The sound quality of the Teatro Comunale in Treviso, Italy

The Teatro Comunale of Treviso was designed at the same time as the Teatro La Fenice of Venice, in the middle of the 19th century. Treviso being so close to Venice, the reputation of the Venetian Theatre, just rebuilt after the burning of 1836, influenced the municipality of this little town, which decided to design the Theatre with the same shape as la Fenice. After the burning of 1996, and following the disappointment of losing such unique architecture and sound quality, acoustical measurements were performed in many Italian theatres, especially in historic theatres where acoustical measurements were never before undertaken. In this paper, the results of the acoustic measurements are presented. According to ISO 3382, binaural measurements, with a dummy head, have been performed in 25 positions in the hall, with different positions of the sound source in the proscenium. Acoustical parameters, such as EDT, G, LE were calculated from the impulse responses and mapped. Also, Ando’s quality maps of preferences, with reference to two different kinds of musical signals, were accomplished from experimental measurements. From the measurements, a good behavior of the theatre has been pointed out, even if some limitations in some positions have been discovered.