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A vastly improved Bezanson Recital Hall makes its debut
For 30 years the hall has been an intimate haven for musical performance at the University's Fine Arts Center.
“This hall is now an absolute joy to perform in. We waited a very long time, but we now have one of the best halls for chamber music in the state and in New England."Paulina Stark, soprano and professor of voice at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, was speaking of Bezanson Recital Hall. For 30 years the hall has been an intimate haven for musical performance at the University's Fine Arts Center, but a recently completed $1.17 million makeover has made it splendid as never before. It now boasts a greatly expanded lobby, a new stage, computer-controlled stage lighting, improved access for the handicapped, and an overall elegance that makes it truly worthy of the music performed there.
The hall has always had one thingthe essential thing, its devotees might argue going for it: a warm sound relished by performers and audiences alike. That can only be ascribed to dumb luck, because the space it occupies was originally slated to be a faculty lounge. Only at the last minute was it decided to include a small recital hall in the Fine Arts Center and that caused problems. Bezanson's lobby could only hold about 35 of the 220 people the hall could accommodate. Because the walls weren't soundproofed, outside noise marred performances. The backstage was tiny. And the hall did double duty as a classroom, which took a predictable toll on its seats and carpets.
By 1996, when Amherst resident and music lover Dorothy Grannis underwrote the purchase of a new Steinway grand piano for the hall, it became painfully clear that the piano was too grand for its surroundings. The University's Department of Music and Dance began seeking renovation funds. In January 1998, then-Chancellor David K. Scott announced that his office and the University would provide dollar-for-dollar matching funds if the Department raised $150,000 by July 1 of that year. A hastily assembled fundraising committee petitioned friends, alumni, faculty, and staff, and the goal was met.
The Department, which had been thinking in terms of cosmetics alone, now set its sights higher. Further funding was sought, and over the course of what became an eight-year effort major donors included the Falcetti family, whose name now graces the lobby, and Thomas Bezanson, the son of Philip Bezanson, chairman of the Music Department from 1964 to 1973 and the man for whom the hall was named.
By the time construction got under way in the spring of 2002, the project amounted to a full-blown transformation. And those attending the hall's official openinga pair of concerts held this April 13saw the results: a new outside awning with handsome signage, an expanded lobby with a counter that serves as both box office and reception table, and the hall itself, with its chrome-and-maple detailing, refurbished seating, soundproofing, much-improved lighting, solid maple stage, and many other felicities.