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Facilities
Buildings.
The Conservatory is housed in a complex of three contiguous buildings
designed by Minoru Yamasaki. These include a large classroom building,
rehearsal spaces, concert halls, a music library, and a practice
facility. An additional space houses the Conservatory Admissions
office and several other administrative areas.
Bibbins Hall, the teaching building, contains 40 studios, 10 classrooms,
and 16 offices. Private instruction, ensemble coaching, and classroom
instruction take place in this building. The Deans' offices, and
the TIMARA (Technology in Music and the Related Arts) complex, including
a recording studio, are also housed here.
The Central Unit, the rehearsal and concert hall building, houses
the two concert halls, the orchestra rehearsal room, choral rehearsal
room, a small classroom, the percussion teaching studio, the Conservatory
Library--one of the largest academic music libraries in the country--including
compact disc, tape and record listening rooms, the Conservatory
instrument collection storage room, the Audio Services recording
facilities, and the student lounge.
Robertson Hall, the practice building, contains 182 rooms including
150 practice rooms, the Otto B. Schoepfle Vocal Arts Center, the
Career Resource Center, the Kulas Organ Center, reed-making rooms,
two networked micro-computing labs, faculty studios, and staff offices.
Concert Halls. Warner Concert Hall seats 696. In 1984 the
acoustics in Warner were substantially enhanced through a renovation
costing one million dollars. R. Kirkegaard provided the acoustical
design. Kulas Recital Hall, especially suited to chamber music concerts,
seats 144. Finney Chapel seats 1250; Artist recitals, orchestra,
and other large ensemble concerts are performed there.
Conservatory Annex. East of Bibbins Hall, the Conservatory
Annex is located on the second floor of the Oberlin Book Store and
houses offices for Conservatory Admissions, Public Relations, the
Associate Dean for Technology and Facilities, and the Business Manager.
Two meeting rooms with media resources are available for use by
the Conservatory community.
Electronic and Computer Music. Eight acoustically isolated
and optimized electronic music studios are located in the Conservatory.
The TIMARA complex is equipped with a wide selection of state-of-the-art
digital synthesizers and Macintosh computers, including a lab with
Power Mac computers connected to the network, each with synthesizer
keyboards and a full complement of music software. Production facilities
include multitrack digital recording, historical analog synthesizers,
and a wide variety of signal processing gear.
The Otto B. Schoepfle Vocal Arts Center is the first of its kind
to be incorporated into a program of vocal instruction in the United
States. Named for a long-time supporter of the Conservatory, this
laboratory includes stroboscopic and fiber-optic instrumention that
can display four types of vocal analyses concurrently, allowing
examination of both the function and the timbre of the artistic
singing voice. The laboratory also houses a sonagraph workstation
that transforms the phonations of the voice into electrical signals
and displays them as waves on a computer screen; a computerized
system for analyzing, synthesizing, and manipulating vocal sounds;
a nasometer, which measures nasality in the voice; a laryngograph,
which determines the accuracy of pitch and vocal onset; a spirometer,
which tests critical pulmonary functions to determine vital capacity
and flow rate; and a system to measure levels of air flow, air pressure,
and sound pressure. Students use the sophisticated audio and video
equipment to record, play back, and analyze their performances.
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