Loudness in concert halls

Consideration of loudness in concert halls has had a rather chequered history. Rightly it has been considered to be closely related to sound level but knowledge of sound level distribution has also been vague. Sabine acknowledged loudness as very important in auditoria. He also promised a paper on the subject, but this never materialised. 20 years ago the subjective importance of loudness was established from experiment. The sound level distribution in concert halls has also now been investigated in some detail, so that it is now possible to specify many of the design details which will influence loudness.