In the 19th century, titan of industry Andrew Carnegie funded a system of libraries and concert halls and a university in his adopted city of Pittsburgh.
One of the grandest and most ornate of these buildings, Carnegie Music Hall in Oakland, on Friday flung its doors wide with great fanfare after eight months of silence. (That’s not a figurative statement — brass musicians from River City Brass were present to musically christen the refurbished space.)
The 1895 hall is one of Pittsburgh’s architectural and acoustic crown jewels.
It was once the musical capital of Pittsburgh and the home of the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra before Heinz Hall and Benedum Center were transformed from movie palaces into concert halls. Over the span of its 130-year history, performers including Pavoratti, Ella Fitzgerald, Arlo Guthrie and many others
Today, it typically hosts a variety of concerts, lectures and other events, including quite a few weddings. It is managed by Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh.
In recent months, crews have updated the hall’s lighting and sound and electrical systems. There’s brand-new seating that is ADA-compliant and significantly more comfortable and spacious than the previous seats. Artists worked tirelessly to clean and restore the hall’s murals.
On Friday, Steven Knapp, president and CEO of Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh, gathered with public officials including Allegheny County Executive Sara Innamorato for a ribbon-cutting ceremony.
“Perhaps most importantly of all, the time had come to bring air conditioning to the hall,” he joked, later noting that the renovation will now allow community organizers to utilize the space in the summer months.
The total price tag was about $9 million, raised through a mixture of foundation and public funding and individual philanthropy.
The hall previously sat just under 2,000 people. Because the new seats are larger, capacity has reduced to 1,530.
Melissa Simonetti, Carnegie Museums of Pittsburgh’s director of construction and project management, noted that the Museums had worked with acousticians and that the “sound” of the hall was not measurably different than before.
There are more than 2,500 Carnegie libraries worldwide but only a handful of Carnegie Music Halls. The most famous of these is of course in New York City, but there are five such halls in Pittsburgh, all of which are going through or have recently completed significant renovations. The other halls are in Braddock, Homestead, Carnegie and the North Side. There was once a hall in Duquesne, but it was demolished.
(As an aside, there are also Carnegie Music Halls in Kentucky and in West Virginia and overseas in Dunfermline, Scotland, but these feature a different architectural style.)
The Oakland structure is the most elaborate of the Pittsburgh halls.
Regular programming is returning, and the Carnegie Mellon University Philharmonic performs in the hall on Sunday.
Jeremy Reynolds: jreynolds@post-gazette.com. His work at the Post-Gazette is supported in part by a grant from the San Francisco Conservatory of Music, Getty Foundation and Rubin Institute.
First Published: March 22, 2024, 8:31 p.m.
Updated: March 23, 2024, 5:29 p.m.
