Getting the acoustics right in Geffen Hall.
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Founded in 1842, the New York Philharmonic is the oldest symphony orchestra in the United States. Carnegie Hall—known for its creamy, embracing acoustics—served as its home starting in 1891. In 1962, a few years after Leonard Bernstein became the Philharmonic’s music director, it moved to Philharmonic Hall, at Lincoln Center. Lincoln Center became the new home of the New York City Ballet and of the Metropolitan Opera, too—it was a Cold War showcase for American high culture. Bernstein was the son of Ukrainian Jewish immigrants; his father ran a beauty-supply company. The Philharmonic was revered; Bernstein was perhaps even more revered. But the new Philharmonic Hall was not. Its acoustics were described by Harold C. Schonberg, the music critic for the Times, as “antiseptic” and “very weak in the bass, with little color and presence”—and Schonberg was one of the hall’s gentler critics. In addition, the members of the orchestra often couldn’t hear one another properly. “This building went up, and it was brand new and very glamorous and modern,” Jamie Bernstein recalled. “But also it had this marmoreal solidity. My father used to call Lincoln Center the Travertine Mausoleum.” Philharmonic Hall had been built to accommodate bigger audiences—in those days, the symphony’s concerts consistently sold out. But acousticians agreed that the hall was too big, and had too many seats, whose occupants absorbed sound waves.
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