Carnegie Hall

Carnegie Hall is a concert venue in Manhattan, New York City. It is one of the most significant venues for classical as well as popular music in the United States, known not just for its beauty and history but also for its fine acoustics.

History

Carnegie Hall is named after Andrew Carnegie, who paid for its construction. Construction began in 1890, and was carried out by Isaac A. Hopper and Company. Although the building was in use from April 1891, the official opening night was on May 5, with a concert conducted by Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky. Work on the building continued until 1897.

Related Topics:
Andrew Carnegie - 1891 - May 5 - Peter Ilyich Tchaikovsky

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The hall was owned by the Carnegie family until 1924, when Carnegie's widow sold it to a real estate developer, Robert E. Simon. When Simon died, his son, Robert E. Simon Jr. took over. Soon, the way Carnegie Hall was being run didn't work out, so he offered it to the New York Philharmonic. They declined, as they were going to move to the Lincoln Center. By 1960, with the New York Philharmonic on the move to the Lincoln Center, there were plans to demolish the building and replace it with a commercial building, so Simon sold the building. He ended up using that money to found the city of Reston in Virginia, RES being his initials. Under pressure from a group led by Isaac Stern, the city of New York bought the site in 1960 for $5 million and leased it to a nonprofit corporation. It was designated a National Historic Landmark in 1964. The dilapidated building was extensively renovated between 1983 and 1995, by James Polshek, who became better known through his post-modern planetarium at the American Museum of Natural History.

Related Topics:
New York Philharmonic - Lincoln Center - Isaac Stern - 1960 - National Historic Landmark - 1983 - 1995 - James Polshek - Planetarium - American Museum of Natural History

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Despite the landmark status of Carnegie Hall, plans for a commercial building were not entirely scrapped. In 1987-1989, a 60-floor office tower, named Carnegie Hall Tower, was completed next to the hall on the same block.

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In June of 2003, tentative plans were made for the Philharmonic to return to Carnegie Hall beginning in 2006, and for the orchestra to merge its business operations with those of the venue; however, these plans were called off later in 2003.

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The Carnegie Hall archives

Unexpectedly, for most concert-goers, it emerged in 1986 that Carnegie Hall had never consistently maintained an archive. Without a central repository, a significant portion of Carnegie Hall's documented history had been dispersed. Advertisements and stories in the media about how Carnegie Hall was scouring basements and attics to recover its history elicited an overwhelming response from the public, who had been keeping their old programs: artifacts began arriving from all over the world. Vast amounts of material, including over 12,000 programs, have been recovered, enabling the Archives to reconstruct much of Carnegie Hall's history.

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