Leopold Nenning
Head-Fier
A concert at the Große Saal (Large or Golden Hall) of the Wiener Musikverein is a transporting experience. I can never stay awake. Not that I sleep. I fall into a trance of musical bliss. Wiener Philharmoniker + Großer Saal, even better. They know the space so well that it comes an additional musical instrument.
The good proportions of what is essentially a narrow tallish big box (lots of early reflections for the audience), no absorption except for the people in the audience (2s reverb time), lots of gilded decorative elements for diffraction, a wooden ceiling that is hanging from the roof structure rather than being supported by the bearing walls, and a hollow (floating) wooden floor all add up to an acoustical stroke of luck (no acoustical engineers in the 1860s).
The smaller Brahms Saal Brahms or Small Hall) is almost as brilliant, by the way.
The good proportions of what is essentially a narrow tallish big box (lots of early reflections for the audience), no absorption except for the people in the audience (2s reverb time), lots of gilded decorative elements for diffraction, a wooden ceiling that is hanging from the roof structure rather than being supported by the bearing walls, and a hollow (floating) wooden floor all add up to an acoustical stroke of luck (no acoustical engineers in the 1860s).
The smaller Brahms Saal Brahms or Small Hall) is almost as brilliant, by the way.
