Until very recently, Mariano Salcedo, a fourth-year MIT electronic engineering and computer science student majoring in artificial intelligence and decision-making, was planning to apply for a master’s program in computer science at MIT. Then he saw the new Edward and Joyce Linde Music Building, which opened this fall for a selection of classes. “Now, instead of going into computer science, I’m thinking of applying for the master’s program in Music Technology, which is being offered here for the first time next year,” says Salcedo. “The decision is definitely linked to the building, and what the building says about music at MIT.”
Scheduled to open fully in February 2025, the Linde Music Building already makes a bold and elegant visual statement. But its most powerful impact will likely be heard as much as seen. Each of the facility’s elements, including the Thomas Tull Concert Hall, every performance and rehearsal space, each classroom, even the stainless-steel metal panels that form the conic canopies over the cube-like building’s three entrances — has been conceived and constructed to create an ideal environment for music.
Students are already enjoying the ideal acoustics and customized spaces of the Linde Music Building, even as construction on the site continues. Within the building’s thick red-brick walls, they study subjects ranging from Electronic Music Composition to Conducting and Score Reading to Advanced Music Performance. Myriad musical groups, from the MIT jazz combos to the Balinese Gamelan and the Rambax Senegalese Drum Ensemble, explore and enjoy their new and improved homes, as do those students who will create and perfect the next generation of music production hardware and software.
“For many of us at MIT, music is very close to our hearts,” notes MIT President Sally Kornbluth. “And the new building now puts music right at the heart of the campus. Its exceptional practice and recording spaces will give MIT musicians the conservatory-level tools they deserve, and the beautiful performance hall will exert its own gravitational pull, drawing audiences from across campus and the larger community who love live music.”
