The Orchestra platform is designed and implemented by a consortium of experienced operators in the field of culture, architecture and technology.
Mobics A.E.
Mobics S.A. (www.mobics.gr) was founded in 2006 as a spin-off of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (Department of Informatics and Telecommunications) based in Athens. Mobics specializes in the design, development and provision of value-added services for mobile and pervasive computing environments and the Internet, focusing on geographic information and context-aware services, middleware, as well as on machine vision. As a spin-off of the University of Athens, Mobics invests in knowledge and people for successful and long-term partnerships, and to offer solutions at the cutting edge of technology. Mobics’s R&D team is made up of internationally recognized researchers with a great scientific contribution to the fields of mobile and web services and applications, as well as participating in several international and national R&D projects.
The role of MOBICS in the Orchestra project is the overall coordination of the project as well as the design and implementation of the platform software.
Club: Friends Music Association
The Friends of Music Society (FMS) is a private, non-profit organization founded in 1953 under the initiative to support and promote music to the Greek society. Among its objectives was the construction of the Athens Concert Hall, one of the largest and most advanced cultural centres in the world, the promotion and the support of Greek composers, young performers and artists and the implementation of several education and research programs around the country in order to introduce young people to the world of music and the arts. Today, FMS continues its important cultural and educational mission organizing and hosting seminars and capacity building workshops, concerts with various well-known artists, offering scholarships to young and promising musicians and among all, is the proud founder of the Music Library of Greece “Lilian Voudouri”. The Music Library of Greece ‘Lilian Voudouri’ is the largest music library in Greece and one of biggest in Southeast Europe, located in the Athens Concert Hall. The Library was created with the scope to become an information resource center for music and the fine arts, able to support continuous research and multilevel educational programs. The Library’s collections, with more than 141.000 items, are constantly expanding and have a principle focus on western classical European music alongside all types of Greek music (ancient, Byzantine, traditional and contemporary). The Greek Music Archive was created in order to fulfill the need for an official body specializing in the collection, processing and documentation of all material relevant to Greek music, with the eventual goal of creating a center for the preservation and study of this material. The collection contains rare documents, manuscripts, archives and both current and historical publications, all related to ancient, Byzantine, traditional and contemporary Greek music. The archives of Greek composers and artists constitute a particularly significant part of this collection. The Library has maintained and preserved the material in Greek Music Archive through digitization programs making it publicly accessible in DIGMA (Digital Greek Music Archive) repository. The Library holds also, the audiovisual archive of Folk and Traditional songs and dances of Thrace and Eastern Macedonia from the Research program “Thrace” that was contacted from The Friends of Music Society in the years 1995-2000. With this collection of 25.000 audiovisual items of field research material the Library preserve the intangible cultural heritage of Northern Greece and reveal its customs, songs and music, dances and daily life. Based on its vast digital repository (with more than 135.000 items) the Library aims to make an efficient reuse of this material in areas like education, research and tourism with the use of cutting-edge technologies promoting intangible cultural heritage to the public.
The role of FMS is the scientific coordination of the project and the design of the methodologies for the creation of enhanced interactive performances. Additionally, FMS is responsible for the evaluation of the platform in terms of effectiveness through its implementation in the space of Music Library of Greece (prototype).
Tetragon S.A.
TETRAGON was founded in 1999 by architects Eleni Vretzaki, Giotis Ioannidis and Ilias Papadopoulos. It is a continuation of the TETRAS company, which was established in 1984 and was mainly active in the field of exhibition architecture. Since then, the company has expanded its range of activities with successful collaborations and projects across Greece and abroad. TETRAGON is a member of the OCTANORM (OSPI Partner) global network of ECSITE Science Centers and Museums, participated in HELEXPO Exhibition Constructions SA, a subsidiary of HELEXPO, and is ISO certified (9001: 2008). Its members are members of ICOM (International Council of Museums), while the company employs 25 people and its creative departments are composed by architects, museologists, historians, archaeologists, designers, decorators, graphic designers and technicians with high scientific training, know-how and experience.
Tetragon is working on developing methodologies create scenarios and narratives in interactive spaces. It also designs good practices for the placement and installation of the Orchestra platform in its various application areas (museums, libraries, educational institutions, exhibitions, etc.).