How to Make a Room More Acoustic

Acoustics are very important to musicians.

A room's acoustics refers to how well sound travels through the space. Echo happens when the sound travels through a room and bounces back off of another object or a wall. Echos negatively affect a room's acoustic ability because people hear the same sound more than once, which is distracting when listening to music. Improving a room's acoustics requires some basic rearranging of furniture and treatment of the room's walls and flooring. The results make the room much more pleasant for experiencing music or public speaking.

Things You'll Need

• Acoustic tiles
• Wooden board
• Microphones

Instructions

1. Move furniture out of the center of the room so it resides against the walls. This reduces obstructions that mute the sound before it reaches people's ears.

2. Hang acoustic tiles on each of the walls in the room. They are cloth-covered boxes that prevent sound from ricocheting back into the room. This eliminates echos and makes the room more pleasant for listening to sound.

3. Place a wooden board under the area where music will be performed or where people will be addressing a group if you have carpeting. Carpeting dampens sound and the wooden board helps eliminate that effect and improves reverb.

4. Set up multiple mics if you're recording sound in the room. This gives you more editing options since each mic records the sound a little differently, allowing for a richer sound when it is all blended together.

5. Stand in one corner of the room and project your sound out towards the other corner if you are speaking to a group. This helps improve sound quality as the sound travels a further distance without getting absorbed or deflected.

References

• Sound on Sound: Recording Acoustic Guitar
• Primacoustic: Music Teaching Studios