Aristo Hall opens your ears

New concert hall Aristohall, with a capacity of 105, recently opened underneath Aristocrat – a high-end audio showroom that both sells and exhibits items ranging from vintage gramophones to state-of-the-art Trio and Bass speakers produced by Avantgarde Acoustic, a quintessential, luxury speaker manufacturer based in Germany – in Minami-Aoyama.

The owner of this unique concert hall is audio connoisseur and Aristocrat owner Yasuteru Kurata – a man who first became caught up in the world of audio equipment after purchasing a sound system for a new residence. After finally fulfilling his goal to create a new space in which to appreciate the finest sounding classical music – and at the same time providing yet another fantastic venue at which to hear live performances in Minami-Aoyama (alongside the likes of Blue Note Tokyo and Body & Soul) – Kurata kindly agreed to tell Time Out Tokyo more about this fantastic new space.

What led you to build the hall?
YK: One of my aims was to provide a space for friends to hold unplanned classical music recitals. Another of my aims was to provide a space for children to experience quality-sounding classical music.

So you’re planning events for children to experience classical music?
YK: In addition to allowing junior members of the NHK Symphony Orchestra to use the hall for recitals and the like, it will also be offered as a space for children to come and experience the sound of live classic music. We’ll be providing opportunities for young musicians to perform as soloists and, hopefully, creating a chance for some interesting musical synergies along the way.

From about what age will the children who come to the recitals be?
YK: To begin with, I’m thinking third-graders; however, they could be as young as even first-grade students. Over the last few years I’ve attended a number of concerts aimed at children; however the quality at such concerts is often under par. Musicians often say that it makes no difference whether they’re performing to adults or children; however, I think that, unfortunately, performances aimed at the latter often have less impact. If the musicians don’t put their heart and soul into the performance when children are listening, their attention is soon lost. While experienced adult listeners may be able to say whether a performance was good or bad, for a child who’s listening to a piece of music for the first time, the quality of a performance could determine whether that particular child becomes a classical music lover or not. Plus the lack of adequate musical education in schools doesn’t help either. I think that by giving children opportunity to hear great classical music when they’re young, we could effectively be setting them up to better appreciate the joys of music for life.

The hall is relatively small, with a seating capacity of 105 people right?
YK: Yes, indeed. We can accommodate 105 people. It's an ideal size for listening to performances by young musicians – which is something I’m very much looking forward to the hall being used for. However, as opposed to regular concert halls, that often make guests share an armrest with a neighbour, there’s enough space here to arrange our seats with an ample amount of space between them; so, if necessary, we could actually seat more than 105 people simply by bringing out some additional seats.

Approximately how much does a hall like this cost to build?
YK: The final figure is something near 50 million yen. The speakers are made by Germany-based Avantgarde Acoustic – similar to those displayed in the showroom above – and the amp kicks out enough energy to toast bread, which I guess doesn’t make us all that ‘energy efficient’. [Laughs] In addition to being used for live performances, our equipment can also be used for listening to pre-recorded music via records, compact discs, etc.

From October onwards, Aristo Hall will be hosting a number of performances by artists selected by Kurata himself. Refer to the website (acrat.jp/hall/) for further details.