Concert Halls

A concert hall is an instrument, and the shoebox halls of the nineteenth century still outperform most of what came after: Vienna's Musikverein and Amsterdam's Concertgebouw are the reference points for anyone building one now. The vineyard halls that followed, Berlin's Philharmonie above all, traded a little warmth for sightlines and intimacy.

Where you sit matters more here than in any other kind of room. The cheap seats behind and above the orchestra are not a compromise: you hear the balance the conductor hears, you watch the hands rather than the backs, and the price is often a third of the front stalls.