String quartet, or octet? How small a stage are you talking about, Fran?!

Anything that can't fit an octet, that's not a stage... that's a postage stamp! You place the singer/guitarist in the middle of a semi-circle of string players, that's still pretty intimate.

Thing is, Col used a TINY room around the voice. It it were matched to the size around the guitar, there'd be room for the string section. And all this is simply a guideline. Adjust your room for the size of the ensemble you intend to put in it. Plus, the size of the room and the size of the STAGE are two different things. You can have small stages in quite large rooms, and vice versa. The POINT was consistency, rather than size...