sabine. — architectueal acoushcs. 53 



11. The Accuracy of Musical Taste in regard to 

 Architectural Acoustics. 



Piano Music. 



The experiments described in this paper were underi;aken in order 

 to determine the reverberation best suited to piano music in a music 

 room of moderate size, but were so conducted as to give a measure of 

 the accuracy of cultivated musical taste. The latter point is obviously 

 fundamental to the whole investigation, for unless musical taste is 

 precise, the problem, at least as far as it concerns the design of the 

 auditorium for musical purposes, is indeterminate. 



The first observations in regard to the precision of musical taste 

 were obtained during the planning of the Boston Symphony Hall, 

 Messrs. McKim, Mead, and White, Architects. Mr. Higginson, Mr, 

 Gericke, the conductor of the orchestra, and others connected with 

 the Building Committee expressed opinions in regard to a number of 

 auditoriums. These buildings included the old Boston Music Hall, 

 at that time the home of the orchestra, and the places visited by the 

 orchestra in its winter trips, Sanders Theatre in Cambridge, Carnegie 

 Hall in New York, the Academy of Music in Philadelphia, and the 

 Music Hall in Baltimore, and in addition to these the Leipsig Ge- 

 wandthaus. By invitation of Mr. Higginson, the writer accompanied 

 the orchestra on one of its trips, made measurements of all the halls, 

 and calculated their reverberation. The dimensions and the material 

 of the Gewandthaus had been published, and from these data its 

 reverberation also was calculated. The results of these measurements 

 and calculations showed that the opinions expressed in regard to the 

 several halls were entirely consistent with the physical facts. That 

 is to say, the reverberation in those halls in which it was declared too 

 great was in point of physical measurement greater than in halls in 

 which it was pronounced too small. This consistency gave encourage- 

 ment in the hope that the physical problem was real, and the end to 

 be attained definite. 



Much more elaborate data on the accuracy of musical taste were 

 obtained four years later, 1902, in connection with the new building 

 of the New England Conservatory of Music, Messrs. Wheelwright and 

 Haven, Architects. The new building consists of a large auditorium 

 surrounded on three sides by smaller rooms, which on the second and 

 third floors are used for purposes of instruction. These smaller rooms, 

 when first occupied, and used in an unfurnished or partially fur- 

 nished condition, were found unsuitable acoustically, and the writer 



