Musicians’ subjective perception and objective acoustic descriptors in the stages

The stages of three historic theatres, designed in the shape of a horseshoe are studied: Masini theatre of Faenza, Rossini theatre of Lugo and Bonci theatre of Cesena. The investigation was divided into three phases. At first, measurements were carried out in situ and two configurations have been considered on the stage: a trio and a chamber orchestra of about 30 elements. Following technical standards and literature, descriptors from the impulse responses measured on stage have been extracted. Then a survey was carried out among musicians: musicians' perception of concert hall is inevitably related to their performing action and active behavior of musician cannot be ignored. In order to understand how the musicians and conductors of Emilia-Romagna perceive the acoustic conditions on stage, a survey of their impression was carried out through the distribution of a questionnaire (structured with reference to those drawn up by Dammerud [2], adapting some questions to the characteristics of the Italian theatre stages). Then the results obtained from the measurements and questionnaires were crossed. Finally numerical models of the theatres with different software confgurations have been studied in order to attempt a tuning between sources and receivers on the stage.