'There's a Concert Hall That Needs Your Support'

OTTAWA—The Feb. 28 deadline is only a few days away, but there is still time for a major sponsor to come forward to turn the dream of building a community concert hall in downtown Ottawa into reality.

Besides being a world-class cultural landmark expected to boost tourism and other business activity in the area, the hall is designed to fill the great need of local artists and festivals for an affordable, acoustically suitable, mid-size venue for live performances and sound recording.

The current combined government funding and corporate and individual funding is at about $25.5 million, said Glenn Hodgins, executive director of the Ottawa Chamber Music Society (OCMS), the not-for-profit organization spearheading the $38 million project.

"We need to raise something in the area of $5 and $7 million to meet the condition of the City of Ottawa funding. So we have been looking for corporate sponsorship that would possibly result in the naming of the hall, or a major gift of $1 million—a number of them—to help us close the gap."

"We are aware of the pressure of the deadline," said Hodgins. "There are a number of 'irons in the fire,' a number of options that we are still considering, and we are not going to stop until we've given it our best effort."

The OCMS presents the acclaimed Ottawa International Chamber Music Festival every summer, the world's largest festival of its kind.

The concert hall project has the support of more than 30 local arts organizations, including the Jazz, Folk, Blues, and Chamber Music Festivals; choral groups; and other music groups and enthusiasts.

Venue for Excellence in Acoustic Musical Performance

The hall was identified as one of five top infrastructure priorities under the Ottawa 20/20 Arts and Heritage Plan adopted by city council in 2003.

The plan anticipated that the hall would help revitalize the downtown core and provide major economic benefits to the restaurants, retailers, hotels, and overall tourism industry in the area. It would also fill a longstanding gap in the availability of space and acoustic staging in Ottawa for medium-sized performances and music recording.

Ottawa's National Arts Centre (NAC) is a fine institution, said Hodgins, but the spaces there are built for large performances or for theatre rather than music. Moreover, the rental costs are prohibitive for local non-profit groups and festivals.

The proposed 925-seat hall "is smaller, partly because of the acoustic principles we're aiming for, but it's [also] more intimate." It is specialized for acoustic musical performance—such as chamber, jazz, folk, and blues music that is not intended to be amplified.

Adjustable acoustics will make it adaptable for all musical styles and musicians, however, including choirs, orchestras, and others both locally and internationally. The facility design includes a state-of-the-art recording studio, which even the NAC Orchestra plans to use for its smaller performances and recordings. Several broadcasting and recording companies have also shown interest in using the facility.

Hodgins said the acoustic excellence of the hall will match that found in other venues of excellence across Canada in the range of 700 to 2,000 seats. Among them are Vancouver's Chan Centre for the Performing Arts, Edmonton's Francis Winspear Centre for Music, Kitchener's Centre in the Square, Guelph's River Run Centre, and the Toronto Centre for the Arts.

Closing the Gap

The project began in 2004. Currently government funding includes approximately $6 million each from Ottawa and the province of Ontario. The federal government has pledged up to $8 million provided the OCMS can show community support by raising significant private funds.

Private funding from individuals stands at $1.2–1.5 million, said Hodgins, and Morguard Developments, the developer, has committed $3.8 million to cover the cost of building the shell of the hall.

If the project can secure an additional private sponsorship of $5–7 million by February 28, that would provide the $32–33 million needed for construction. Completing the project's $38 million budget is a further $5–6 million endowment fund to be raised for operating costs over the next three years via a public fundraising campaign.

If the project cannot secure the sponsorship, the OCMS has announced it will not ask city council to extend its funding deadline. Council had already twice extended the original September 2006 deadline, first to November 30, 2007, then to February 28, 2008.

"The current economic climate and the competition for the sponsorship and charity dollar made the concert hall a tough sell at this time," the society's board president Colin Cooke has said in a February 26 press release, according to a CBC News report.

"We have not completely closed the door on our dream of a concert hall, but at this time it wouldn't be fair nor right to request additional time," he said.

Investment in a Rich Cultural, Tourism Experience

"Most cities our size would have a community concert hall," said Kanata North city councillor Marianne Wilkinson, a key supporter of the project.

However, the difficulty with finding a naming sponsor in Ottawa is that the city has a lot of government but not a lot of large industries that can provide significant financial backing, like in Toronto, Montreal, and Vancouver, she said.

Tourism Industry Association of Canada's president Randy Williams says the hall "will help tourism and the product base we offer visitors" by giving visitors more options to experience part of the culture of Ottawa as well as Canada.

He notes that "it's best when the public and private sectors come together in investment," because "it usually means that a project is sounder and has more chance to be sustainable."

However, he added that "30 cents on every dollar that a traveler spends goes to government taxes. . . So if the government is building this facility, there will be more visitors to Ottawa and more expenditures, which will come back to them in tax revenue."

Hodgins said the acoustics will provide "an unbelievably wonderful experience" to attract visitors to Ottawa "to hear the best artists and our community artists performing in the best kind of environment."

It's "a huge possibility for some philanthropic individual or corporation that wishes to put their name in downtown Ottawa—there's a concert hall that needs your support," he said.

For more information about the Ottawa Community Concert Hall Project, please visit the Ottawa Chamber Music Society's website