Sound of music as €60m school officially opens

THE €60 million Cork School of Music catering for 3,500 students from ages 5 to 75 was officially opened yesterday — eight years after being first announced.

Enterprise Minister Micheál Martin described the intervening period as a bumpy ride on his way into the ceremony at the building on Union Quay.

At 1.38pm, Education Minister Mary Hanafin declared the CIT Cork School of Music officially open, during an event which featured musical performances from the institution’s wide range of student profiles.

“Music is not just something that needs facilities like this but it is also being embraced in classrooms in every school in the country. My father recalled recently how Luke Kelly once told him ‘Hell is the place where there is no music’,” she told the 400 guests.

It must have felt like seventh heaven for school director Dr Geoffrey Spratt, CIT president Dr Brendan Murphy and the institute’s head of development Michael Delaney who helped oversee progress.

Dr Spratt quoted WB Yeats to sum up their feelings: “Joy is of the will which labours, which overcomes obstacles, which knows triumph.”

Classes began at the school on Monday but the opening gave all those concerned a chance to celebrate the end of a long-fought battle which faced planning, funding and contractual obstacles since Mr Martin first announced an extension for the old school of music in October 1999.

The facilities in the 12,000sqm six-storey building, which was built and fitted out as a public/private partnership between the Department of Education and German firm Hochtief, is the envy of colleges around Ireland and across Europe. It has more than 50 baby grand Steinway pianos and a recording studio fit for use by the world’s top artists.

Those who performed yesterday included renowned Cork soprano Mary Hegarty, who has just completed a masters degree at Cork School of Music, and some of the school’s youngest talents such as the Cáirde String Quartet and 14-year-old pianist Gary Beecher.

The celebrations continued last night with the opening of the Carducci Quartet Festival, with free public performances today at lunchtime and at 6pm, and at 3pm tomorrow.