Hi,
I am in the early planning stages of a listening bar business. After looking at a few buildings many of them are too open (potential problems with neighbors) or acoustical nightmares with tiled floors and lots of glass and of course low ceilings and only parallel surfaces.
So unless we find a better space we may end up getting empty land and build our own building. Then I can make a space (150-200m2) with non parallel surfaces (golden trapagon?) and a sloped and/or vaulted ceiling. Also the room will be quite sealed without many windows and double door entry.
I am by no means an expert so I would love some opinions on the following:
1. In a regular room people use absorbers, rugs, curtains, furniture..... Is that also needed when the shape of the room is optimized? Or can a room sound good with only hard surfaces?
2. What is the best wall for early reflexions? Would rockwool sandwiched between a brick wall and concrete ventilation blocks be a good and cheap option with a mix of absorption and deflection?
3. What would you do if you could build a large listening room with a small budget?
I am in the early planning stages of a listening bar business. After looking at a few buildings many of them are too open (potential problems with neighbors) or acoustical nightmares with tiled floors and lots of glass and of course low ceilings and only parallel surfaces.
So unless we find a better space we may end up getting empty land and build our own building. Then I can make a space (150-200m2) with non parallel surfaces (golden trapagon?) and a sloped and/or vaulted ceiling. Also the room will be quite sealed without many windows and double door entry.
I am by no means an expert so I would love some opinions on the following:
1. In a regular room people use absorbers, rugs, curtains, furniture..... Is that also needed when the shape of the room is optimized? Or can a room sound good with only hard surfaces?
2. What is the best wall for early reflexions? Would rockwool sandwiched between a brick wall and concrete ventilation blocks be a good and cheap option with a mix of absorption and deflection?
3. What would you do if you could build a large listening room with a small budget?
I think you should go find a few listening bars and visit them.
Here's a listening bar in Seattle. I have yet to go there. It has all these wood
slats on the walls. I expect there may be absorptive material behind them.
https://www.shibuyahifi.com/
Each person in a room absorbs sound. When I play speakers at a club meeting
the speakers sound loud with five people in the room. When it has 45 people
the volume goes way down.
A room with only hard surfaces is horrible. Go visit a Five Guy's Burgers and Fries.
You will want to leave immediately. All concrete, metal, hard wood, glass and
tile in the whole place. Many new restaurants are acoustic crap due to this.
They got rid of all the padded seating and carpet and now they are super
loud.
There are two different ways to go about it. Omni directional speakers in a
somewhat reflective room. This creates the illusion of a performance in the
room. This is great for parties and people all over the room, as the sound
level stays some what consistent even as you walk right up to a speaker.
Directional speakers in a well damped room. This opens a window
into the performance around plane of the speakers. This is the
typical movie theater. The sound is loud in the front and subdued in the
back, unless you have finely tuned flying arrays like at a concert.
Bang & Olufsen wrote a white paper about it for the Beolab 90 speaker. It's too
large to upload here. I hate posting links as they stop working.
https://audiovideo.fi/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bang-olufsen-beolab90-whitepaper.pdf
The Beolab 90 has variable directivity, and this manual describes how to
use each mode.
This is a room a guy built for personal use in the area. You can see both absorptive and reflective diffuser surfaces.
Here's a listening bar in Seattle. I have yet to go there. It has all these wood
slats on the walls. I expect there may be absorptive material behind them.
https://www.shibuyahifi.com/
Each person in a room absorbs sound. When I play speakers at a club meeting
the speakers sound loud with five people in the room. When it has 45 people
the volume goes way down.
A room with only hard surfaces is horrible. Go visit a Five Guy's Burgers and Fries.
You will want to leave immediately. All concrete, metal, hard wood, glass and
tile in the whole place. Many new restaurants are acoustic crap due to this.
They got rid of all the padded seating and carpet and now they are super
loud.
There are two different ways to go about it. Omni directional speakers in a
somewhat reflective room. This creates the illusion of a performance in the
room. This is great for parties and people all over the room, as the sound
level stays some what consistent even as you walk right up to a speaker.
Directional speakers in a well damped room. This opens a window
into the performance around plane of the speakers. This is the
typical movie theater. The sound is loud in the front and subdued in the
back, unless you have finely tuned flying arrays like at a concert.
Bang & Olufsen wrote a white paper about it for the Beolab 90 speaker. It's too
large to upload here. I hate posting links as they stop working.
https://audiovideo.fi/wp-content/uploads/2016/01/bang-olufsen-beolab90-whitepaper.pdf
The Beolab 90 has variable directivity, and this manual describes how to
use each mode.
This is a room a guy built for personal use in the area. You can see both absorptive and reflective diffuser surfaces.
Hi,
few thoughts from coffee table:
You are likely best to hire a professional acoustician for it, and if you want to overlook it start reading some books, which I do not know what they are 🙂 It is a vast subject. In general there is two big different things, sound isolation and then the acoustics. To seduce people there you likely want some of both so that the space becomes special and something else compared to anyones home. Biggest difference is likely in the bass, try and make that good and impressive somehow, different than todays people are used to, the wimpy and the boomy and the plagued with room modes.
Acoustic treatment depends the building and space you'll eventually get, needs to be measured and then treated to some plan, which must include how you setup everything in there, the audience, the bar / kitchen, and so on. Don't forget safety, the escape routes and stuff like HVAC.
Haphazard Acoustic treatment could be just the opposite what needs to be done, thats why acoustician and studying before doing anything. If there is parallel walls you likely need to add something on the walls to kill any flutter echo, and most trouble is likely the bass, like in any room. If the space is big you might need to reduce reverberation time, and stuff like this. I hope you check out David Griesinger's Limit of Localization Distance and what it means for a space intended for good audio reproduction.
Also, you might want to have dedicated sections for conversation and listening but this is something I do not know how it works in such bars. I find it highly distracting to have refrigerators and stuff making noise if I'm listening closely and it would be lovely if one could just relax into the sound without much disturbance. Although, when there is multiple people zipping drinks this might not be feasible in the first place. Your goal is to make some profit to keep it running so there must be some noises somewhere. Most people want to talk more than listen so perhaps optimize for the drinks and think the audio secondary to that. You could still invest some thought into noise, like the HVAC, the fridge, chairs that can be moved silently, and so on.
I'd put speakers on long a wall to get side reflections further out. Use point source speakers with very good directivity, with suitable coverage and low diffraction, elevate them up so that people in front are more off-axis than those on the back to provide more even SPL so it stays comfortable and impressive for all. You really want high sensitivity system to have dynamic impact. You likely want to use time-intensity trading to try and maintain some stability for stereo phantom center. Put train of chairs exactly at the center line between speakers so that people who want to listen exactly good sound can do so, equidistant to both speakers, or at least have tables and stuff so it's possible to put chairs there if someone wants to. Even better, consider three speakers in front, for true center.
Have fun!🙂
few thoughts from coffee table:
You are likely best to hire a professional acoustician for it, and if you want to overlook it start reading some books, which I do not know what they are 🙂 It is a vast subject. In general there is two big different things, sound isolation and then the acoustics. To seduce people there you likely want some of both so that the space becomes special and something else compared to anyones home. Biggest difference is likely in the bass, try and make that good and impressive somehow, different than todays people are used to, the wimpy and the boomy and the plagued with room modes.
Acoustic treatment depends the building and space you'll eventually get, needs to be measured and then treated to some plan, which must include how you setup everything in there, the audience, the bar / kitchen, and so on. Don't forget safety, the escape routes and stuff like HVAC.
Haphazard Acoustic treatment could be just the opposite what needs to be done, thats why acoustician and studying before doing anything. If there is parallel walls you likely need to add something on the walls to kill any flutter echo, and most trouble is likely the bass, like in any room. If the space is big you might need to reduce reverberation time, and stuff like this. I hope you check out David Griesinger's Limit of Localization Distance and what it means for a space intended for good audio reproduction.
Also, you might want to have dedicated sections for conversation and listening but this is something I do not know how it works in such bars. I find it highly distracting to have refrigerators and stuff making noise if I'm listening closely and it would be lovely if one could just relax into the sound without much disturbance. Although, when there is multiple people zipping drinks this might not be feasible in the first place. Your goal is to make some profit to keep it running so there must be some noises somewhere. Most people want to talk more than listen so perhaps optimize for the drinks and think the audio secondary to that. You could still invest some thought into noise, like the HVAC, the fridge, chairs that can be moved silently, and so on.
I'd put speakers on long a wall to get side reflections further out. Use point source speakers with very good directivity, with suitable coverage and low diffraction, elevate them up so that people in front are more off-axis than those on the back to provide more even SPL so it stays comfortable and impressive for all. You really want high sensitivity system to have dynamic impact. You likely want to use time-intensity trading to try and maintain some stability for stereo phantom center. Put train of chairs exactly at the center line between speakers so that people who want to listen exactly good sound can do so, equidistant to both speakers, or at least have tables and stuff so it's possible to put chairs there if someone wants to. Even better, consider three speakers in front, for true center.
Have fun!🙂
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You mean diopole/open baffle or true omnidirectional like German Physiks or Duevel?
For a while I've been following a guy on instagram who does custom systems for listening bar-type environments, a project he calls "Cafe Sound." His name is Chris and his handle is @cathodebias.
He's spent the past few years working on systems designed to be integrated into public listening spaces, could be a great resource to reach out. I'm not sure if he's active on this site, but you can find him here:
https://www.instagram.com/cathodebias/
He's spent the past few years working on systems designed to be integrated into public listening spaces, could be a great resource to reach out. I'm not sure if he's active on this site, but you can find him here:
https://www.instagram.com/cathodebias/
I think I have to clarify my goal a little. Me calling it a listening bar might give the wrong idea. It is not a bar where music is 100% the focus.
It is a place where you can meet friends, have a beer and eat tapas. If you are not sitting right next to a speaker the music is not so loud you have to shout to have a conversation and later at night the volume may go up a little for a bit more clubby atmosphere. So not a true audiophile environment but if I get to build a custom space I want to get the basics right. I have total control over the geometry of the room and can make some surfaces diffuse or absorb.
This fellow has some seriously expensive gear in his listening room. Like that studio console with THREE reel-to-reel decks.
Absolutely true. Good even detailed effortless deep bass is the foundation. To start I was looking at multiple sealed dual opposed 18" subwoofers for the regular sound system and two floor to ceiling open baffle arrays with 8 15" drivers each for my open baffle line array speakers.
The open baffles will be mainly used for jazz, soul, blues,singer songwriter the other system for pop, rock, electro....
For those in the West, & going by the OP's flag, rooms in Thailand tend to be concrete/tile, very little absorbtion, highly reflective, & very different from western living/listening spaces
Absolutely.. if the speaker is designed to work that way.
However if you have people talking you effectively have many uncontrolled sources. Reflective walls could make it difficult to concentrate, which would make it difficult to relax.
Yes, concrete and tiles.....or because of the climate very open spaces with lots of gaps and openings.
What I have in mind is a earth covered brick building with vaulted ceilings and non parallel walls.
Something like these railway bridge arches in Amsterdam but with non parallel walls and maybe double vaulted ceilings.
No noise pollution to the outside and easy to keep cool without giant electric bills.
You’ll want to create an immersive sound environment so first solution will be all mono or dual mono transducers.…..a stereo sound field will never work with infinite listening positions.
Second order will be to get the foundation right…..the bass. You’ll need multiple subwoofers with enough to excite the air in the entire space without creating large modes or nulls. How many and how large will be dependent on the size of the space. Don’t focus on extension below 40hz, it’s not needed in your use case.
Up firing soffit mounted speakers work very well in a space with vaulted or tray type ceilings using the ceiling walls as giant horns or lenses. Combine these with even coverage in ceiling speakers.
Don‘t concern yourself with frequencies beyond 12khz…….these will be highly directional and impossible to diffuse.
If you follow the guidance above , you’ll need two channels or dual mono and a subwoofer channel. Two discrete 4 band parametric equalizers will allow you to tune the room for immersive audio to work within a conversation space.
Second order will be to get the foundation right…..the bass. You’ll need multiple subwoofers with enough to excite the air in the entire space without creating large modes or nulls. How many and how large will be dependent on the size of the space. Don’t focus on extension below 40hz, it’s not needed in your use case.
Up firing soffit mounted speakers work very well in a space with vaulted or tray type ceilings using the ceiling walls as giant horns or lenses. Combine these with even coverage in ceiling speakers.
Don‘t concern yourself with frequencies beyond 12khz…….these will be highly directional and impossible to diffuse.
If you follow the guidance above , you’ll need two channels or dual mono and a subwoofer channel. Two discrete 4 band parametric equalizers will allow you to tune the room for immersive audio to work within a conversation space.
I feel that is taking it too much into the background music direction. I still want a healthy dose of audiphilism.
I am now working on a trapezoidal space with 3m tall open baffle line arrays (24 full rangers and 12 ess heils per side) with a big horizontally oriented mono OB sub (4x21") in the center hanging from the ceiling. There is a dancefloor in the ⅓ narrow part of the trapezoid behind the speakers and the last ⅓ of the wide end of the trapezoid has a raised floor....or maybe there are even 3 levels....a bit like an amphitheater.
I think the wide dispersion line array in combination with a raised floor in the back should give a lot of good coverage. Or am I missing something here?
how big is this trapezoid approx.? If it's big, mayhem is spot on about the HF and the LF and the stereo.
Very roughly 8&12×14 meters in front of the speakers, 8&6x6 behind the speakers. So 140m2 or 1500ft2 in front of the speakers (with three height tiers) and 42m2 or 450ft behind the speakers.
For 80-120 guests
I am happy enough if half of the guests get to enjoy a halfway decent stereo image....
For 80-120 guests
I am happy enough if half of the guests get to enjoy a halfway decent stereo image....
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This quote is from Floyd Toole's book (1st Ed):
So non-rectangular rooms aren't what they are generally assumed to be in terms of acoustic performance. I think it is wise to say that your notion of non-rectangular room design to mitigate room modes is not actually well calibrated. Think harder about the problem space and be much more careful about the solutions you accept without data supporting your chosen ideas.
With that said, if you're interested in doing anything with the room's shape and loudspeaker placement to facilitate deep bass reproduction and avoiding room modes, the "double bass array" concept is said to work very well (enclosed below). This paper was translated using Google Translate from its native German language, so if you want to ensure getting the original, search for German versions.
Another observation:
The type of loudspeakers used in home hi-fi operation all seem to surrender to the notion that "head-in-a-vise" listening is inevitable. This is actually a false notion. Instead. look to cinema loudspeaker designs--in which the sound imaging and amplitude/phase response at every seat in the cinema auditorium must be as good as possible. I've found that loudspeakers having very flat directivity (polar coverage vs. frequency) are required, not direct radiating loudspeakers having constantly changing polar coverage vs. frequency, or complete loss of directivity control. In general, you find these type of loudspeakers in commercial cinema brochures, not boutique audiophile magazines. I also strongly recommend looking at Danley MEH (multiple entry horn) designs to get the highest performing loudspeakers for this kind of demanding application.
So thinking about a three-loudspeaker array (i.e., left, center, right) to lock in the stereo center image for listeners off-axis--is actually a requirement, not a desirement.
JMTC.
Chris
So non-rectangular rooms aren't what they are generally assumed to be in terms of acoustic performance. I think it is wise to say that your notion of non-rectangular room design to mitigate room modes is not actually well calibrated. Think harder about the problem space and be much more careful about the solutions you accept without data supporting your chosen ideas.
With that said, if you're interested in doing anything with the room's shape and loudspeaker placement to facilitate deep bass reproduction and avoiding room modes, the "double bass array" concept is said to work very well (enclosed below). This paper was translated using Google Translate from its native German language, so if you want to ensure getting the original, search for German versions.
Another observation:
The type of loudspeakers used in home hi-fi operation all seem to surrender to the notion that "head-in-a-vise" listening is inevitable. This is actually a false notion. Instead. look to cinema loudspeaker designs--in which the sound imaging and amplitude/phase response at every seat in the cinema auditorium must be as good as possible. I've found that loudspeakers having very flat directivity (polar coverage vs. frequency) are required, not direct radiating loudspeakers having constantly changing polar coverage vs. frequency, or complete loss of directivity control. In general, you find these type of loudspeakers in commercial cinema brochures, not boutique audiophile magazines. I also strongly recommend looking at Danley MEH (multiple entry horn) designs to get the highest performing loudspeakers for this kind of demanding application.
So thinking about a three-loudspeaker array (i.e., left, center, right) to lock in the stereo center image for listeners off-axis--is actually a requirement, not a desirement.
JMTC.
Chris
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Yes, true omni. A dipole is very nearly omni in practice. Many of the Bang & Olufsen speakers have omni modes and have the advantage of being wireless. I would team up with a Bang & Olufsen dealer to populate the bar with speakers along with
information on how to buy them.
D
Deleted member 375592
1. Low ceilings are good for a bar, they let you separate groups of people so that they don't overhear each other.
2. You'll need Class A fireproof acoustic foam (1"... 2") on the entire ceiling and anywhere on the walls where you can put it. I would consider Sonex or Auralex. Do not buy any cheap foam - you'll be very sorry. Buy 20% extra. Measure RT60 & DRR across the room and adjust based on the results. Nobody can tell you what will work - you will find it yourself.
3. Soft furniture helps a lot - but may be impractical.
4. Floor-to-ceiling line array speakers in the corners. Do not use anything else or you'll find yourself in a nightmare.
5. Avoid self-proclaimed experts at all costs.
2. You'll need Class A fireproof acoustic foam (1"... 2") on the entire ceiling and anywhere on the walls where you can put it. I would consider Sonex or Auralex. Do not buy any cheap foam - you'll be very sorry. Buy 20% extra. Measure RT60 & DRR across the room and adjust based on the results. Nobody can tell you what will work - you will find it yourself.
3. Soft furniture helps a lot - but may be impractical.
4. Floor-to-ceiling line array speakers in the corners. Do not use anything else or you'll find yourself in a nightmare.
5. Avoid self-proclaimed experts at all costs.
Thanks. This is very helpful. I was looking at images of existing listening bars all over the world and noticed most are very small and have regular point source speakers. I hardly see large listening bars.
Line arrays in corners make sense. That should give the most even coverage possible. When I am traveling and listen to something on my phone in a hotel room I always put my phone in a corner. It always amazes me how much more full, loud and intelligible it becomes. A corner line array should be the ultimate horn! The room is the horn.
Also treating the entire ceiling makes sense. One of my favorite Mexican restaurants has such a deafening sound from customers talking that I visit less often than I otherwise would. They have a large room with concrete ceiling.
Here is a presentation that you may find helpful. It will be streamed live. They will be talking about the sound system at a local club that was recently upgraded. https://pnw.aessections.org/
Dimitriou’s Jazz Alley is located at 2033 6th Avenue, Seattle 98121
(This is the edge of Belltown and the north edge of downtown.)
Website
Free parking at the Amazon Doppler Garage, on 6th Avenue, between Virginia and Lenora streets.
It is free after 5pm and doesn’t close until midnight.
Join us on September 30th at 7:30 pm as we get a sound perspective of Jazz Alley with veteran house audio engineer, Ted Wright!
Get a behind the scenes look at the recent audio upgrades at Jazz Alley including, dual Yamaha CL5 consoles, Symetrix system control and processing, and Lab Gruppen amplifiers, all connected through Dante. This biggest change came with the replacement of the line array speakers, with high power full range speakers with FIR filter control. The new speaker system was provided by local manufacturer McCauley and the results are fantastic.
Ted will give us a breakdown of the equipment and its use and discuss the challenges of mixing loud bands in small rooms, getting a quick and effective sound check done, and integrating artist equipment into your house system. He will also discuss his acoustic piano micing techniques and strategies. Ted is eager to share his 30+ years of experience in live audio and will be ready to take your questions. Jazz Alley is a fixture of the Seattle live music and dining scene, family owned and operated since 1980.
For over four decades, Dimitriou’s Jazz Alley has been a West Coast ‘must’ for all the towering figures in the world of jazz – stars such as Dizzy Gillespie, Oscar Peterson, Betty Carter, Eartha Kitt, Dave Brubeck and McCoy Tyner have all played there.
Live Sound Improvements at Dimitriou’s Jazz Alley
Presented by
Ted Wright – Jazz Alley house sound engineer
and
AES Pacific Northwest Section
Meeting Produced by Jayney Wallick
(AES PNW Committee Member)
Monday, September 30th, 2024
7:30 PM PDT(UTC -7) exact time is TBD
This is a hybrid in-person & Zoom meeting.
The virtual doors open at 7:00PM.Dimitriou’s Jazz Alley is located at 2033 6th Avenue, Seattle 98121
(This is the edge of Belltown and the north edge of downtown.)
Website
Free parking at the Amazon Doppler Garage, on 6th Avenue, between Virginia and Lenora streets.
It is free after 5pm and doesn’t close until midnight.
Please register at Zeffy
Join us on September 30th at 7:30 pm as we get a sound perspective of Jazz Alley with veteran house audio engineer, Ted Wright!
Get a behind the scenes look at the recent audio upgrades at Jazz Alley including, dual Yamaha CL5 consoles, Symetrix system control and processing, and Lab Gruppen amplifiers, all connected through Dante. This biggest change came with the replacement of the line array speakers, with high power full range speakers with FIR filter control. The new speaker system was provided by local manufacturer McCauley and the results are fantastic.
Ted will give us a breakdown of the equipment and its use and discuss the challenges of mixing loud bands in small rooms, getting a quick and effective sound check done, and integrating artist equipment into your house system. He will also discuss his acoustic piano micing techniques and strategies. Ted is eager to share his 30+ years of experience in live audio and will be ready to take your questions. Jazz Alley is a fixture of the Seattle live music and dining scene, family owned and operated since 1980.
For over four decades, Dimitriou’s Jazz Alley has been a West Coast ‘must’ for all the towering figures in the world of jazz – stars such as Dizzy Gillespie, Oscar Peterson, Betty Carter, Eartha Kitt, Dave Brubeck and McCoy Tyner have all played there.