Here's one thought: Lute concerts are often given in large halls or churches, though they are not really attracting a huge crowd.
Huge crowds are also not really the setting in which lutenists florished back then. Recently, I had been invited to play the lute at a 30something birthday party on saturday night, a crowd of about 40 people max. Not one of the guests had probably ever heard Renaissance music. The host assured me that he wanted this and would deny any requests for other music from the stereo. It was a two bedroom late 1800s apartment with 11.5 ft./3.50m ceilings and all doors were open, I played in a 215 sqft/20 m² room where I sat on a chair in the corner at a table lit with a lamp. So I played straight from my 500+ p. book (message me if you are interested in my selection), for about 8 hours (it actually felt more like two). There was no programme, I just selected pieces on the fly according to "room temperature". There were sight-reading glitches, but no one noticed or cared. The reactions were very positive and no one complained about the music though most of the people normally listened to house, electro and other non-early musical styles. The music was described as: * never annoying * with a huge range of emotions * very pleasant for conversation * very interesting to listen to if you care to come close * filling the whole apartment (!) This was probably a setting more historically accurate than listening to French chanson intabulations in a church. The acoustics were perfect for a full and clear sound. I found this house concert situation very pleasing. You need to say goodbye to silence though. But having conversations to lute music is a whole other experience, as is playing lute for people not consciously listening most of the time. You end up with two or three people sitting closer and listening, the rest enjoying the atmosphere. I would highly recommend this experience. What are your experiences with house concerts? Has anyone ever played in the background? To get on or off this list see list information at http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~wbc/lute-admin/index.html
