BELL DEAL WORTH $ 10 MILLION
National Music Centre gets new name
Andrew Mosker called it a “gamechanger.” It’s also a name- changer.
On Thursday, the National Music Centre announced a deal that gives the naming rights for its new home being built in Calgary’s East Village to telecommunications giant Bell Canada.
The 12- year, $ 10- million partnership will see the 160,000- squarefoot facility, which is scheduled to open in the spring of 2016, dubbed Studio Bell.
“It’s a huge day, a huge day — a turning point for the National Music Centre,” said Mosker, the president and CEO of the facility, prior to a ceremony at the construction site on Thursday. “It’s a major milestone for us in the development of what we’re doing. It’s really exciting.
“It’s both a reflection, I think, of our emerging presence in Canada and certainly in Calgary, and it’s also, to a certain degree, a legitimization … of our mission and vision as far as our organization.”
“We’re excited about it, because it gives Canada a home for music,” said Bell Canada’s vice- president of corporate marketing, Loring Phinney, after the announcement.
“It’s an opportunity for all Canadians to engage in very innovative ways in this building when it’s ready next spring."
Mosker said the deal, which has been in the works for over two years now, is one that made sense for both parties on a number of levels.
From the centre’s perspective, he called it a “strategic decision,” with Bell not only sharing their vision in supporting and enriching the arts in this country, but being a company with a great history and national reach.
“It’s a great partnership to help spread our message through Canada,” he said.
Phinney agreed, noting the deal made sense because Bell “deliver( s) so much content across so many platforms.”
“So that cultural connection ... it’s important to the fabric of our country,” he said. “We are a Canadian only company so it’s really important for us to celebrate the things that we as Canadians do well — whether it’s film, arts, dance and now music, we really have a chance to participate in every aspect of the arts on a national basis.”
Mosker was also quick to point out that the deal allowed Studio Bell to be the company’s “primary cultural association in Western Canada.” It will join the other major naming partnerships the company has out east, such as the Bell Centre in Montreal, which is hallowed in hockey circles but also “one of the busiest live music venues in North America,” and the Bell Lightbox in Toronto, home to the Toronto International Film Festival.
“When Andrew came to us with this concept and we realized it was in the west, I was like, ‘ What a fantastic thing. Let’s move things around, let’s give all of our country a chance to celebrate,’” said Phinney.
“And there’s a lot of great music from the west.”
The $ 10- million deal also bumps up the total money raised for the completion of the East Village project to $ 125 million. Mosker is hoping that the partnership with Bell will, again, help legitimize what National Music Centre is doing and possibly kick- start more significant financial support from the business and private sectors so that they can reach their $ 168- million goal.
“We believe that that’s going to invite other people to the table in the line of conversations with us to get involved, both from a partnering perspective and from a fund development perspective,” he said. “We see this as a major instigator or strategy in fulfilling the rest of fund development campaign.”
On a programming note, the centre had another announcement to celebrate on Thursday — that Canadian rock legend Randy Bachman would loan the organization the guitar he wrote the classic hit American Woman on.
Bachman, in town for a Friday night concert at the Deerfoot Inn and Casino to support his new album Heavy Blues, performed a short set — the first in the new building — during the announcement including, perhaps prophetically, a version of the song You Ain’t Seen Nothing Yet.
Mosker said the relationship with the musician is one that began when he met Bachman at an event at Massey Hall four years ago. It has, over that time, “continued to deepen and strengthen.” When the agreement he had with the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland to display the rare Gibson 1959 Les Paul ended, the “proud western Canadian boy” was more than happy to lend it to the Calgary centre.
“I’ve got to applaud Calgary for taking the steps, I mean this has been going on for four or five or six years,” Bachman said after his performance in the unfinished building, also acknowledging that many other centres around Canada over the years had discussed similar projects.
“They had a dream, they had an idea, I told them I support it, and I know Neil Young said the same thing — Gordon Lightfoot, a lot of other people said they support it.
“When you have enough people that believe in the dream, it ain’t a dream any more, it becomes reality and everybody goes, ‘ Oh, wow, my God, how did this happen?’
“A bunch of people shared a dream.”
Mosker said that with Bachman sharing his iconic instrument, which has been valued at more than $ 1 million, it will go a long way in helping contribute to the organization’s goal of telling the stories of this country’s musicians while hopefully creating more.
“It will live here and people can enjoy it and learn from it and be inspired by it,” he said.
As for the musician’s onstage promise to return and perform during the grand opening of Studio Bell and, perhaps, one day record in the facilities, Mosker wouldn’t rule that out. “I think Randy’s relationship with us going forward is going to be a really fruitful one, with lots of programming opportunities and surprises to come,” he said.
“Again, it’s a huge day for the National Music Centre.”