Rockheim (also called ''Det nasjonale opplevelsessenteret for pop og rock'', The National Discovery Centre for Pop and Rock, and ''Det nasjonale museet for populærmusikk'', The National Museum for Popular Music) is

Norway Norway, officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic countries, Nordic country located on the Scandinavian Peninsula in Northern Europe. The remote Arctic island of Jan Mayen and the archipelago of Svalbard also form part of the Kingdom of ...

's national museum for popular music from the 1950s to the present. It is a division of Museene i Sør-Trøndelag (

Sør-Trøndelag Sør-Trøndelag (; ) was a Counties of Norway, county comprising the southern portion of the present-day Trøndelag county in Norway. It bordered the old Nord-Trøndelag () county as well as the counties of Møre og Romsdal, Oppland, and Hedmark. ...

Museums) and is housed in a former grain warehouse in

Trondheim Trondheim ( , , ; ), historically Kaupangen, Nidaros, and Trondhjem (), is a city and municipality in Trøndelag county, Norway. As of 2022, it had a population of 212,660. Trondheim is the third most populous municipality in Norway, and is ...

. It opened in 2010; since 2013, the director has been Sissel Guttormsen. The museum also has a virtual presence, ''Virtuelle Rockheim'', which launched in 2009, and since 2011 musicians and groups have been chosen for the Rockheim Hall of Fame.

History and administration

The idea for the museum goes back to 1998; the

Ministry of Culture Ministry of Culture may refer to: * Ministry of Tourism, Cultural Affairs, Youth and Sports (Albania) * Ministry of Culture (Algeria) * Ministry of Culture (Argentina) * Minister for the Arts (Australia) * Ministry of Culture (Azerbaijan)Ministry o ...

began planning eight years later and in 2007 Bratterøkaia AS won the commission to create it. It was to have opened in 2009, but completion of the building was delayed by a contractor bankruptcy and a fire.Elizabeth Hopkirk
"Rockheim opens in Norway"
''Building.co.uk'', 19 August 2010.Kristin Agerlie
"Her er Trondheims nye trekkplaster"

NRK The Norwegian Broadcasting Corporation (), commonly known by its initialism NRK, is a Norwegian state-run, government-influenced radio and television public broadcasting company. The NRK broadcasts three national TV channels and thirteen nat ...

, 5 August 2010 . It officially opened on 5 August 2010. Rockheim is housed in a 1919 grain warehouse in Trondheim. To roughly double the space available, a new sixth floor was added in the form of a cantilevered 'box', which is clad in glass decorated with reproductions of album covers and with changeable back-lighting provided by 13,000 individually controllable

LED A light-emitting diode (LED) is a semiconductor device that emits light when current flows through it. Electrons in the semiconductor recombine with electron holes, releasing energy in the form of photons. The color of the light (corresp ...

s; the public can affect the colours by using cellphones.Terje Mosnes
"Drømmeslott for rockevåkne"
''Dagbladet'', 6 August 2010 . ir IIbr>"Warehouse represents Norwegian rock 'n' roll"
''World Architecture News'', 29 November 2012. A "black box" building for performances was also added; the design envisaged this being covered by climbing plants. The architects for the conversion were and for the grounds, Agraff AS. The conversion was awarded the City of Trondheim's 2010 building award. The building has of floor space, of which half is exhibit space. The building and installations cost 300 million kroner. The museum is a division of Museene i Sør-Trøndelag. It was headed by Arvid Esperø during planning and construction and until 2011, when Petter Myhr became the director; he was succeeded in 2013 by Sissel Guttormsen.

Permanent and virtual exhibits

The primary mission of the museum is to preserve and document Norwegian popular music. The permanent exhibit, for which the lead designer was Canadian Stacey Spiegel, takes the form of a journey through Norwegian music and cultural history from the 1950s to the present. It occupies in the building's top-floor box, and devotes a room to each decade. The exhibition has many interactive components. Visitors first encounter an interactive map of Norway, can select the videos shown in each room, and there are three discovery rooms: in the Ronni Room they can try playing guitar with guidance from Ronni Le Tekrø, and in the Hiphop Room they can experiment with DJing, graffiti art and

breakdancing Breakdancing or breaking, also called b-boying (when performed by men) or b-girling (women), is a style of street dance originated by African Americans and Nuyorican, Puerto Ricans in The Bronx borough of New York City. Breakdancing consist ...

. In ''Virtuelle Rockheim'', launched on 21 August 2009, they can manipulate an

avatar Avatar (, ; ) is a concept within Hinduism that in Sanskrit literally means . It signifies the material appearance or incarnation of a powerful deity, or spirit on Earth. The relative verb to "alight, to make one's appearance" is sometimes u ...

to explore a selection of the exhibits in 3D. Spiegel, who also designed the virtual museum, predicted in 2008 that Rockheim would be "the world's most technically sophisticated virtual museum"; it was Norway's first online museum.

Temporary exhibitions

The museum opened with a temporary exhibition of photographs by Robert Meyer titled ''Icons of the 60's''. Other temporary exhibitions have been ''Jukeboks!'' (

jukebox A jukebox is a partially automated music-playing device, usually a coin-operated machine, that plays a user-selected song from a self-contained media library. Traditional jukeboxes contain records, compact discs, or digital files, and allow user ...

), ''Wenches Verden'' (on

Wenche Myhre Wenche Synnøve Myhre (born 15 February 1947), known in German as Wencke Myhre, is a Norwegian singer who has had a great number of hit songs since the 1960s in the Norwegian, Danish, German and Swedish markets and languages. She represented Ger ...

), ''Innenfor/utenfor'' (inside/outside; photographs by Peter Beste) and ''Teigens Tivoli'' (on

Jahn Teigen Jahn Teigen (born Jan Teigen; 27 September 1949 – 24 February 2020) was a Norwegian singer, musician and comedian. He represented Norway in the Eurovision Song Contest three times, in 1978, 1982 and 1983, From October 2006 until his death in F ...

Hall of Fame

The Rockheim Hall of Fame honours individuals and groups for their contributions to Norwegian popular music. Inductees must have debuted at least 25 years before and are chosen annually by a jury.

a-ha A-ha (often stylised as ''a''-h''a''; ) is a Norwegian synth-pop band formed in Oslo in 1982. Founded by Paul Waaktaar-Savoy (guitars and vocals), Magne Furuholmen (keyboards, guitars and vocals), and Morten Harket (lead vocals), the band ros ...

, Åge Aleksandersen, Jokke & Valentinerne,

and

Alf Prøysen Alf Prøysen () (23 July 1914 – 23 November 1970) was a Norwegian author, poet, playwright, songwriter and musician. Prøysen was one of the most important Norwegian cultural personalities in the second half of the 20th century. He work ...

were the first to be inducted, on 5 September 2011.Magne Gisvold
"Disse innlemmes i Hall of Fame"
Rockheim, 5 September 2011

References

External links