source file: mills2.txt Date: Wed, 16 Apr 1997 22:18:05 -0700 Subject: Ya gotta have halls From: Daniel Wolf ''Little'' Bridges Hall of Music at Pomona College (Claremont, CA) is an extraordinary place for hearing both chamber and large ensemble musics and quite beautiful to look at as well. There is not much of a backstage, but that could be solved in a number of ways; too, the organ console could be better placed. However, in general, I find that a 500-600 seat hall is a curious beast. A recital hall for chamber music is probably optimal at 150-250 seats. An professional orchestral hall will probably demand - for economic reasons - a capacity of well over 600. If the target is to play classical repertoire, then I would look seriously at those halls in Salzburg, Vienna, Prague where the repertoire was premiered (how about ''historical performance practice'' for concert hall architecture?*). If the needs are very diverse it might be worthwhile looking at the mistakes (and some successes) made by IRCAM in attempting to design a flexible space. If recording is very important I would look at the Sendesaal of Hessischer Rundfunk in Frankfurt, which seats around 600, sounds great, but feels like a cross between an airplane hanger and a basketball court. In any case, sound isolation is extremely important, the climate control must have the ability to be shut down immediately and noiselessly (Heinz-Klaus Metzger has quipped that Webern was the last composer to compose before the advent of air conditioned concert halls), the chairs should be comfortable, and glass walls never work in concert halls. And by all means, if there is to be an organ, put it in an appropriate tuning, with split keys if needed. * One historical practice germane to the tuning list that might be worth reviving is the use of resonant cavities in the walls or under the stage floor to amplify particular frequencies. _The New Grove_ article on acoustics describes some of these. With automated controls it should be possible to modify the dimensions of such cavities to optimize the hall for individual concerts or even pieces. Received: from ns.ezh.nl [137.174.112.59] by vbv40.ezh.nl with SMTP-OpenVMS via TCP/IP; Thu, 17 Apr 1997 10:03 +0200 Received: by ns.ezh.nl; (5.65v3.2/1.3/10May95) id AA01940; Thu, 17 Apr 1997 10:03:20 +0200 Received: from ella.mills.edu by ns (smtpxd); id XA01938 Received: from by ella.mills.edu via SMTP (940816.SGI.8.6.9/930416.SGI) id BAA05340; Thu, 17 Apr 1997 01:01:35 -0700 Date: Thu, 17 Apr 1997 01:01:35 -0700 Message-Id: <3.0.1.32.19970417005442.006b0f28@adnc.com> Errors-To: madole@mills.edu Reply-To: tuning@ella.mills.edu Originator: tuning@eartha.mills.edu Sender: tuning@ella.mills.edu