On the Acoustics of Auditoria

The paper presents a short introduction into auditorium acoustics and reports on a few new developments in this field, which are believed to be of great benefit both for the acoustical design of auditoria and for research in practical room acoustics.

The first part describes in a rather elementary way the basic facts of sound propagation in enclosures, including the effects of reflections and the role of reverberation. Furthermore, some of the numerous objective parameters are discussed which have been introduced in order to characterize particular aspects of sound fields. In the second part, recently developed methods of sound field simulation are described by which such parameters can be predicted. Methods of “auralization” are briefly discussed by which aural impressions from non-existing halls can be created on the basis of digital sound field simulation.