COLLOQUIUM MUZIEKWETENSCHAP
Viktoria Tkaczyk
April 18, 2013, 15:30-17:00
Universiteitstheater, Nieuwe Doelenstraat 16, zaal 3.01
Generally, the foundation of the discipline of architectural acoustics
is attributed to the physicist Wallace Clement Sabine, who developed around
1900 the formula for reverberation time, and with it the possibility of making
calculated prognoses about the acoustic potential of a particular design. If we
shift, however, the perspective from the history of this discipline to the
history of architectural knowledge and praxis it becomes apparent that the
topos of ‘good sound’ had already entered the discourse much earlier. In my
presentation, I will trace the Europe-wide architectural discussion on the
behaviour of sound in enclosed spaces between 1760 and 1830. Special emphasis
will be put on the acoustics of theatre auditoria. It will be shown that the
period of investigation is marked by a rising interest in theatre sound, which
is linked to the emergence of a bourgeois theatre culture and the
socio-political importance of the spoken word. Subsequently, the architects’
search for new methods of research on sound propagation in enclosed spaces
prompted a profound rethinking of the ‘mediality’ of architectural buildings,
which, in turn, paved the way for the academic establishment of architectural
acoustics in the early 20th century.
