The nation’s first concert hall in nearly three decades to be built exclusively for classical music performances is scheduled to open in August.

The two-tier Lotte Concert Hall, seating 2,036, is housed in the eighth to 10th floors of the Lotte World Mall in Jamsil, southeastern Seoul. Designed by Yasuhisa Toyota of Nagata Acoustics, responsible for the acoustic design at the Suntory Hall in Japan, the Walt Disney Concert Hall in the U.S. and the Philharmonie de Paris in France, Lotte Concert Hall is the first concert hall in Korea to adopt a vineyard-style seating configuration with the seats completely surrounding the stage.

A unique feature of the Lotte Concert Hall is the 4,958-pipe, 68-stop pipe organ from the Austrian company Rieger, making it the country‘s first large-scale concert with more than 2,000 seats to feature a pipe organ.

The seats are divided into 37 different sections by dividers that “act as reflectors” for the sound, according to Choi Yeon-sik, director of artistic planning.

“The biggest difference in acoustics for a classical concert hall is lingering sound,” said architect Park Se-hwan, the director of design at Design Mooncamp. “For classical music and operas, traditional music, there is no electronic sound, meaning the sound must last longer. Very hard materials must be used to create surfaces for reflecting and amplifying sound. The details of the design create shapes and angles that will allow sound to linger.”

Meanwhile, the interior design of the hall is fluid and compact. “Some other concert halls utilize straight lines and sharp edges, which is very imposing,” said Ryu Hyoung-sun, director of operations and management at Lotte Concert Hall. “Our design is more familiar. Also, although the distance from the stage to the back row is the same as that of the Seoul Arts Center‘s concert hall, it feels much closer because of the design.”

The accessible design fits into the Lotte Foundation for Arts’ plans for operating the concert hall within Lotte World Mall. 

“We have about 60 daytime performances planned for next year,” said Choi. “Our hope is that the customers who are at the mall shopping will become walk-in audiences for those performances, creating a synergy effect for the mall and the concert hall,” added CEO Kim. As part of the Lotte Group’s corporate social responsibility work, daytime performances are planned to be priced at no more than 70,000 won ($58) each.

“Although we have no control over ticket pricing when we rent the hall to outside production companies, our own productions will all be available at relatively low prices,” Choi said.

The Lotte Concert Hall will be renting out its space for outside productions beginning in 2017. This year, some 20 performances are scheduled at the hall for its opening festival, to be held from Aug. 18 to Dec. 31. The opening night will feature the Seoul Philharmonic Orchestra, to be followed by orchestral performances from the Korean Symphony Orchestra, the Filarmonica della Scala & Choir and pipe organ performances by Jean Guillou and Cameron Carpenter, among others.

Although the hall has been completed, it is awaiting a permit from the Seoul Metropolitan Government to open. According to Ryu, the facility inspections were completed Friday, and he “cautiously” expected the permit to be issued by “the end of this month or next.”

By Won Ho-jung (hjwon@heraldcorp.com)