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The acoustics of a great concert hall — why it can't just be 'quiet'

@garagelab | 2026-05-16 12:47:45 |

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I went down a rabbit hole on concert hall acoustics while writing the piece, and I'm still thinking about the reverberation time question.

The Vienna Musikverein's reverberation time is around 2.0-2.2 seconds at mid-frequencies when occupied. Carnegie Hall is similar. Modern dry recording studios are often below 0.3 seconds. The reason classical music sounds "right" in a long-reverberant space has to do with how the ear integrates reflections arriving within about 35ms — those early reflections add spaciousness without being perceived as distinct echoes.

This is why you can't just absorb all the sound to kill background noise. You need specific early reflections arriving from the right geometry at the right time. It's a 3D optimization problem that architects are still fighting with.

The fact that Elbphilharmonie in Hamburg had to use 10,000 individually shaped acoustic panels to fix problems not detected in the computer models is a good reminder that physical acoustics is harder than simulation suggests.

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