In 2005, a Croatian architect designed a 230-foot-long organ that turns the rhythm of the waves into actual music.
It’s not a nonsensical organ with bellows or chaotic sounds. Real, real music.
We have all never heard or seen anything like it.
Imagine walking along the picturesque Adriatic Sea, treading lightly on a set of white stone steps as a cool breeze rolls past.
The steps have narrow channels that connect 35 organ pipes. Each pipe is tuned to a different musical chord.
The waves push air through the pipes, creating a musical arrangement that is both harmonious and totally random.
You don’t know what’s below the surface. You close your eyes and all you hear is a song like you’ve never heard before, one completely unique to the movement of the sea at that exact moment.
The Norske Orgulje, also known as the Sea Organ, is an architectural marvel that was created to revive one of the most ancient cities in the world.
Zadar, a 3,000-year-old city on the coast of Croatia, was almost completely destroyed in World War II –– so many of its ancient landmarks were lost forever. Years after a rebuilding that featured lots of plain, concrete structures, award-winning architect Nikola Bašić was brought in to bring some delight back to the coastline.
No doubt he was inspired by the hydraulis — a nifty little instrument built by the ancient Greeks that used water to push air through tuned pipes — or even the Wave Organ in San Francisco — a set of curved tubes built in the 1980s that amplify the gurgles and howls of the Pacific Ocean.