Title: Natalie L. Haslam Music Center
Location of Proejct: Knoxville, Tennessee
Project Completion Date: September 2013
Firm Name: BarberMcMurry Architects

Short Description: A new consolidated University of Tennessee Music Center to house Band, Instrument, and Vocal studies. Sited away from the architecturally historic center of UT's campus, the Natalie L. Haslam Music Center uses the building to express the nature of music through architecture and detailing. By designing a Music Center which resonates with the creative class, faculty and administrators report that the facility has led to dramatic improvements in recruitment, and the recital hall is widely considered among the top university recital halls in the world.

Architect's Statement: The University sought to coalesce their various music programs under one roof with a faculty inspired vision to create a facility that projected a modern architectural expression to resonate with students pursuing the creative arts. The facility captures and reflects the physical embodiment of music while providing an expressive environment to encourage creativity. Through forms, massing, and details, the architecture mirrors the art of music: ordering tones in succession, in combination, and utilizing relationships to produce a composition having unity and continuity.
 
The site places the Music Center adjacent to an existing Art + Architecture building, both reviled and celebrated for its provocative, modern yet Brutalist, cast-in-place concrete, architectural stance on a “traditional” gothic campus. Given the adjacency, the new Music Center respects the contextual massing, setbacks, and precedents set by the A+A building while combining the materials of typical campus structures within the composition. The overall design provides a dialogue between the provocative, the sublime, and the traditional. Exterior materials of brick and limestone are used to respect the campus context, while the building form projects a modern expression desired by the Music Center faculty.
 
The Music Center is organized around a Recital Hall and large Band Room, each of which is three levels tall. The Faculty Studios, Offices, Classrooms, Rehearsal, and Individual Practice Rooms wrap the building exterior in order to take advantage of natural light and views.
 
The building is certified LEED: Silver and features an array of sustainable design techniques. The site is maximized to provide ample green spaces around the building and is landscaped with drought-tolerant planting. A cistern system collects rainwater for irrigation. Energy and solar path modeling was leveraged to inform glazing selections, building overhangs, and shading strategies to reduce energy use throughout the facility. The resulting analysis dictated a fritted glass pattern that was also deployed to reinforce a lyrical rhythm across the building facades.