Music Center to See Needed Expansion
The Academy’s Forrestal-Bowld Music Center is currently in the design portion of a project involving much-needed renovation. There is a plan in place to ultimately replace the Fisher Theater and to build a dance studio for the school; however, the first step is expanding the music center. The renovation project must first fundraise and receive approval from the Trustees. Once these requirements have been met, the construction will begin. There is a loose deadline for design completion set for the spring of 2015.Exonians use the music center for practicing instruments, music lessons and performances, as well as a quiet place to work on homework or projects. “I use the music building every day, for a cappella rehearsal, practicing for an EP or just singing by myself. Even though I'm a day student, I live in the music building,” senior Sabrina Movitz said.
"Even though I'm a day student, I live in the music building."
About half of Exeter’s student body takes music lessons or use the building for reasons similar to Movitz. The large population of interested students has outgrown the building’s capacity. “The whole place is slightly cramped now because of all the students coming and going. That's a wonderful thing to have—too many music students—but now the department and the school have to adapt,” Movitz continued.
A large part of the expansion plan is the building of a new recital studio, a large room that will have an audience capacity. Designed to be adjacent to the current main lobby, it will be a place for students to both practice and perform. “It is a large rehearsal space that will have seating capacity for an audience so we can do concerts there. It will have audience capabilities for up to around two-hundred and fifty and will be able to handle the vast majority of the concerts that we do,” Peter Schultz, chair of the music department, said.Many of the school’s ensembles are currently required to practice out of the building in places like the assembly hall or the forum. Part of the renovation plan is to help alleviate this space tension.“Many times, ensembles spill out into other areas of the school. With this new addition, all of those ensembles will be able to rehearse in the music building, which will make life much easier for everybody,” Schultz said.The music department has had to grapple with lack of performance space in addition to the ensemble practice issues. The expansion addresses an important tension between the music building and the church. For the past few years, the music department has utilized the church for almost all of its performances. This new rehearsal studio, or more accurately performance hall, will accommodate about ninety percent of the department’s concerts.“It will be able to handle the vast majority of the concerts that we do, and it’s very important for us to move our performances away from the church,” Schultz said.“The church is not really meant to be a performance space; it’s a spiritual and holy place. We have been bumping up against the religious programming that’s going on in the church for quite a while now. Hopefully, it will get rid of the majority of the conflicts that we have.”Along with a new rehearsal studio, the renovations include plans to add more practice and teaching rooms. A number of classrooms, including the music building’s first actual Harkness table, will be added, focusing on music theory and private lessons. Teachers currently in crowded rooms will be able to move to areas with more space.“There will be a couple more practice rooms, and it will enable some of us in very small rooms possibly to move to a larger room where there may not be adjacent rooms on either side with thin walls producing noise to distract from what's going on in our room,” music instructor Robert Loechler said.The music building renovation will also include an expansion of the current music library. A section of the library will be devoted to music technology and feature computer workstations for editing and synthesizing.