Sonic Wizardry
   By Scott MacClelland / sfcv.org

   With exploding trumpets and drums, the Carmel Bach Festival
   opened its 66th season last Saturday and simultaneously inaugurated
   its "new" home at historic Sunset Center.  During the last two
   years, the old Gothic-style school auditorium was razed and a
   totally new one erected in its place.  Notwithstanding a visually
   stunning state-of-the-art facility, much of the $21 million
   renovation inevitably focused on acoustics, the old ones being
   the notorious bete noire of the Monterey Peninsula's most popular
   concert venue.  By themselves, the acoustics at the new theater
   are astonishing - and then some.  Unless you've witnessed such
   clarity, transparency, sonority and presence elsewhere - and
   it's safe to say most concertgoers and musicians haven't - you
   are simply not prepared for what you'll hear in this hall.
   Elizabeth Wallfisch, the internationally celebrated performing
   and recording violinist, and CBF concertmaster, says she's never
   heard anything like it anywhere.

   Conductor Bruno Weil and his players and singers began rehearsing
   in a local church, only gaining access to Sunset a little over
   a week before opening night.  Once music started sounding,
   technicians began "tuning" the hall, adjusting the new reflecting
   shell and overhead clouds, measuring reverberations, and - now
   we come to the "and then some" part - using an extensive electronic
   system of amplifiers and some 80 speakers along the walls to
   manipulate the rate of decay time.  ...

Full article at: http://www.sfcv.org/arts_revs/carmelbach_7_22_03.php

Janos Gereben/SF
www.sfcv.org
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