The Setnor School of Music has taken on the task of raising $2.5 million to become one of a select number of music schools to practice and perform exclusively on Steinway pianos.

The College of Visual and Performing Arts has launched the initiative to help the Rose, Jules R. and Stanford S. Setnor School of Music have all its pianos built and designed by Steinway and Sons, a piano company that stands as one of the last companies to produce hand-crafted pianos. To become an all-Steinway school, Setnor will need to purchase 67 pianos in the next few years.

“By becoming an all-Steinway school, an institution demonstrates its commitment to excellence on every level when it comes to the study of music,” said Sally Coveleskie, national director of institutional sales at Steinway. “When students are looking to choose a school to attend they may look at the all-Steinway school roster to see who has these instruments where they can study.”

VPA launched this initiative this month at an all-piano concert that showcased performances from piano faculty as well as undergraduate and graduate representatives. The fundraising concert was arranged by Setnor associate professor of piano Steven Heyman and featured solo performances as well as duets and group arrangements. In the past few years, the Crouse College has been able to replace some of its pianos with Steinway pianos, but the initiative did not truly begin until the night of the all-piano concert.

Plans for this initiative have been in place for years, but issues with climate conditions like heating and humidity in the historic Crouse College building have hindered the process, Heyman said. To become an all-Steinway school, certain qualifications must be met to house the delicate handcrafted pianos that Steinway creates.

“Steinway has very strict rules about who can become a Steinway school,” Heyman said. “A couple of years ago due to climate issues in the building we were not even able to be considered to be a Steinway school but those have been corrected and we’re very happy and grateful to those who were able to make that happen.”

According to a news release from VPA, SU alumna Jennie Berkson will chair the Setnor Steinway initiative. Berkson and her husband, SU Board of Trustees member David Edelstein, have already contributed a lead gift of a nine-foot Steinway concert grand piano — the largest Steinway model. This is now being built and will be placed in the Setnor auditorium. VPA is looking to raise additional funds through alumni and friends of VPA and the Setnor School.

If Setnor does complete the initiative, it will be added on to the “All-Steinway School Worldwide Roster,” which currently includes approximately 160 other colleges and universities internationally.

“It’s really exciting to have the prestige of being an all-Steinway school and just to be able to practice and perform on the best pianos,” said Julia Tucker, a graduate piano performance major. “We spend all day practically in the practice rooms and to be able to have these amazing pianos available to us will be really quite fantastic.”

Due to the large size of the initiative, no date has been set for the initiative to be completed, and the school only has plans to purchase two more Steinway pianos this year, Heyman said. Regardless, Coveleskie — Steinway’s national institutional sales director — is excited about Syracuse’s initiative to become an all-Steinway school.

“Steinway and Sons will be deeply honored when Syracuse University becomes an all-Steinway school,” she said. “This is an institution that is already well known for its excellence in programs, faculty and academics and now the students and faculty at Syracuse University will have the instruments that they need to support these already exceptional efforts.”

Published on November 21, 2013 at 1:28 am

Contact Margaret: mglin@syr.edu