Omaha's Holland Performing Arts Center

The Holland Performing Arts Center was opened in 2005.  It is spare in design with little lobby decoration (where are the modern painting?).  Nevertheless, the auditorium is spectacular.  It is nearly perfect acoustically.  It has a noticeable reverberation with fairly long decay.  It does not muddy the sound and the various sections of the orchestra are easily identified.  This was particularly noticeable in Vaughn Williams "Variations on a Theme by Thomas Tallis", where the string quartet was sonically separate from the full string ensemble.  The Omaha Symphony sounded first class in this environment.  The music director of the orchestra is Thomas Wilkins, a tall, elegant man who actually wore a tuxedo to conduct.  He was impressive, both in the "Tallis Variations" and in the Mahler Seventh.  I was really impressed.  Oh that Atlanta could have such a wonderful concert hall.