Nelson Centre of Musical Arts
The original Nelson School of Music was built in 1901. The current redevelopment sought to maintain the historic elements of the buildings.
A glazed entranceway provides volume to the atrium, which is sandwiched between the façades of the two historic buildings.
A glazed back wall on the new building allows the historic façade to live on.
Heavyweight materials such as brick weight the edges of the building and help with acoustics, while also lending a contemporary look.
Architect Jeremy Smith says, “We created a collection of black boxes constructed in black brick.”
The concert hall is modest in design, keeping to its roots of community use. The seating absorbs sound so acoustic levels are maintained, even with a small audience.
The opportunity to show the contrast between old and new has been taken on in the eastern elevation.
A group of Girl Guides outside the Nelson School of Music in Nile Street East. Photograph taken by Frederick Nelson Jones circa 1920s.
Site plan.
Eastern elevation (top), northern elevation (bottom).
Western elevation (top), northern section – front (bottom left), northern section – rear (bottom right).
Ground-floor plan.
An historic provincial concert hall and new teaching and rehearsal spaces, designed by Irving Smith Architects, draw talent and visitors from around the world into Nelson.
Built in 1901, the Nelson School of Music, now known as the Nelson Centre of Musical Arts (NCMA), has gained a reputation for having one of the top chamber music concert halls in the Southern Hemisphere. The New Zealand String Quartet performs here regularly and refers to it as its ‘second home’, while musicians come from around the world to perform and record their music in the heritage concert hall – all thanks to its incredible acoustics. The Adam Chamber Music Festival is a coveted international event that is held biennially at the Centre, selling out months in advance.
While most contemporary auditoriums are acoustically equipped to cater to a variety of musical styles, balancing out the requirements of each, the recently renovated and expanded NCMA is absolutely perfect for chamber music.
It is one of the great strengths of some of New Zealand’s older provincial concert halls that they are ‘the best’ in certain genres; for example, another regional offering, the Wanganui Opera House, draws opera talent from around the globe because of its celebrated acoustics. Meanwhile, Marshall Day Acoustics’ work on The Christchurch Town Hall is renowned for advancing the understanding of concert hall acoustics during the latter part of the 20th century.
“The NCMA is spectacular if you’re living in Nelson,” says architect Jeremy Smith of local firm Irving Smith Architects (ISA). “On the one hand, it attracts musicians from around the world and, on the other hand, it’s about providing a space for people to learn and a community resource where people can listen to music. Hundreds of students go through the building each week. Whether you are a superstar or coming into the school to learn violin or recorder, you walk through the same route, and the lessons are held in the same rooms in which the superstars practise.”
Located on the edge of Nelson’s central city, NCMA is sandwiched between three roads: Nile and Collingwood Streets and School of Music Lane. ISA was brought on board in 2013, following the Canterbury quakes when buildings around the country were being assessed for their earthquake risk. It was tasked with designing the restoration of the heritage concert hall and a new $6.5-million extension, which is an insert slithered between the hall and an Alex Bowman-designed school building from the 1970s.
This new extension contains an atrium in which people congregate before concerts, as well as the school facilities, including rehearsal and teaching spaces. Behind the back of the stage is what the architects like to call ‘the squeeze box’ – a large performance practice room where the musicians warm up. Out back, there is also an older ‘piano building’ – a remnant from the original school that has now been wrapped around and incorporated into the new development.
A contemporary glazed entranceway mitigates the constrained area of the site by creating more volume in the atrium space, while a glass wall effectively gives back the western wall of the heritage concert hall, illuminating the elevation. “Our approach has been that ‘nothing is finished forever; things change over time’,” says Smith.
“If you look at the history of the original building, at first, it had no power, then they added gas lights, then electricity. Part of any job like this is to be very aware of what’s important and work towards that; in this building, that is the auditorium, the acoustics and the space. From the front, we exposed the corners of both existing buildings and that fundamentally says what’s important. Our building is just facilitating anything old and bringing it together. What’s most important here is the auditorium, whether you’re going to watch a show or you’re going to learn the recorder. So, we wanted the process of walking to your practice to include glimpses of the auditorium.”
An extensive new seismic upgrade of the concert hall has topped up structural strengthening work that was completed during the 1970s, which the architects couldn’t remove. Smith describes the new seismic work as being difficult to see and requiring massively complicated engineering.
Steel tension rods hold the building together in the event of an earthquake: “The ties hold it together but, if you push too hard, it pops, or, if not enough, it doesn’t work.” ISA collaborated with various experts to ensure the old hall was up to the required standard – dealing with other surprises as they arose, including structural issues and an asbestos find.
“We’re not heritage architects, yet we’ve become experts in things we never wanted to be experts in!” says Smith’s ISA partner Andrew Irving. “It was about balancing the performance demands of the space and the budget afforded to it.”
The interior of the concert hall has been modestly done to reflect its community roots, with the main focus on ensuring the acoustics remained first-rate; Marshall Day was brought on board in this regard. The seating had been made absorbent to ensure the sound of a concert would be the same, whether the hall was empty or filled with people, and heavy curtains add additional acoustic absorbency.
Folded concertina cladding, both internally and externally, is a reference to music, whilst also working to enhance the acoustics by breaking up the sound, as do other materials, including bricks and mortar used in the build. “Where we wanted heavyweight materials for acoustics or to weight the edges, we created a collection of black boxes constructed in black brick,” explains Smith.
Indeed, everything contemporary is intentionally distinguishable from the heritage: “It is quite modest compared to the concert hall, which is far larger and more articulated in its design.”
Even though the NCMA has a continual programme of world-class concerts, the community teaching, choirs and orchestras remain its main focus. “People who come to a show at the centre are not immaculately dressed,” says Smith.
“It’s a very casual community here in Nelson so the hall’s been left to look like a community teaching hall, which is quite important. It’s not fancy. We have left all the matchstick linings and that’s what the building is; that’s what’s beautiful about it.”
This article first appeared in Architecture New Zealand Magazine.
