Unbeknownst to many outside of the music program, the second story of the new music building contains hallways filled with individual soundproof practice rooms. Most rooms have a piano.
The largest of these rooms is Practice Room 1, which is roughly half the size of a normal classroom. Containing two pianos — a black Suzuki and a wooden Yamaha — it is an ideal room to practice duets.
Like some of the other practice rooms, Practice Room 1 also has automatic doors, allowing musicians with large instruments to push a button to open the door rather than having to use their occupied hands.
Also, since the music department is still moving into the new building, there are boxes and storage cabinets scattered throughout the room. There is also a stack of chairs in the corner of the room. The chairs allow non-pianists to practice their instruments and friends to sit together and hang out.
One of these sophomores is Alex Mah, a baritone saxophone player for the Symphonic Wind Ensemble. According to Mah, the new practice room is much bigger and nicer than the previous rooms they had in the old music building.
Also, the new practice rooms have built-in metronomes and tuners that are attached to the walls — a huge convenience.
Mah said he uses the practice rooms whenever he is assigned a new piece of music, and he also sees it as a good spot to hang out with his other band friends as they both play music and socialize. Among these friends is sophomore Joshua Yoon, a piano player and a member of the trumpet section in the Symphonic Wind Ensemble.
Yoon said he enjoys the soundproof nature of the room because it allows him and his friends to have conversations in privacy without the interruption of other noises. Also, it allows them to be noisy without disturbing others.
Besides practicing, the musicians snack, chat, and play mobile phone games, all of which usually results in a chaotic and lively environment.
“Imagine one person playing the piano and three others crowding around him, trying to mess him up,” Yoon said. “Two others are blasting rap music through their phones, and everyone else is telling them to shut up. That’s what a typical tutorial would be like. Thank goodness these rooms are soundproof.”
