Britain’s best concert hall was destroyed by the Nazis – why hasn’t it been rebuilt? The Queen's Hall had near-perfect acoustics, and hosted some of the world's greatest composers. Its loss was a tragedy 9 May 2021 • 12:00pm The Blitz destroyed many of Britain's best-loved buildings – including the Queen's Hall Credit: London Stereoscopic Company/Hulton Archive/Getty Images Eighty years ago on Monday, London experienced its worst night of the Blitz. Between 11pm on May 10 1941 and 5.50am the following morning, 505 Luftwaffe bombers destroyed substantial stretches of the capital, using 711 tons of high explosives and almost 2,400 incendiaries. They attacked not just what were by then the familiar targets of the docklands, but landmarks of the West End. In human terms, the cost was appalling: 1,436 dead; more than 2,000 injured. Of the many buildings badly damaged or destroyed, three were of the highest cultural importance: the House of Commons, St Clement Danes Church (now the RAF church), and the Queen’s Hall, then London’s leading classical music venue, next to Broadcasting House in Langham Place. The first two were rebuilt; the third, deeply regrettably, was not.