Beats of burden: Why Hong Kong's music scene is suffering
The city's live music scene is suffering from a lack of good acoustics in venues
We've all been there: one of your favourite bands is going to play in Hong Kong. You gulp at the ticket price but buy one anyway, and spend weeks getting terribly excited. Then you go along, only to find that the songs you love have been reduced to tinny, echoing knockoffs by dreadful acoustics at the venue.
Whether a stadium rock act, jazz legend or an orchestra is playing, acoustics are often lacking at Hong Kong halls. The big arenas - such as AsiaWorld-Expo and the Hong Kong Convention and Exhibition Centre (HKCEC), which can seat more than 10,000 for a concert - cop most of the flak. At the opposite end of the scale, seating 1,000-2,000 each, are City Hall and town halls around the New Territories run by the Leisure and Cultural Services Department (LCSD).
Every time a new venue goes up, I get excited - until I go there
The problem is that mid-sized facilities are scarce, so groups that would prefer a venue that seats about 5,000 are basically forced into the much maligned big places.
But the venues themselves aren't really the problem. Hong Kong's big venues are multipurpose, as likely to be used for an exhibition or a convention as a concert, so any audio set-up is temporary and the responsibility of the promoter. Most large venues are essentially massive concrete boxes. So getting the acoustics perfect requires sensitive handling, and that costs money.
"To treat a room properly and effectively is expensive and requires 100 per cent commitment from the venue," says Dan Findlay, a sound engineer who also runs Midnight & Co nightclub in Central.
"There are plenty of options available to alleviate acoustic issues, the only deciding factor is the cost. Why would a multipurpose venue dedicate funds towards music events that only happen 12 to 15 times per year? Financially it makes zero sense when there is no competitive space raking in all the business.
