It all began in 2016, surely, when the Conservatoire Massenet created a sound logo and musical identity (radio jingles, telephone hold music, etc.) for the Saint-Étienne City Council.

Then it snowballed in the summer of 2018, when the communication team from the MAMC+ and the council’s cultural communication department knocked on the door of the Conservatoire.

The question was simple, but the answer not so much. The Museum had been struggling to find musical coherency in its communication tools. Whether for videos, radio spots, or telephone hold music, the atmospheres were too different, too unrecognisable.

But… how does a modern and contemporary art museum ‘sound’? How do you create a ‘musical colour’ for a museum? How do you make the connection with its history, its building, its graphic charter, collection, and programming?

To meet this challenger, we would’ve liked to call on Michel Legrand but there was no reply… We could’ve switched galaxies and called John Williams, but we were afraid of the worst of the dark side of the force.

So it was Mathias Pignal who accepted the challenge: a resident of Saint-Étienne, a student at the Conservatoire Massenet in the electroacoustic class of musician Diego Losa, as well as a student in Professional Audiovisual Technique at Vichy.

The result? A sound creation with trip-hop, hip-hop, and electro accents, which has been a huge success!

‘I was inspired by current trends to suggest something in the taste of the day, while keeping it somewhat accessible. I simplified the melodies as much as possible to obtain a catchy result that would allow the museum to be identified within seconds.’

This was a first for Mathias, but also for the Museum, which has thus entered the exclusive club of French museums endowed with a sound logo.

You can now hear this sound identity in the announcements made over the loudspeakers, on the phone, or in our advertising spots and videos. Is it stuck in your head? We’ll level with you: that was kind of the goal!