Musical Metaverse

By Luca Turchet, University of Trento

IEEE Metaverse Newsletter, 2025

The Metaverse relates to a vision of a virtual, digital world which is parallel to the real, physical world, where each user owns and interacts through his/her own avatar. Music is one of the possible activities that can be conducted in such a space. The “Musical Metaverse”, the metaverse part which is dedicated to musical activities, is currently in its infancy, although is a concept that is constantly evolving and is progressing at a steady pace. Such emerging space offers several new opportunities for musical stakeholders at artistic and economic level. However, much academic, industrial and artistic research still needs to be conducted to accomplish the vision of a Metaverse tailored for musical stakeholders. Several technical challenges at hardware and software level exist in the domains of metaverse platforms, telecommunications, multimodal tracking, multisensory rendering, artificial intelligence and blockchain. Moreover, artistic, ethical, sustainability, and regulatory issues need to be addressed so for the Musical Metaverse to be created and utilized in efficient, creative, and responsible ways.

The MUSMET project

The MUSMET project (“Musical Metaverse made in Europe is an innovation lab for musicians and audiences of the future”, musmet.eu/) has started on the 1st of February 2025. The project is funded by the European Innovation Council under the scheme EIC Pathfinder Open of the European Commission.

MUSMET aims to establish the foundation of a new technology that enables the creation of Musical Metaverse systems and services for musicians and audiences, to achieve novel forms of musical expression and foster music performance and consumption.

Given the strict perceptual constraints imposed by musical interactions, a fundamental objective of the project is to minimize latency in scalable metaverse platforms, while ensuring a high quality of the exchanged multisensory content.

The MUSMET consortium comprises 15 organisations from 9 European countries holding advanced and complementary expertise in research, art and innovation programs, as well as in-depth knowledge of music, AI, networking and XR and their application to the Metaverse sector.

Future events:

• The 6^th IEEE International Symposium on the Internet of Sounds (IS² 2025) will take place at Palazzo dell’Emiciclo and Gran Sasso Science Institute, in the city of L’Aquila, Italy, from 29^th to 31^st of October 2025
• The 3^rd IEEE International Workshop on Networked Immersive Audio will be a satellite event of IS² 2025
• The 2^nd IEEE International Workshop on the Musical Metaverse will be a satellite event of IS² 2025
• The 2^nd IEEE Music Packet Loss Concealment Challenge will be a satellite event of IS² 2025.

Notably, the IEEE Metaverse Initiative promotes and supports the 2^nd IEEE International Workshop on the Musical Metaverse by providing travel grants for PhD students. Information on how to apply to such grants is available at: internetofsounds2025.ieee-is2.org/registration/travel-grants-0

Relevant scientific publications:

• Turchet, L. (2023). Musical Metaverse: vision, opportunities, and challenges. Personal and Ubiquitous Computing, 27(5), 1811-1827. Open-access: https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s00779-023-01708-1.pdf (992 KB)
• Boem, A., Tomasetti, M. and Turchet L (2025). “Issues and Challenges of Audio Technologies for the Musical Metaverse.” Journal of the Audio Engineering Society, 73(3), 94-114. Open-access: https://aes2.org/publications/elibrary-page/?id=22806