One thing's for sure: Before my tour of the new Clarice Smith Performing
Arts Center at Maryland, I had never worn a hard hat. After it was over,
I didn't want to give it back!
4.26.00 Donning a hard hat wasn't the only criteria for the tour: We
were told to wear jeans and heavy boots. There would definitely be mud
and possibly nails and other objects that could penetrate our shoes.
Absolutely no high heels allowed.
The soon to be completed Claris Smith Performing Arts Center
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We gathered around the trunk of our guide's car outside the center's
construction site near Byrd Stadium. Five of us newbies for one reason
or another, were lucky enough to get a tour of the new performing arts
village destined to be a cultural hub for the university community,
Prince George's County and the region. More than 200 faculty and staff
and 5,000 students from the School of Music, and departments of theatre
and dance will call it home.
With some trepidation I began the trek to the main entrance, mindful of
the large bodies of water that were everywhere. Too deep or too muddy?
Hard to tell. Onward! Soon we were walking on long boards across wide
ditches.
As we approached the entrance, I saw that it was covered by two huge
plywood pieces, secured with a locked padlock. They looked oddly funny
because a beautiful brick facade surrounded them.
Our guide pulled the doors open for us revealing a huge entrance
hall--the Grand Pavilion--with its staircase sweeping grandly up and
around to the right. What I saw was scaffolding, cement slabs and steel.
What I felt was the overwhelming sense of space and grandeur to come.
We walked toward was what would be the Performing Arts Library (23,000
square feet, our guide tells us). One of the first things I notice is
how high the ceilings are. Skylights at the very top provide a strong
sense of space, light and a connection to the outside.
We're told the new library will have a state of the art digital audio
distribution system: Want to listen to a concert from 10 years ago or a
piano sonata performed last night? You'll be able to hear it reproduced
almost as if you were seated in the concert hall where it was originally
performed. There will also be a special collections reading room, 58
public computer workstations and a seminar room.
Walking through what seems to be a labyrinth of concrete, we end up at
what will become the Ina and Jack Kay Theatre seating 650 people. One
can almost picture the seats filling up for a performance of Hamlet or
Anything Goes. Behind the stage I look up at the framework meant to hold
the rows and rows of colored lights and scenes. There's computerized
scene-movement equipment alongside the traditional scene rigging so that
budding theater managers will be trained to work in any theater in the
world.
Our group passes by huge areas with signs reading Scene Shop, Property
Shop, and Theatre Storage. Again, I have a strong sense of the vastness
of this space. While walking, we hear about creative ideas for the
studios: jazz in the Studio Theatre with Sunday brunch; daring and
innovative plans for performance art; the Dance Studio that converts
into a 180-seat theatre.
Soon we have wound ourselves around a circle of sorts to find the Joseph
and Alma Gildenhorn Recital Hall that will seat 250 guests. Our guide
says there will be performances in this hall almost every day of the
year. I am blown away by all this information. I'm pretty sure I must be
walking around with my mouth hanging open.
We walk by the opera rehearsal area, the orchestra rehearsal area,
oohing and ahhing at the incredible height of the rooms and the space,
imaging the orchestral music and operatic arias soon to come pouring
out.
Turning another corner, we find a truly awe-inspiring sight: the Concert
Hall. Seating 1,100, it's the largest area in the center and boasts an
air-handling system that makes no sound. The hall's walls are padded so
thickly that no sounds penetrate from within or without. A dramatic
pitched ceiling allows the music performed within to achieve perfect
balance. Extra-wide doors accommodate the wheeling in and out of grand
pianos. And, we are told that the world-famous firm of Kirkegaard and
Associates provided the comprehensive acoustics design. Their client
list includes the Boston Symphony Hall, Carnegie Hall and the Lincoln
Center for Performing Arts (and now, the Clarice Smith Performing Arts
Center at Maryland).
It seems as if every detail has been taken into consideration. But we
haven't seen everything yet. There are 30 classrooms, 100 faculty and
staff offices, and 50 practice and rehearsal rooms, built with walls
that are insulated on both sides. Two-inch gaps between the floors and
walls prevent sound from reverberating into the wall. The musician next
door won't hear a single note that isn't her own.
The doors in this area are made of cherry, meant to age to a golden hue
over the years. Classroom hallways are painted lively colors, unexpected
at every turn. And large windows provide light--so much light.
An hour later, we are outside the complex again. Walking back to my
office, I am filled with such--what can I call it--excitement, I guess. A
sense of anticipation. To think that next year all the brick, mortar,
scaffolding and cement will be a definitive, dynamic, dazzling
performing arts center here at Maryland. That will be a site to see. (By
the way, I did have to give my hat back.) --Linda Martin '78, M.A. '80
Linda Martin, director of Internet Communications in University
Publications, is doing some building of her own: the Clarice Smith
Performing Arts Center at Maryland's Web site
(www.claricesmithcenter.umd.edu).
Reese Cleghorn Writes -30- as Dean
It's a journalistic tradition to note the end of a story with "-30-" as
a signal for typesetters. And although Reese Cleghorn closed his 19-year
career as dean of the College of Journalism on June 30, he will remain as
professor and teach commentary and analysis--two areas of particular interest.
Cleghorn got his journalistic start writing for his hometown newspaper
in Summerville, Ga., an experience he shared in an American Journalism
Review column: "For me, at 16, it was the opening of the world. And at
15 cents per column inch, it was a start, not to mention an inducement,
to write long." When reminded of that, Cleghorn replies with his
characteristic Southern drawl, "You get inspired to a find a lot of the
local historical listings of boards of deacons for the church. You want
to list every board of deacons that they had."
Reese Cleghorn
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He stayed in Georgia through college, studying journalism at Emory
University. After graduation his first job was as general assignment
reporter for the Atlantic Journal, a paper to which he later returned
for nine years, culminating as associate editor. Subsequently, he was
the editorial page editor of the Charlotte Observer. His last newspaper
post was as associate editor of the Detroit Free Press, where he was
approached about becoming dean at Maryland. Cleghorn was 51 at the time.
He says that he had always considered teaching, but figured it would
occur after retirement from newspapers. Instead, he launched a
successful second career.
Under Cleghorn's leadership, the college created the Knight Center for
Specialized Journalism, the Casey Journalism Center for Children and
Families, the Hubert H. Humphrey Fellowships for international
journalists, the Journalism Fellowships on Child and Family Policy, the
Capital News Service student reporting program in Washington and
Annapolis, the Maryland Scholastic Press Association for high school
journalists and this spring, UMTV, the university's cable television
station.
"All are pertinent to what we do in the classroom and they are all
extensions of the traditional academic function," says Cleghorn, who
believes that should be the mandate for all professional schools.
"In terms of the curriculum we have done something that is unique and I
use that word very carefully. We now have a three degree (bachelor's,
master's, doctoral) professional school that is all journalism. There's
not another one in the country," says Cleghorn. "We adopted a curriculum
to match. For example, everyone now has to take an ethics course. You
can't teach anything about writing unless you teach something about
values and decision-making."
In focusing the curriculum, Cleghorn thought the college might
experience a drop in enrollment. It didn't happen. In fact, says
Cleghorn, "The freshman class that just finished was the best ever." He
can justifiably boast that nearly two-thirds of journalism students are
enrolled in an honors or scholars program, and nearly half are drawn
from beyond Maryland.
"The next few year are going to be terrifically exciting because we are
experimenting to some degree," says Cleghorn, reflectively adding, "I
think this is a place I would have liked to be even if I hadn't been
here." --DB
Cleghorn Scholarship Honors his Leadership
Imagine keeping a secret among fellow journalists. That's precisely what
more than 170 former students, friends, colleagues and other admirers of
Reese Cleghorn did when they pledged $223,450 to establish the Reese
Cleghorn Journalism Excellence Scholarships, in honor of Cleghorn's
vision and leadership. Faculty member Gene Roberts, former executive
editor of the Philadelphia Inquirer, presented the check to a surprised
Cleghorn during the college's graduation exercises, May 25. The endowed
scholarship fund will provide annual awards for outstanding
undergraduate or graduate students based upon academic merit. A scroll
bearing the name of each contributor was presented to Cleghorn at a
retirement party held June 15 at the National Press Club.
