DISNEY CONCERT HALL
Monster Wood Ceiling Crowns City of Angels’ Music Heaven
(8/11/2003 Issue)
High praise for theater’s natural acoustics is music to the ears of the building team
By Nadine M. Post
On June 30, the Los Angeles Philharmonic first took
to the stage of the new, $274-million Walt Disney
Concert Hall and played Mozart, Beethoven and
Stravinsky to a very select group. The "house" was filled
with anticipation, though only 20 of the 2,273 seats were
occupied. The audience, composed mostly of those
charged with creating the "world’s greatest concert hall,"
was on tenterhooks. After years of trials and tribulations
associated with rendering architect Frank Gehry’s
extravagantly sculptural and description-defying forms,
the hour of judgment had arrived.
"This place can be as beautiful as it is [but] if it
doesn’t sound right, it’s a failure," says Jim Yowan,
project director for the local office of M.A. Mortenson
Co., the general contractor-construction manager.
With its percussive, edgy and asymmetrical exterior
wrapping a curvaceous and symmetrical wood-lined
theater, the 293,000-sq-ft concert hall had about as
many learning curves as geometric ones. It was "a long
birth," says Terry Bell, partner-in-charge of contract
administration for the local Gehry Partners.
The job’s supreme challenge
was the theater itself, a 238 x
152-ft-wide warped "box," with
flared walls up to 130 ft tall, and
a flattened-V roofline. It was
quite a feat to "get everything in
the right place while still making
[the theater] look perfect and be
acoustically pure," says Yowan.
It didn’t take long for the jury
to render a sound verdict at the
first orchestra session. After a
few minutes of the Jupiter
Symphony, "I could tell this was
a great hall," says cellist Barry
Gold, one of three orchestra
representatives on the WDCH
committee.
CENTER STAGE Dazzling Disney Concert Hall grabs spotlight in
Impressed with how softly
the orchestra could play without
sacrificing quality, Gold talks about the
sound’s "immediacy and clarity." He
isn’t alone in his enthusiasm. Players
have called the hall "fantastic,"
"already a miracle," "magnificent" and
"wonderful." Conductor Esa-Pekka
Salonen is pleased, Gehry is "thrilled,"
and the acoustician is "happy." The
acoustics will not be altered as a result
of the orchestra’s tuning sessions,
says Yasuhisa Toyota, director and
U.S. representative in the Santa
Monica, Calif., office of Nagata
Acoustics Inc.
downtown Los Angeles.
The praise is music to the ears of
the beleaguered building team, no
REFLECTIONS Simulation shows sound waves reflecting once
strangers to unsettling words related to (red), twice (yellow), three times (green). (Graphic courtesy of Nagata
the difficult job (ENR 4/8/02 p. 24).
Acoustics Inc.)
Though no claims or lawsuits have
been filed, unconfirmed reports indicate outstanding changes equal 10 to 12% of the roughly $200-million
construction cost.
Edward J. Burnell, president of WDCH Inc., the job’s development manager, declines to comment on
the amount still unresolved, saying only that the project’s "substantial" contingency fund is "gone."
The long haul officially began in December 1999 and ended on time April 27, the substantial
completion date, says Yowan. It was quite a feat to "get everything in the right place while still making the
hall look perfect and be acoustically pure," he says.
Success hinged on learning to "play" the project’s digital master "score"–the three-dimensional model
created by "composer" Gehry. That daunting task was made worse by plentiful leanings, curves, twists
and turns.
All but one of the major players, including
Mortenson, started out as neophytes on
CATIA, the high-end CAD system Gehry
uses. The job required "a leap of faith," says
Joe Patterson, vice president of Columbia
Showcase & Cabinet Co., Sun Valley, Calif.
The millwork contractor had a $9.5-million
contract to supply the theater’s Douglas fir
paneling.
SOUND TRIO Acoustician Toyota (l.), orchestra conductor
Salonen, architect Gehry, in hall. (Photo courtesy of Marhew
Photographic Services)
Patterson, now confident in the CAD tool,
and others agree the job would have been
impossible without CATIA. Joseph P. Riley,
project manager-estimator for wall and
ceiling contractor Martin Bros./Marcowall
Inc., Gardena, Calif., is another CATIA
convert. Martin Bros. had a $17-million
contract that ballooned to $25 million and
included 404,736 sq ft of metal stud framing.
The modified theater-in-the-round or "vineyard" seating for the Los Angeles County building, ordered
by the main tenant–the orchestra–introduced an acoustical design adventure. "Good natural acoustics are
more difficult to achieve" in a vineyard hall than in a tried-and-true, "shoebox" hall, says Toyota. But the
team "wanted to look toward the future by breaking with the shoebox," he adds.
On the plus side, vineyard seating is more intimate and engaging because it brings the audience
closer to the players. On the minus side, it eliminates three proximal stage walls that reflect music toward
the audience.
The vineyard also needs space for
seating rows to the sides and rear of the
stage. That means a wider hall, with side
walls farther apart than is optimal.
Nagata had to contend with still
another design element–wood paneling–
good for "psycho" but not aural
acoustics. Plaster, which has greater
mass, is the preferred surface material.
Even with a vineyard hall under his
belt, Toyota had his work cut out for him.
The acoustician first analyzed the hall as
a shoebox and then applied the results
to the vineyard. This meant a hung
ceiling, freestanding walls lining the hall
and numerous wood-panel partitions,
roughly the height of seat backs,
throughout the audience to "replace"
proximal full-height walls.
TRICKY LOCATION Curved ceiling panels positioned using
lasers. (Photo courtesy of Warren Photography Inc.)
The acoustician used computer simulation and the architect’s 1:10 scale model of the interior to
develop the acoustical design. After tests on the physical model, the only revision to the room was the
addition of partial walls with a slatted surface in risers behind the orchestra.
Other theaters have movable walls,
ceilings and doors to adjust acoustics,
depending on the concert. WDCH’s
passive design is simpler but "you have
to get it right the first time," says Toyota.
In May, the acoustician ran a sound
test involving brass and percussion
instruments. After that, he spent four
days taking readings, using a sound
source and microphones. Based on
some unexpected echoes, the hall is
being tuned with the addition of slatted
panels on the side balcony walls. Corner
ceilings also are being treated to soften
echoes, which were anticipated.
The theater’s acoustical envelope
(AE) is designed to create sounds of
silence equivalent to a recording studio’s
ambient noise level (NC-15). By comparison, a conference room is NC-35.
(Rendering courtesy of Mortenson)
Double-wall construction, separated by a 4-ft cavity, and thick concrete slabs above and below, in
addition to isolators and sound locks, keep out helicopter, plane and street traffic noise and structureborne vibrations. The basic sound-isolating partition is complicated by the significant dynamic load created
by the walls’ tilts, says Tom Schindler, vice president of Charles M. Salter Associates, San Francisco, the
sound isolation consultant.
At the stage end, the outboard AE wall, with no buffer from city noise, is made from precast concrete
panels rigidly attached to the steel frame behind the stainless steel skin. Elsewhere, the outboard AE wall
is made from either multiple layers of drywall or shotcrete on light-gauge metal framing. The inboard wall
is shotcrete, with neoprene isolators along the bottom.
Background noise in the theater has been measured at NC-10 or less, says Schindler. Helicopters
passing by the north window are inaudible, he reports.
No millwork could be installed without conditioned air for humidity control. But the conditioned air
milestone wasn’t reached until Jan. 15, 2002, because the steel frame took six to eight months longer
than expected, says Yowan.
To make up time, work was resequenced. A big change was to build the wood ceiling and the woodpanel freestanding walls concurrently. This was accomplished thanks to a "dance-floor" platform that
allowed work to proceed safely above and below it.
The most intimidating part of the auditorium was its drop ceiling, a basket weave of 8,000 dissimilar,
curved shapes. To save time and money, the team switched to a prefabricated, panelized ceiling. "We
gave a credit of about $2 million to the owner," says Yowan.
The ceiling, hung from steel posts that hang from attic roof trusses, is composed of 82, on average 30
x 12-ft panels. Each 1-in.-thick panel is built up from 1 ﾚ 2-in. moisture-proof, medium-density fiberboard.
To that, a 1 ﾚ 2-in. veneer is applied, consisting of 1 ﾚ 64-in. Douglas fir pressed onto fire-rated plywood.
Columbia and Martin Bros. produced panels with framing at Columbia’s factory after two mock-ups were
made. Columbia cut the shapes using a computer numerically controlled machine that received patterns
from the CATIA model.
Each framed panel was shipped finished side up on a flatbed truck to the site. There, the truck backed
through an opening temporarily left in the building’s exterior wall to a spot under a 50 x 20-ft hole in the
dance floor. Once the unwrapped panel was flipped over and hoisted onto the dance floor–the pick points
having been set in CATIA–it was set on a monorail-and-cart system running the length of the hall and
moved under its final resting place. The track, fastened to the dance floor to evenly displace the weight of
the 3 to 5-ton panels, had to be repositioned more than 80 times. It was moved a couple times a day.
Using chain pulls, workers then lifted the panel and loosely connected it to attic posts, attached to roof
trusses. To establish horizontal panel locations, the team used a laser system instead of using a
conventional surveying system that would have required measuring each panel corner from a grid system.
Two lasers would be positioned for each panel, one on the stage wall and one on a side wall, in a
predetermined location based on the CATIA model. During fabrication, a small depression was made in
the wood surface at a predetermined location, also based on CATIA. The intersection of the lasers and
the depression would determine the panel’s horizontal location. The elevation coordinate was shot
conventionally. The laser system drastically cut down the amount of surveying required.
Workers then completed the permanent connection, which required welding and bracing. Special fans
and "smoke eaters" were required to allow welding to proceed safely in the overcrowded attic. The entire
installation went like clockwork, taking 10 days less than the 115 anticipated, says Yowan.
Finally, shotcrete for acoustical density was applied to the panels’ upper surface in six operations.
UP TEMPO INSIDE AND OUT Disney Concert Hall, 15 years in
development, is a jazzy composition of light, texture, form and–beginning Oct.
23–sound.
The wood-paneled theater walls were almost–but not quite–easy by comparison. "Each stud is
different, and nothing is straight or normal or at the same elevation," says Riley.
Much time was saved on wall and ceiling work when a switch was made to a shotcrete backing with
the wood panels serving as forms, instead of plaster walls with wood panels adhered after the fact.
Shotcrete take less time to cure than plaster. That meant less interference with work on the moisturesensitive finishes. The shotcrete also minimized unwanted voids between the backup material and the
wood panel, much to the pleasure of the acoustician. "Using shotcrete took a couple of months off the
schedule," says Riley.
Everyone on the team agrees that it took an enormous amount of energy and team effort to construct
the concert hall from the bottom up. "It was a challenge for contractors to make money on this project,"
says Yowan.
They may not all have made bundles, but they did get introduced to computer-aided construction,
CATIA-style. "We’re providing an education to the industry," says Bell.
Gehry’s team, which peaked at 12 at the jobsite, also benefited. "It was very exciting to be out here
and the opportunity of a lifetime for young people, for it provided good technical training," says Bell
Adds Bell, looking back to the first rehearsal: "It was a very emotional experience. The only thing that
will top it is to see the hall filled" at the first concert, Oct. 23.
(All other photos by Michael Goodman for ENR)