Saturday, December 04, 1999
CCM moves into Village
Complex is a gem for music school
BY JANELLE GELFAND
The Cincinnati Enquirer
UC President Joseph A. Steger wields a baton as Mayor Chalie Luken watches.
(Ernest Coleman photo)
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After 10 years in gestation and seven years of construction detours, the new CCM Village at the University of Cincinnati College-Conservatory of Music kicked off its dedication weekend on Friday.
Faculty members, university and state dignitaries, patrons and architects assembled for the opening ceremony in the spacious new atrium that links academic and performance wings of the $93.2 million project. Under the design leadership of architect Henry N. Cobb of the New York firm Pei Cobb Freed & Partners, the CCM Village comprises new and renovated buildings that surround a courtyard.
The dedication ceremony “is always a dramatic and emotional moment for the people who have worked on the project,” said Mr. Cobb, who characterized it as the most complicated of his 50-year career. “What I love is what you hear — more than what you see. You hear people using the space.”
The sounds of the CCM Chamber Players, directed by faculty member Rodney Winther, filled the hallways, as UC President Joseph A. Steger wielded a baton and led CCM's “downbeat for the future.”
“I feel very positive at seeing so many people here who had the foresight to support what I believed in,” said arts patron Patricia Corbett, whose name graces CCM's Corbett Center for the Performing Arts. “It was a meeting of the minds of the architects and the musicians.”
The ceremony was followed by an architectural forum with Mr. Cobb and David Niland, professor of architecture and head of UC's Ar chitectural Review Committee, in the new Robert J. Werner Recital Hall.
As a test of the hall's acoustics, there were performances by CCM's Amernet String Quartet, soprano Anna Christy and guitarist Todd Nelson.
CCM Village is the last major project of CCM Dean Robert J. Werner, who retires in June.
“Certainly, it will be perceived as my legacy, but I really feel my legacy is the talented faculty and students,” Mr. Werner said.
“It's an inspiration to work in a place like this, with the physical beauty, the aesthetic setting and the great attention that was paid to functionality,” said Robert Zierolf, division head of composition, musicology and theory. “This was not a building that was for show only. It works as well for the day-to-day activities.”
The weekend includes a celebration gala, a showcase of CCM talent in Corbett Auditorium tonight with TV celebrity Hugh Downs as host, and conducted by Cincinnati Pops conductor Erich Kunzel.
VISITING CCM
The school will have a public open house from noon to 6 p.m. Sunday. Also Sunday is the annual Feast of Carols (2 and 5 p.m.) in Corbett Auditorium. Tickets: 556-4183.
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