SONIC JUBILANCE by Jeremy W.
A day at the new Edward and Joyce Linde Music Building at MIT
Banjos & Basements: A Brief History of Music at MIT
Music has been part of MIT since the Institute’s earliest chapters. By 1884, 23 years after MIT was founded, the Banjo Club and the Glee Club had been officially launched. The October 22, 1884 issue of The Tech confirmed that, “An instrumental orchestra, consisting of first and second violins, violas, ‘cellos, flutes, first and second cornets, clarinet, trombone and double bass,” was in the process of forming, as well. On November 19, 1884, The Tech reported the first “official” musical space on the MIT campus (then located in Boston’s Back Bay):
The Glee Club and Orchestra are so fortunate as to have secured a room in the Institute for holding their rehearsals this year. The room in the basement of the new building, occupied by the architects as a studio for water-color sketching and life class, and as a recitation-room, is to be heated and lighted, and, through the kindness of President Walker, the musical societies will be permitted to place a piano there, and at certain hours to hold rehearsals. The great advantages of having a room in the Institute itself are apparent, and these, together with the fact of the far greater interest felt by the students this year than that which was shown last, give a bright prospect of success.
Unfortunately, a year later the orchestra was disbanded due to lack of support, and for the next several decades—which marked MIT’s move from Boston to Cambridge—the MIT orchestra disbanded and reformed several times.
It wasn’t until 1947 with the transformational arrival of conductor Klaus Liepmann, MIT’s first first ever full-time music professor, that the foundation of MIT’s music program would begin to form. For the next quarter-century, Liepmann would put in motion a thriving music program at MIT, supported by funding from the Institute, that built the foundation for the world-class, conservatory-quality music program we have today.
On May 23, 1947, the revitalized MIT Symphony orchestra put on a spring concert. As reported by The Tech:
The M.I.T. Symhony orchestra will be heard for the first time under its new conductor Mr. Klaus Liepmann…The orchestra been enlarged since its last concert and this program represents an ambitious undertaking for a college orchestra. The success of this concert will have much to do with formulating future plans.
Ambitious, indeed. The program included Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 1 (featuring Arnold Judson ’47 as the soloist), Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 2, Mozart’s Symphony No. 35, and Strauss’s Kaiser-Walzer, Op. 437 (Emperor Waltz).
The orchestra performed in the auditorium of Rindge Technical High School in Cambridge (today known as Cambridge Rindge and Latin School). Six years later, MIT would break ground on Kresge Auditorium, the 1,200-seat performance hall and “meetinghouse of MIT.”
Music at MIT Today
Fast-forward to 2025: the opening of the Edward and Joyce Linde Music Building, the first facility on the MIT campus dedicated solely to music! Today, more than 1,500 MIT students take music classes each year, and hundreds of student musicians participate in one of MIT’s 30 performance ensembles—but until now, there has never been a centralized facility at MIT for music instruction, experimentation, and rehearsal.
More than 140 years since the Institute’s first orchestra gathered in the basement of a building in Boston’s Back Bay (and nearly 80 years since welcoming our first professor of music) we finally have a dedicated home to consolidate the rich variety of musical activities that take place at MIT. A cause for celebration!
To mark the historic opening of the Linde Music Building—and to kick off Artfinity: The MIT Festival of the Arts—MIT presented SONIC JUBILANCE, a performance featuring a range of vocal and instrumental ensembles spanning jazz, classical, and traditional music of Senegal and Bali. Set in the acoustically-immaculate Thomas Tull Concert Hall, the concert featured world premieres of four remarkable new pieces: John Harbison’s Two Noble Kinsmen, Charles Shadle’s Grace, Miguel Zenón’s Summit, and Keeril Makan’s Madrigal.
Music Building Open House
In the afternoon leading up to the much-anticipated SONIC JUBILANCE concert, the Linde Building opened its doors to the public for an open house, with performances by jazz and chamber ensembles and interactive workshops for Balinese Gamelan (led by Gusti Komin) and Senegalese drumming (led by Lamine Touré). I arrived at the Linde building at 1:30 PM, exploring the lobby that conjoins the facility’s three halls.
Even though I was early, I still wasn’t able to get a seat to the standing-room-only jazz performance held in the Jae S. and Kyuho Lim Music Maker Pavilion. Standing in the back didn’t detract from the experience at all; with the remarkable acoustics in the space I could hear every detail of each performer with striking clarity.
After the first piece in the jazz set, I snuck out to explore the Beatrice and Stephen Erdely Music and Culture Space. After first taking off my shoes (as instructed by the sign at the entrance) I slide into the hall to find Lamine Touré leading a West African drum workshop in the style of his renowned ensemble, Rambax MIT. I enjoyed the energizing sounds of the sabar drum beats for a few minutes before hopping across the lobby to the Thomas Tull Concert Hall to check in on the MIT Laptop Ensemble (FaMLE) soundcheck.
As a musician and sound nerd myself, I often enjoy soundchecks and rehearsals more than the performances themselves—so I was excited for the opportunity to observe FaMLE set up their rig in the new hall outfitted with an insane set of speakers. Here’s a quick compilation of some of the footage I grabbed while FaMLE ran their soundcheck.
During the FaMLE performance, director Ian Hattwick and his students experimented live using a few methods of digital music performance: generating music through code, looping music samples created live on pads and keyboards, and collaborating in real-time to produce lush sonic scapes that took full advantage of the surround-sound setup. Honestly, I could have gone home after this performance and been more than satisfied with the day.
SONIC JUBILANCE
My musical cup was already full just from the open house performances and workshops in the afternoon…but this was just the beginning. There were several more hours of music to enjoy later that evening at the main concert event.
Around 7 PM, my colleague Trinidad and I arrived back at the Linde Building just as a winter storm began to blanket Cambridge in snow. After we snagged great seats in the second row (behind all the Music and Theater Arts faculty!), I took a few minutes to explore the upper level of the hall.
What unfolded for the next two hours was an overwhelming display of creativity and talent— and thankfully, you can enjoy a recording of the concert on both MIT’s Facebook page and the MIT Music and Theater Arts website.
I did manage to capture a few moments on video, which I’ll share below. These clips include the world premiere of Summit by Grammy Award-winning, MacArthur Genius Miguel Zenón (timestamp 1:14:40 on the concert livestream), beautiful shadows cast by the MIT Wind Ensemble Flutes (timestamp 1:59:50), and the world premiere of Keeril Makan’s Madrigal, featuring violinist Natalie Lin-Douglas (timestamp 2:16:50). Madrigal was a clear highlight of the evening for me.
To introduce Madrigal before its world premiere, Keeril offered some remarks about the inspiration behind the piece:
As part of any MIT capital project there is a commission for a new piece of art, and Joyce [Linde] was part of that selection committee that chose Sanford Biggers to create the sculpture Madrigal that you greet, that greets you at the front of the building. A madrigal is Renaissance composition—multi-voiced—which inspired Sanford in his work to create something that is multifaceted. No matter what angle you look at the work, you see something new, and your own perspective is prioritized over any one point of view. I found this inspiring for my piece, which you’ll hear now…
The piece features Natalie Lin-Douglas as the solo violinist in the center of the stage, with several student musicians perched around the upper-level of the hall. Natalie is lit dramatically on four sides, casting a prismatic display of shadows around her, while the supporting musicians glow softly in the rafters above. As the soloist produces a succession of stark, percussive bursts and romantic lamentations, the musicians above repeat the same motifs, creating a disorienting surround-sound effect. Like the sculpture that inspired the piece, Madrigal has no clear static focal point, visually or aurally. Instead, a swirl of sound and light places each listener at their own sensory anchor point.
To me, Madrigal is the perfect metaphor for music at MIT: multi-voiced, always changing, and unique to every listener. And if history is any guide, music will continue to be a fundamental part of MIT in the chapters that lie ahead.