Thursday the Buffalo foundation community gathered to celebrate
one of their most venerable members at the site of one of its early and most
visible successes–Kleinhans Music Hall.
In 1934 when Edward and Mary Kleinhans died, they left their
fortune from their downtown clothing business (founded in 1893 in the Brisbane
Building, it was part of downtown Buffalo for a century) to create a first-rate
music hall for the community. With Mother’s Day this weekend, it should
be noted that, in making this bequest, they cited their mothers’ love of music
as an inspiration. But to whom to entrust such a large sum (a million
dollars), and community-spirited vision? To the Buffalo Foundation, of
course–the precursor of the Community Foundation for Greater Buffalo.
Throughout the next eight years, the Buffalo Foundation convened
a citizens committee to select the site, and held an international design competition,
which resulted in the choice of Finish-born Eliel Saarinen as the architect.
As fortune would have it, his son Eero, who was just embarking on an
architectural career, which would eclipse his father’s, collaborated with his
father on the Kleinhans project. The result was such a beautiful and
iconic design (not to mention a landmark of acoustic perfection) that it would
later be chosen by the National Parks Service as singularly representative
Saarinen work nationwide.
Clotilde Perez-Bode Dedecker, President and CEO of the Community
Foundation, talked about the community debate that raged throughout the 1930’s
over where to build the music hall. “The more things change, the more
they stay the same,” she said with a wry nod to the ability of modern
Buffalonians to talk and debate public projects to death–and that was before
blogs! There were over 25 sites considered before the site of the Avery
homestead (donated to the people of Buffalo) on what was then known simply as “the
Circle” was chosen.
Catherine Schweitzer, Executive Director of the Baird
Foundation, and current board chair of Kleinhans Music Hall, filled us in on
the pivotal role of Esther Link, whose persistence and vision led to the
ultimate selection of the Saarinens as architects. Link was a high school
music teacher–and apparently, something of a force of nature–who had traveled
widely in Europe and was up on the latest in architecture and architects.
Unimpressed and even alarmed by the more traditional designs being proposed,
she convinced the architectural selection committee that the kind of
architecture practiced by Saarinen would result in creation of a building that
not only they, but their children would enjoy and be proud of.
And was Esther ever right on. When Kleinhans Music Hall
was designated a National Historic Landmark, it was one year shy of the 50 year
age normally required for consideration for such an honor. At its
opening, when a Buffalo newspaper asked Eliel Saarinen why he hadn’t chosen a
more “classical” design (compare to Memorial Auditorium, which was designed and
built nearly concurrently), his response was classic: “Because we are not
Greeks!”
Alphonso O’Neil-White of the Community Foundation board told me
that he sees Kleinhans as a magnificent and wonderful asset, and they considers
it fitting that the National Trust for Historic Preservation will be holding
its 2011 conference in Buffalo. Alphonso and Catherine Schweitzer, who is
also the board chair of Preservation Buffalo-Niagara,
unveiled a plaque in Kleinhans lobby commemorating the role of the Community
Foundation in the creation of Kleinhans.
All of those offering remarks agreed that the creation of
Kleinhans Music Hall still offers lessons to Buffalo today of the benefits of
the community working together for common purpose.
In
addition to installing the plaque, Kleinhans and the Buffalo Philharmonic Orchestra will pay tribute to the Community Foundation’s role in
their history with a Brahms Double Concerto, on Saturday, May 9, 2009 at “CFGB
Night at Kleinhans.” For ticketing information, call 716.885.5000.