Music school nearly completed

THE €70 million reconstruction of the Cork School of Music is ahead of schedule and the building is likely to be handed over to the Department of Education in mid-July.

Hochtief PPP Solutions, the company involved in the Public Private Partnership, confirmed yesterday that the redevelopment work will be finished well ahead of the scheduled date in September.

Hochtief PPP Solutions project director, Peter O’Shea, said the main structure of the Union Quay building is completed and the fitting out of rooms continues apace.

Around 200 people are employed on the project and Mr O’Shea said that the refurbished building will contain a bistro which will be open to the public.

“We envisage it will open six days a week from 7.30am to 10.30pm and may also open on Sunday mornings if there are concerts on. We are sampling menus for it,” Mr O’Shea said.

The two-storey library section is also under construction and when completed it will be large enough to house 30,000 pieces of sheet music which have been collected to date.

In addition, Mr O’Shea confirmed that an order for 64 pianos had been put in with the world famous Steinway manufacturers in Hamburg.

“That order represents a third of Steinway’s yearly output. We will also be appointing a technical expert from Steinway to maintain and tune all the pianos for the next 25 years,” he said.