Music school needs new home after Metrocenter’s closing
For 22 years the Phoenix Conservatory of Music has changed the lives of students, introducing them to aspects of the art form ranging from classical composition to EDM production.
The school helped students like Jude Poorten, 20, who found his love of jazz guitar there and is now a junior at Berklee College of Music in Chandler.
“My freshman year in high school was my first year at PCM and they put me in a jazz program. (Jazz) is now my passion, like, I play it all the time every day,” Poorten said.
He was also recently selected to participate in the Berklee Global Jazz Institute in Boston. The program gives students a chance to use their musicianship as a tool to affect society.
At a time when nearly 1,500 students would normally be participating in its after-school programs and camps, it closed in March due to the new coronavirus pandemic.
And now it has another challenge. The school is inside Metrocenter Mall, which closed permanently in July. So it has to find a new home.
Administrators had less than a month to pack more than a decade’s worth of equipment and move it into storage. The school learned of the mall’s closure on June 19 and had a deadline of July 15 to vacate the premises.
“We’ve been in the mall since 2011 and we’ve seen the decline over the
years, but we thought we were going to have another two years here,” said Regina Nixon, the school’s executive director.
“It was a big shock and we thought we’d have more time, at least more notice.”
What is the Phoenix Conservatory of Music?
PCM is a nonprofit that provides after-school programming, summer camps and private and in-school music lessons to students in schools with large concentrations of low-income students.
In addition to traditional music lessons with an instrument of choice, the school offers programming that exposes students to the behind-the-scenes aspects of the music industry. Enrichment classes teach the life skills needed to have a career as a musician; topics include budgeting, marketing, copyrights and promotion.
“Some students have been in our programs since fourth or fifth grade and they stick all the way through high school. It feels like a second home to them,” said Nixon.
With any big move comes stress. Nixon said parents were notified of the closure and were assured that although the school has to relocate, it intends to thrive in a new location.
“This does not mean anything negative for our students. We will find a place that we will continue with programming,” Nixon said.
‘If it weren’t for PCM’: The success stories
Alumni like Poorten have come back to PCM to help pack and sort instruments, chairs, music stands, drum sets and more, packing away their memories with the closing of each case.
“I probably would have ended up pursuing something different in school if it weren’t for PCM,” Poorten said. “They exposed me to types of music that I would have never gotten into.”
Cian Callahan, 20, is a senior at Arizona State University with a major in jazz performance.
“PCM helped me prepare for the kind of adult business scene when it comes to music making, like interacting with booking agents, house engineers and people who mix the sound,” Callahan said.
“I’m certain that had I not interacted with those people while I was in middle school and high school, thanks to the program, that I’d have a very limited understanding of all of that now and it would be much harder.”
Hopes for a new location
Until the school can find a new permanent location, charter school Phoenix International Academy, 4310 E. Broadway Road, will host the nonprofit.
PCM relies on grant funding and donations. To donate, visit http://www.pcmrocks.org/ ways-to-help/donate.
“Moving is really expensive and this was not an expense we were anticipating,” Nixon said.
The mall provided a safe and easily accessible area where parents could drop off their children. Nixon said any new location will have to be able to host a sometimes noisy school and provide the same sense of safety for parents and students.
“It’s very early days and a real quick turnaround time,” Nixon said, “but I want to make sure that the choice we make is the right one for our community.”