “Clickbait”

  • Each of our colorful and bright jukes will be presented in context, e.g. a 1945 Juke will be set in a 1945 café or bar, 1955 in a “Happy Days” style diner, etc.
  • Visitors will be encouraged to insert a quarter (museum token) to select and play a song on the various jukes (which will be acoustically isolated from each other, each in their own era/setting).

Audio Taste Test:

  • Visitors will be able to A-B-C-D-E switch between various audio playback configurations, e.g. MC vs MM cartridge, mono vs stereo, tubes vs transistors, Hi Fi, Lo Fi, Master vs Re-Master, various codex, etc…

 

Dazzle Your Friends:

  • Visitors will Mine the CM-RMC visuals database, e.g. records covers, photos, ads.
  • Search and filter visuals by a series of topics and keywords e.g. Artist, Label, Year,  and/or “classy”, “formal”, “funny”, etc.
  • The resulting short slide show, driven from the filter and search criteria (and turbo charged by AI), will be “debuted” in a 10-person mini theatre with large monitors for friends and family

Audio Time Tunnel:

  • Play media of working playback devices from Edison to Amazon
  • Tinfoil, Wax cylinder, shellac 78, vinyl mono, vinyl stereo, 45 rpm, RCA Cassette, Compact Cassette, Reel To Reel, 8-Track, various digital codex,
  • Hands on with working gear from the era.

Under Glass: Rarest of the Rare:

  • Visitors will enter “The Vault” where they will be able to see the rarest records and musical artifacts in the world under heavy security,
  • Our treasures will each have a storyboard explain the how, where and why of the rarities.

DJ Jungle:

  • There are two genres of DJ:
  • Old school radio “disc jockeys”: Dave Boxer, Al Boliska,, often with a bigger fan base than many of the musical acts they played (and made) (Payola).
  • Radio Charts from the Top-40 era offer a great data visualization opportunity
  • Modern DJ: the sensory world of nightclub DJ’s brought to life

Where we found and where we listened:

  • We will recreate a series of Record Store environments over the years:
  • 1945, 1950, 1955, 1960, 1965, 1970, 1975, 1980, 1985, 1990, 1995, 2000
  • We will also recreate a series of home listening rooms using the same time intervals to showcase the listening technology, fashions, furniture, and overall gestalt.
  • Visitors will have a digital guide to highlight and display the many aspects of the store and listening settings highlighting broader historical context.