Canadian architects help lift ‘curse’ of bad sound at New York’s famed Lincoln Center

There’s a sign of Canada on the beams of one of New York City’s most iconic buildings: the newly renovated David Geffen Hall at Lincoln Center for the Performing Arts, home to the New York Philharmonic.

Gary McCluskie, principal architect with Toronto-based Diamond Schmitt Architects, can show you exactly where the sign is. He put himself in the final stages of the US$550 million renovation that his team helped with before the hall reopened last October.

It was a proud moment for McCluskie after a long journey that began with a phone call in 2016 asking a Canadian team to solve a well-known problem at the heart of the United States’ culture – that is, one of the largest concert halls has a reputation for being ugly. voice.

“The challenge of Geffen Hall is that the acoustics of the hall are never great, and they never match the grandeur of the orchestra,” McCluskie said.

The acoustics were so bad that some began to call it a curse after two expensive renovations failed to fix the problem.

The problem, according to the current CEO of the New York Philharmonic, Deborah Borda, appeared since the hall opened in 1962. (It was originally called Philharmonic Hall, then Avery Fisher Hall in honor of a benefactor who donated $ 10.5 million in 1973. . In 2015, it was named after entertainment mogul David Geffen, who donated $100 million as part of a fundraising campaign and won the naming rights.)

“It actually looks beautiful inside. Max Abramovitz is the architect,” said Borda. “The problem is, you don’t hear it. Everyone knows right away. The sound is not good from the orchestra, and the orchestra. [members] can’t hear each other on stage.”

Diamond Schmitt won the coveted contract to redesign the hall once and for all to solve a decades-old problem.

The new concert hall began the 2022-23 season last fall, and by all accounts, the so-called curse has been removed. Patrons, musicians, and critics provide reviews.

The New York Times called the sound “glistening and lucid,” and the Washington Post described the experience as “as if you were inside the body of the instrument.”

Fix the sound

Colin Williams, an associate principal trombonist, joined the New York Philharmonic in 2014. When he heard about the latest effort to fix the problem, he held his breath.

“Lord, please lift the curse of this time,” he said. He was tired of the tinny quality of the old hall, which flattened the sound of the world-famous orchestra. He lamented that his voice was better in the other great halls he played in Europe and Asia.

Williams said the difference in the amendment is like going from black and white to color.

“A lot of these voices are going to be mixed,” he said. Now, “there is more warmth to the sound. Now, there is clarity.”

Diamond Schmitt worked with Connecticut-based firm Akustiks, theater designer Fisher Dachs Associates and New York-based architecture firm Tod Williams Billie Tsien.

Together, they are on a mission to redesign space in the service of sound – from building materials to textiles to the shape of the hall.

“Probably the most significant change is moving the orchestra,” said Paul Scarborough, lead designer with Akustiks. “We pulled the stage 25 feet out into the room to bring everyone closer to what was happening on stage.”

Gone is the more traditional shoebox interior, which features a proscenium-style stage that creates a clear divide between performers and audience.

With 500 seats removed – bringing the hall down to 2,200 – Diamond Schmitt created a vineyard-type seating arrangement with many curves to allow the audience to insert around the stage. There was even a section of all the seats behind the players.

“The idea of ​​a surround experience is going to be a fundamental change in how the audience experiences music,” McCluskie said, “but it also creates an opportunity to improve the quality of the sound.”

He points to the combination of warm copper and textile materials, beech wood panels and walnut seats chosen to complement or enhance the sound. There was a sense of immediacy in the room, as described in the Washington Post, inside the musical instruments.

“Become [with] every material, we really think about how it will work together as an ensemble, how it will work together in a co-ordinated way to create a feeling in the room,” said McCluskie.

More than just a voice

While getting the sound out of the right orchestra hall is a heavy lift, architects and designers also have to contend with other problems in the history of Lincoln Center.

To create a massive center for New York ballet, opera and orchestra in the 1960s, the city had to destroy the Black and Puerto Rican neighborhoods of Manhattan’s Upper West Side. David Geffen Hall’s redesign aims to address that injustice.

To begin with, the social space outside the concert hall was opened up by creating a clear path from the outer square to the inner lobby open all day to the public. The space has a cafe and a big screen that livestreams concerts for free. There is also a new performance area visible from the outside, called the Sidewalk Studio.

“What we’re saying to the city of New York is, ‘Come in, we welcome you,'” architect Billie Tsien said when she unveiled plans for the project three years ago.

As McCluskie puts it, there’s almost a symphonic quality to the way the project begins and then concludes with a pandemic-defying grand finale.

He said he will never forget when he got the call, on a spring day in 2016, after a long bidding process for the project. “It’s an icon of 20th-century architecture in North America and the world. So it’s a lifetime project.”

For Diamond Schmitt’s team, the project is the crowning glory of the prestigious resume that helped him get the Lincoln Center job in the first place. His work includes redesigning the Four Seasons Center for the Performing Arts in Toronto, the Maison Symphonique in Montreal and the National Arts Center in Ottawa.

“Just the opportunity to take the knowledge that has been developed in Canada and bring it to the world is a source of pride for us,” McCluskie said.

Hence, the Canadian sign in David Geffen Hall, hidden under the ceiling, of a giant maple leaf.

Done

There were concerns that the COVID-19 pandemic would halt the project, but backed by a $100 million Geffen donation, the renovations went ahead during the key period. It was done on time and on budget.

At a ribbon cutting on October 8, New York Governor Kathy Hochul expressed her pride in the completion of the project.

“People will look back and say this was an amazing age,” he said. “People will look back and say you were the patron, the visionary, the person who said, ‘We can do this.'”

That feeling we do this really landed in a top-secret rehearsal last summer attended by project executives, donors, designers, musicians and team McCluskie. First notes from Anton Bruckner Symphony No. 7 in E Major give you the answer you are looking for.

“If you listen to the music, the way it starts quietly and slowly with the strings, then the rest of the orchestra builds up [it] … the quality of the sound that enlarges in space,” said McCluskie. “You can hear everything in the first three minutes.”

He said that everyone who came that day was in tears.

For Colin Williams and other members of the New York Philharmonic, the new venue means a legitimate home for the music.

“Perhaps every 50 to 60 years, the orchestra undergoes a transformation like this,” he said. “To be a part of this reimagining, not just from the venue but from the sound of the orchestra, is an incredible thing.”

For Borda, the results of the project complete a personal journey. He actually left the New York Philharmonic in the 1990s, frustrated by failed renovations. He spent decades in California as head of the Los Angeles Philharmonic, where he worked with another famous Canadian-born architect, Frank Gehry, on the Walt Disney Concert Hall.

Borda is said to be returning to New York when the Lincoln Center project gets funding for a revamp.

“I rarely say this: I have been in this business for a long time. This turned out to be beyond my expectations,” he said.