The Detroit Orchestra Hall “Centennial Sound Lab” multi-location binaural acoustic measurement and audition project

Detroit Orchestra Hall, opened in October 1919, entered its centennial year in October 2019 with a variety of special events. A Board member, a recently retired automotive sound quality engineer, suggested starting the celebration with a comparative audition study of the Detroit Symphony Orchestra in Orchestra Hall with acquisition and analyses “using the tools of Sound Quality engineering.” HEAD acoustics, Inc., was contacted by Symphony management and data were acquired during a dress rehearsal of the Brahms Fourth Symphony using five Aachen HEAD Measurement Systems (HMS): four at various seats in the Hall and one onstage behind the brass section. Analysis included conventional, psychoacoustic and advanced psychoacoustic tools including the Hearing Model of Sottek. One revealing analysis was an animatable display of left and right ear levels and loudnesses as XY plots, the left ear plotted on the vertical axis and right on the horizontal. In collaboration with Jaffe Holden Acoustics, Orchestra Hall acousticians, two presentations were made: one to the public as part of a roundtable discussion in the Hall, the other to Board members and donors including calibrated binaural playback in the Hall with ability to “jump” seamlessly during playback from any recorded seat to any other.