Fatatrac, a division of the Italian publishing house Giunti, is introducing Look Listen Play!, a new multimedia initiative, on April 3. The project begins not with books but with music: a musician will be commissioned to produce an original composition for children—and that composition will then be passed on to a writer, who will use it as the inspiration for a children’s book.

The project has strong ties to the city of Bologna and is being developed in partnership with the city’s Istituzione Bologna Musei, a consortium of 15 local museums. Veronica Ceruti, director of education for the Istituzione, and Charles Kim, formerly associate publisher of the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, are serving as editors and curators for the project, which is expected to deliver its first title in the spring of 2020.

“The idea is to create original educational and entertainment content and expand the musical canon for children through books and real-world interactions,” Kim says. A third partner in the project, Bologna’s Teatro Comunale, the city’s opera house, has agreed to stage performances of the original musical compositions of the first books to come out of the project; MAMBo, the Bologna Modern Art Museum, is also on board to host an exhibition related to the first book.

“By bringing together the musical and visual arts and reading, as well as experiences of the concert hall and museum going, Look Listen Play! will help emphasize multidisciplinary learning and reinforce to children and parents the importance of arts education,” Kim says.

The hope, according to Kim, is that the project will spread to other cities across Italy and abroad. Giunti is handing foreign rights sales, and so far, U.S. rights have been acquired by Six Foot Press, a new publisher.

A press conference for Look Listen Play! will be held on Wednesday at 3:45 p.m. on the main stage in the central hall housing the Illustrator’s Café.