BYU’s New Music Building a Testament to How Much the Church Values Music, Says Elder Christofferson

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By Rachel Sterzer Gibson, Church News

Brigham Young University’s newest addition might not be the largest of its kind, but it’s “one of the very best,” commented Elder D. Todd Christofferson of the Quorum of the Twelve Apostles.

While a minority of universities are dedicating entire buildings to music studies, BYU’s new 171,000-square-foot Music Building — which features state-of-the-art practice and performance spaces — “attests to the value that Brigham Young University and The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints attach to music and its vast potential for good in society and for the blessing of the human soul,” said Elder Christofferson during the facility’s dedication on Wednesday, April 16.

Speaking from a pulpit on the center stage of the 1,000-seat Concert Hall in the new building — and flanked by BYU student instrumentalists — Elder Christofferson expressed gratitude in his dedicatory prayer for the power of music and its ability to “gladden the heart, lift the troubled and weary spirit, speak peace to the soul, grant courage to the righteous, and then foster joy in Thy children. We are grateful for the power of music to ennoble us and glorify Thee.”

Elder Christofferson asked the Lord to accept the structure as a gift and a worthy offering. “Grant that we may glorify Thee and Thy Beloved Son in music and song and in our very lives. May all that transpires in this music building and in the School of Music and in the lives of its faculty and students serve to strengthen faith, strengthen testimony and strengthen conversion,” he prayed.

Accompanying Elder Christofferson were his wife, Kathy; Elder Clark G. Gilbert, a General Authority Seventy and Church commissioner of education; and BYU President C. Shane Reese and his wife, Wendy. Academic vice president Justin Collings conducted the meeting.

In addition to remarks by Elder Christofferson and President Reese, the dedication program included a musical number by the Chorale Chamber Ensemble and a number by the BYU Philharmonic Orchestra.

As the reverberations of the final note of the BYU Philharmonic Orchestra dwindled, Sister Christofferson was among the first to offer a standing ovation for their rendition of Symphony No. 3, “Organ Symphony” by Camille Saint-Saëns.

Elder Christofferson called the musical performances during the dedicatory service “magnificent” and spoke of attending a performance of the orchestra with Sister Christofferson several years ago featuring guest violinist virtuoso Itzhak Perlman.

The orchestra “had worked tirelessly in preparation, and they deserved to be on the same stage. Their talent made me want to jump up and sing ‘Rise and Shout, the Cougars are out,’” Elder Christofferson, a BYU alumnus, recalled with a smile.

President Reese said the beautiful performances were “emblematic of the amazing things that happen here in the School of Music.”

He called the new building “stunning” and recalled a conversation with Diane Reich when she was installed as the School of Music’s director. She asked, “What could the School of Music do uniquely to contribute to the mission of BYU?”

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President Reese said he would like a special focus on music that points students, faculty, staff and audiences to Jesus Christ. “And I’m pleased to say that the School of Music has responded,” President Reese said during the dedication. “I’m so inspired every time I hear our students, our choirs, our orchestras, our bands, our ensembles. During practices and performances, their music points us to Jesus Christ. Their collective work is Christ centered.”

About the New Music Building

BYU’s School of Music and other visual, performing arts and communications programs were previously housed in the Harris Fine Arts Center, which was demolished in early 2023.

Construction of the Music Building began in June 2020, and the Music Department began using the facility in 2023.

The building’s state-of-the-art features and upgrades were designed with BYU’s 435 music students in mind.

The Concert Hall, for example, is designed in a “vineyard style,” where the seats surround the stage and rise up in rows like the sloping terraces of a vineyard.

Wood panels on the ceiling and fringes of the hall can be manipulated to customize the acoustics.

“There isn’t a bad seat in the hall — acoustically or visually,” says an article on the School of Music website.

Performance spaces, faculty offices and practice areas were built with a small gap between walls to help isolate sound from the rest of the building. The result? A pianist can practice scales in a room next to a trumpeter rehearsing Wagner, and they won’t bother one another, explained a “Y Magazine” article about the new facility.

“We’re noisy,” noted Jeremy N. Grimshaw, music professor and associate dean for the College of Fine Arts and Communications, in the article. “[Musicians] are bad neighbors.”

The building includes the Concert Hall, practice rooms and offices, as well as recording studios, a recital hall, a choral hall, spacious ensemble rooms and a theater stage.

The “crown jewel” of the new building, said BYU organ professor Don Cook in a BYU News release, is the pipe organ found in the Concert Hall.

With 4,613 pipes and 81 sets of pipes, it’s the third-largest organ in Utah and the only one with two consoles.

It took Létourneau Organs, an organ builder from Quebec, Canada, two and a half years and 25 full-time craftspeople to design and build the organ, installing pipes ranging in length from 32 feet to the length of a pencil.

The organ can create the “kind of sound that you feel in your belly,” said Andrew Forrest, the president and artistic director of Létourneau Organs, in the news release.

Joseph P. Beck II, the BYU facilities project manager over the building, told “Y Magazine” that it was fun to wander through the building when it opened to students and hear the music flowing from all the spaces. “It was a miracle to me to see the building start working immediately for the students.”

By the Numbers

• Total square footage: 170,950
• Performance halls: 2
• Rehearsal halls: 5
• Classrooms: 11
• Recording studio: 1
• Midi studios: 5
• Faculty offices: 70
• Student practice rooms: 64
• Pianos: 200
• Performing groups: 40
• Music majors: 435
• Performances per year: 175–200

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