Sydney Conservatorium of Music
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| Established | 1916 |
|---|---|
| Dean | Kim Walker |
| Location | Sydney, Australia |
| Enrollment | approximately 750 |
| Homepage | music.usyd.edu.au |
The Sydney Conservatorium of Music (formerly the New South Wales State Conservatorium of Music), informally known as the ‘Con’, is one of the oldest and most prestigious music schools in Australia. Located in the Sydney Royal Botanical Gardens, the Con incorporates a faculty of the University of Sydney, the community-based Conservatorium Open Academy and the Conservatorium High School.
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[edit] The Greenway Building
Originally constructed in 1821 as the Government Stables for the Colony of New South Wales, the structure that houses the Conservatorium is one of the few surviving works of the convict architect, Francis Greenway. A dramatic gothic structure with turrets, the building was described as a ‘palace for horses’ and is a portrayal of the romantic vision of Governor Lachlan Macquarie and the British architectural trends of the time. The stables, located in proximity to picturesque Sydney Harbour, reflects the building techniques and the range of materials and skills employed during the early settlement era.
[edit] Origins of the Conservatorium
In 1915, the NSW Government under William Holman allocated £22000 to the redevelopment of the stables into a music school. The “NSW State Conservatorium of Music” opened on 6 March 1916, under the Directorship of Belgian conductor and violinist Henri Verbrugghen, with the stated aims of "providing tuition of a standard at least equal to that of the leading European Conservatoriums" and to "protect amateurs against the frequent waste of time and money arising from unsystematic tuition". The reference to European standards and the appointment of a European director was not uncontroversial at the time, but criticism soon subsided. By all accounts, Verbrugghen was hugely energetic: Joseph Post, later himself to be director, described him as " a regular dynamo, and the sort of man of whom you had to take notice the moment he entered the room". Enrolments in the first year were healthy with 320 "single-study" students and a small contingent of full-time students, the first diploma graduations occurring four years later. A specialist high school, the Conservatorium High School was established in 1919, establishing a model for music education across the secondary, tertiary, and community sectors which has survived to this day.
Verbrugghen's impact was incisive but briefer than had been hoped. When he put a request to the NSW Government that he be paid separate salaries for his artistic work as Conductor of the Orchestra (now the NSW State Orchestra) and educational work as Director of the Conservatorium, the Government withdrew the subsidy, both of the Orchestra and the string quartet which Verbrugghen had installed. He resigned in 1921 after taking the Conservatorium Orchestra to Melbourne and to New Zealand.
The Con was the home to Australia's first full-time orchestra, comprised of both professional musicians and Con students, and remained Sydney's main orchestra for much of the 1920s, accompanying many artists brought to Australia by producer J C Williamson, including the legendary violinist, Jascha Heifitz, who donated money to the Conservatorium library for orchestral parts. However, at times during the later part of the stewardship of Verbrugghen's successor, Dr W. Arundel Orchard (Director 1923 - 1934), there were tensions with another emerging professional body, the ABC Symphony Orchestra (later to become the Sydney Symphony Orchestra), driven by the young, ambitious and energetic Director General of Music for the Australian Broadcasting Commission, Bernard Heinze.
In 1935 the Conservatorium Opera School was founded, later performing works such as Giuseppe Verdi’s Falstaff and Othello, Richard Wagner’s Die Meistersinger von Nürnberg and Die Walküre, Debussy’s Pelléas et Mélisande, among others. Under Sir Eugène Goossens (Director 1948 - 1955), opera at the Conservatorium made a major contribution to what researcher Roger Covell has described as " the most seminal years in the history of locally produced opera...". Although the most prominent musician to have held the post of Director, Goossens' tenure was not without controversy. Apart from the international scandal surrounding his departure in 1956, Goossens was said during his directorship to have channelled the best players in the Conservatorium Orchestra into the Sydney Symphony Orchestra(of which he was concurrently Chief Conductor), leaving only a student group for the Conservatorium. He disbanded the choir and several chamber ensembles and, some claimed, tended to ignore administrative matters. Richard Bonynge, however, who graduated in 1950, felt that it was he who turned the Conservatorium into a world-class institution, lifting standards and exposing students to sophisticated twentieth century scores (particularly Debussy and Ravel) for the first time.
[edit] Expansion and reforms
Under the direction of Rex Hobcroft, the Conservatorium adopted the modern educational profile recognised today. Hobcroft’s vision of a “Music University” was realised, in which specialised musical disciplines including both classical and jazz performance, music education, composition and musicology enriched each other.
In 1990, as part of the Dawkins Reforms, the Conservatorium amalgamated with the University of Sydney, and was renamed to the Sydney Conservatorium of Music.
A 1994 review of the Sydney Conservatorium by the University of Sydney resulted in a recommendation ‘That negotiations with the NSW State Government about permanent suitable accommodation for the Conservatorium be pursued as a matter or urgency”
As in 1916, a wide range of sites were considered, many of them controversial. In May 1997, 180 years after Governor Macquarie laid the foundation stone for the Greenway Building, State Premier Bob Carr announced a major upgrade of the Conservatorium, with the ultimate goal of creating a music education facility equal to or better than anything in the world. A team was assembled to work to that brief, resulting in a complex collaboration between various government departments (notably the Department of Education and Training and the Department of Public Works and Services), the Government Architect, US-based acoustic consultants Kirkegaard Associates, Daryl Jackson Robin Dyke Architects, the key users represented by the Principal and Dean of the Sydney Conservatorium of Music, and the Principal of the Conservatorium High School, the Royal Botanic Gardens and Domain Trust and many others.
The building process saw the temporary relocation of the Conservatorium’s performance activities, and the Conservatorium High School to the Australian Technology Park from 1998-2001. With the Conservatorium's Composition, Music Education and Musicology Units housed in an office building in Pitt St, the challenges (which had existed since the 1970s) of a split campus connected only by an umbilical railway line from Redfern to Wynyard became acute.
By the time of the relocation, the historic Greenway building, Governor Macquarie's stables, had housed music students for longer than it had housed horses. Nevertheless heritage was a sensitive issue. The redevelopment has restored Greenway's historic castellated building, removing newer additions to discreetly complement, enhance and enlarge the public green space of the Royal Botanic Gardens. For the city of Sydney it makes a major step towards the completion of the vision first enunciated by the then Conservatorium Director Eugene Goossens in 1947 when he lobbied Joe Cahill (Minister for Local Government, later Premier) for an Opera House on Bennelong Point to create a music precinct in the lower end of Macquarie Street. For the Conservatorium, it provides facilities of outstanding acoustic and architectural quality in which to serve the music and wider communities, and to educate future generations of performers, musicologists, composers and music educators.
[edit] Newcastle Conservatorium of Music
The Newcastle Conservatorium of Music opened as a branch of the New South Wales State Conservatorium of Music in 1952 with an initial enrolment of 163 and a staff consisting of both local teachers and teachers from the Sydney branch.
The Newcastle branch was supported financially by a State Government Grant (which it still receives to date), help from business and tuition fees. Money was raised from businesses and community to help students with scholarships. The Newcastle City Council also awarded scholarships and facilitated popular end of term student concerts in the Town Hall.
In 1990, the Newcastle branch ceased its relationship with the Sydney branch (now the Sydney Conservatorium) and became known as the Faculty of Music at the University of Newcastle. In 2001, it amalgamated with the university's Department of Drama, and is now known as the Conservatorium: School of Music and Drama.
[edit] Heads of the Conservatorium
Professor Kim Walker is the Dean of the Sydney Conservatorium. The past directors were Dr Edgar Bainton, Sir Eugene Goossens, Sir Bernard Heinze, Joseph Post, Rex Hobcroft, John Painter, John Hopkins and Sharman Pretty. The model of music education across secondary, tertiary, and community sectors continues to this day.
