Beyond Measurements

By Barry Blesser & Linda-Ruth Salter Blesser Associates

bblesser@alum.mit.edu

9/19/2011 © 2011 Barry Blesser 1

A Multi-disciplinary Framework for the Aural Experience of Ancient Spaces

Acoustic Archaeology

Fuses two unrelated disciplines: 1. (hard science) Physical acoustic measurements of extant spaces using modern science and technology. 2. (soft science) Speculating on why ancient cultures created their spaces, and how they experienced them.

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Modern Acoustic Science

1. Explosion of powerful techniques 2. Tools are powerful, yet inexpensive 3. 1000s of computable parameters 4. Simulators to replicate sonic environments 5. Still difficult to interpret relevance of data 6. Assumption: listeners are interchangeable

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Hard Science at the Extreme

“When you can measure what you are speaking about, … you know something about it; but when you cannot measure it, … your knowledge is of a meager and unsatisfactory kind.”

Lord Kelvin (1894)

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Human Sciences are Soft

“Not everything that can be counted counts, and not everything that counts can be counted.”

Albert Einstein (195x) “Hunch, feel, insight, wisdom and instinct are the only proper tools for the study of … human activity.”

Austin Ranney (1976)

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Experience is Always Private

1. Mind reading is never possible 2. Indirect access to human experience:

• Introspective written and verbal reports • Observed behavior, both individual & cultural • Imaging scans of brain activity when stimulated

3. Assertions are speculative without proof • Plausible explanations may have limited utility • Universal patterns produce stronger speculations

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Universal Patterns as Framework

1. Sensory anthropology: cultural hearing 2. Plastic brains changed by experience 3. Limitations of language and communication 4. Observing and creating are unrelated 5. Noticing “accidents” drive change 6. Tension between replication and invention

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Part II

Historic Case Studies of Creating & Replicating Acoustics

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Ancient Chinese Bronze Drums Painted patterns on surfaces of bronze drums from Han Dynasty

Observed resonance patterns by Chlandi (1787)

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Fritz Kuttner (1990)

Good Sight Lines Produce Good Acoustics

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Shankland (1973) correlated acoustic quality of amphitheaters with their visual sight lines

Hearing and Seeing Are Not Symmetric

“The dominant impression that one gets from reading the medieval philosopher’s account of sound is their fascination with the illusiveness of the entity.”

Burnett (1991)

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Because sound is too abstract to be readily understood, it had been considered to be the voice of god, people, and resonant objects.

Origin of Cathedrals Acoustics

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Shakespeare Globe Theater

• Modeled on Bearbating arenas • Actors adapted to space with experience • Recognized stage had acoustic signature

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BSO: Sabine Replicates Acoustic Parameters of Leipzig Gewandhaus

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Leipzig Gewandhaus as Model Boston Symphony Hall 1900

Sempere’s Post-Facto Acoustics

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Refurbish BSO Performance Floor

• Replicate construction techniques • Ignored acoustic science of sound • Uncertainty of equivalent results

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Part III

Culture, Familiarity, and Adaptation Influence Sensory Experience

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Changes are Mostly Negative

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Original Boston Music Hall New Boston Symphony Hall

Algerian Wine in England

• 1960s corrupt wine distributors • Algerian wine in French bottles • Public became familiar with taste • Objected when scandal broke • Quality equals familiarity • Subjective preferences

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New Music and Art Initially Disliked Slonimsky (1965)

• Wagner’s Lohengrin was described as having “no more real pretension to be called music than the jangling and clashing of gongs…”

• Stravinsky’s Le Sacre du Printemps was called the Massacre du Printemps.

• Gershwin’s An American in Paris was “nauseous claptrap, so dull, patchy, thin, vulgar, long-winded and inane.”

• Saint-Saëns’s Danse Macabre was heard as the “clatter of the bones of a skeleton.”

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Part IV

Speculations vary in their likelihood of being true.

A multiplicity of plausible

explanations must be sorted.

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Post Hoc Discovery of Patterns in Random Events

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Speculative Framework with the Strongest Evidence

1. Social needs determines size of audience 2. Building technology limits size & geometry 3. Size, materials, & shape determine acoustics 4. Once constructed, listeners adapt to space 5. Experience enhances subjective quality 6. Future spaces replicate earlier spaces 7. Incremental evolution by trial and error

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