Listening Comparisons: Sarasota Van Wezel vs. Boston Symphony Hall

Headphone Listening

The sounds on the file above are sequenced as follows:

a) Flute up very close, recorded in a ‘dry’ recording space,

b) Flute situated center stage at the Van Wezel, listener at row 20 center, flute-listener distance eighty seven feet,

c) Flute at Boston Symphony Hall, same flute-lister distance as Van Wezel.

Contrasting the Van Wezel with Boston the dominant character of the Van Wezel’s orchestra shell is apparent; a somewhat thin quality. This demonstrates the dramatic difference between the unfriendly acoustical environment of the Van Wezel and the rich immersive sound of a world class concert hall.  Moreover, despite its substantially longer reverberation time Boston also exhibits excellent clarity and immediacy, owing to dense early reflections from hall side walls and ceiling.

Aural-Environments next broadened the soundscape to incorporate a variety of symphonic instruments, as well as operatic voice. Contrasting a range of musical instruments in these two very different acoustical environments raises interesting questions: is one acoustical environment ideal for all instruments? And is one acoustical environment ideal across genres of orchestral music?  The obvious answer to both questions is no. So in listing to these very different halls it’s useful to keep this in mind. For the most part concertgoers have greatly preferred the sound of the symphonic acoustical hall over the Van Wezel, with some slight preference differences. Boston supports the development of rich instrumental sounds, as expected with its more reverberant space.  But at the same time maintaining excellent clarity and intimacy due to its high density of early lateral and ceiling reflections.

For the Mozart comparison thirty-nine instrumental locations were defined on Van Wezel and Boston stages, with instrument seating positions relative to the conductor position the same, and with equal conductor-listener distances. As one can imagine considerable computations are involved here. First, the unique acoustical response between each instrument location and the listener location is generated, incorporating a directivity function for the instrument type, followed by processing of these individual response files with their respective instrument’s studio recording. Finally, these individual instrument results are summed to a binaural file for headphone listening.  As a practical matter the recording, individually, of a full symphonic ensemble can be problematic, both logistically and musically. From the player’s perspective, performing in isolation is a much different experience than when surrounded on-stage by the full orchestra. In the Mozart demonstration the result is less fluid and dynamic playing. This suggests that in future such endeavors the most satisfactory hall comparisons will be with modest ensembles, recorded in the studio with players in isolation booths, or baffled, but viewing each other, and listening to each other with carefully prepared headphone monitor mixing.