Sounding Off In Miami

The new 2,200-seat hall at the Carnival Center for the Performing Arts in Miami is making a point to offer the best in what live performances are all about – sound.

While just about everything else is likely on the minds of talent buyers and agents involved with the center’s concert hall, acousticians Russel Johnson and Tateo Nakajima hope the sound will create an atmosphere where “even when the music stops, everybody’s holding their breath and you can still hear its reverberation in the air,” Nakajima told The Miami Herald.

The first concert at the hall will feature a Gloria Estefan performance on opening night October 5th. The first play at the Carnival Center will be “The Light In The Piazza,” which starts September 26th.

The Cleveland Orchestra helped Johnson and Nakajima’s Artec Consultants fine-tune the PAC’s acoustics with an August 18th practice session.

Despite some initial harsh reviews of the The Kimmel Center‘s Verizon Hall in Philadelphia, which Artec was a part of, Nakajima told the Herald the $446.3 million Carnival Center won’t disappoint.

“It’s designed for everything from Gloria Estefan to full-size orchestras,” he said. “We have every reason to be confident.”

Johnson said a major problem with the sound at Kimmel Center was that the hall opened before the acoustic adjustments were completed. He said a hall can require months of acoustic fine-tuning before reaching its potential.

Helping bring the sound to life at the Carnival Center will be adjustable acoustics including an “acoustic canopy” that can be raised and lowered above the orchestra, giant reverberation doors in the walls that change how large the room sounds, and heavy drapes that are lowered along the walls to dampen echo effects during rock shows, the Herald said.