HALL GETTING 'INTERESTING'.

Byline: Fred Shuster Staff Writer

Though the jutting steel beams may not offer downtown passers-by much of a clue, internationally acclaimed architect Frank O. Gehry thinks that when the Walt Disney Concert Hall is finished, ``This might become a pretty interesting part of town.''

Gehry was talking Friday at the unveiling of the building's structural framework at Grand Avenue and First Street, just across from the Music Center. The city's newest classical concert venue and future home of the Los Angeles Philharmonic was designed by the architect and is scheduled to open in the fall of 2003.

The $274 million concert hall is considered a cornerstone of downtown revitalization. Other major projects include the Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels, the recently built Colburn School of Performing Arts, Staples Center, the renovated Ahmanson Theatre at the Music Center, the Museum of Contemporary Art, the Los Angeles Public Library and a rehabilitation of Grand Avenue.

``It will be unique in the country to have this much architecture, this much culture, on a city street,'' Gehry said.

The 2,273-seat auditorium is also expected to be one of the most acoustically sophisticated concert halls in the world, with its curved wood ceiling and stainless steel exterior panels, which will be put in place this summer. The new venue will occupy a 3.6-acre site - a full city block in the Bunker Hill area - with a large portion of the site dedicated to an urban park with public gardens and ornamental landscaping.

For the symphony and the Los Angeles Master Chorale, the move for the fall 2003 season will allow for expanded repertoires. Esa-Pekka Salonen, the L.A. Philharmonic's music director, revealed few future programming details except to promise that ``it won't be boring.''

Salonen added that the new venue's inaugural season would surely be closely watched, since ``the whole world expects us to make a profound comment on the future of classical music.''

When the Disney Concert Hall opens, the Los Angeles Opera will expand its season at the Music Center and dance will also be offered at the 3,098-seat venue.

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3 photos

Photo:

(1) Civic leaders and members of the media join architect Frank O. Gehry on a tour of the Disney Concert Hall construction site.

(2 -- 3) Architect Frank O. Gehry leads a tour Friday, above, pointing out design elements of the Disney Concert Hall taking shape downtown. At right is a drawing of the finished plan.

Andy Holzman/Staff Photographer