So really, no musical hall of fame. That was the entrance.
They hyped up the thing so much, Kyle Rae bragged about snatching it up for Yonge St. and then ... POOF! it's gone without any mention.
Not sure if you saw this...
MUSIC
Hall of Fame seeks space in Hummingbird Centre
Talks are under way for museum to move from online to bricks and mortar
JAMES ADAMS
July 28, 2007
The Canadian Music Hall of Fame wants to make its home in a revamped Hummingbird Centre in downtown Toronto and serious discussions are under way to turn that hope into reality, at a cost of perhaps as much as $30-million.
Talks at this stage are "exploratory," Hummingbird CEO Dan Brambilla stressed this week. But the push is on to have some sort of agreement in place by late October or early November. Key for Brambilla is that the Hall of Famers "have to come up with a pre-determined amount of money by then." He declined to specify that amount.
The city-owned Hummingbird, former home of the Canadian Opera Company and the National Ballet of Canada, is on the cusp of a $200-million renovation and "re-branding." Included in the project is a 49-storey condominium tower designed by superstar architect Daniel Libeskind, scheduled to start construction next summer, as well as an interactive, multicultural Arts and Heritage Centre to be built as part of a seven-storey podium.
City council has already approved the revamp. But the Music Hall of Fame -- until now an online museum -- was not part of the package councillors okayed. The city understood the hall was going to be part of the Toronto Life Square project in the Yonge-Dundas district.
However, last summer the hall's major sponsors, the Canadian Academy of Recording Arts and Sciences and the Canadian Songwriters Hall of Fame, quietly dropped that plan for what one source calls "a variety of business reasons ... Putting the hall there was like trying to fit a square peg in a round hole in terms of the commercial lease business negotiations around a not-for-profit organization with charitable status." Instead, they contracted a Hamilton lawyer and consultant to confidentially firm up a "preferred site," raise funds to that end and negotiate a deal.
The irony here is that the negotiator, Jasper Kujavsky, was the prime mover behind Hamilton's 2004 bid to get the Music Hall of Fame built on that city's waterfront for an estimated $30-million. Hamilton, Winnipeg and Toronto ended up as finalists in the competition organized by CARAS - but in May, 2005, the nod went to Toronto for a proposed 5,130-square-metre hall in Toronto Life Square, at a cost of $38-million. (The square is scheduled to open this year.) Another irony is that Brambilla broached the idea of including the Music Hall of Fame in his building four years ago, shortly after the former Livent Inc. executive was hired to shape a new future for the 47-year-old Hummingbird. But "the music people went off on a different track and I went off on a different track," Brambilla said.
Now, declares Kujavsky, "being part of the Hummingbird redevelopment is the perfect place for the perfect project," not least because of it's kitty-corner location to the Hockey Hall of Fame, a major tourist draw. Admittedly, "the configuration of the hall needs to be discussed," Kujavsky noted. "The concept of our discussions is how you incorporate the Canadian Music Hall of Fame [into the new Hummingbird] ... without affecting any of the material elements of Dan Brambilla's plan approved by the City of Toronto."
If the Hall is included in the new Hummingbird, it almost certainly will occupy a smaller space than what was proposed for Toronto Life Square, Kujavsky said, adding: "I always felt [5,130 square metres] was too large." As a result, he and Brambilla think the Hall can fit into the new Hummingbird's approved configuration. "If it means losing a restaurant or a banquet facility or something like that," said Brambilla, "no one's going to care."
Like Brambilla, Kujavsky wouldn't say how much money he needs to raise in the next little while, although he expected the capital cost of including the Hall of Fame in the Hummingbird likely would be between $25- and $30-million. Initial fundraising will be done through the private sector. "We are not speaking to any level of government, not at this stage," Kujavsky remarked. (Brambilla, by contrast, has been pumping both the provincial and federal governments for a total of $30-million for his project.)
"Right now we're nuancing through the process.... I fully intend to see this thing really intensify after Labour Day [Sept. 3] and within two months of that, once we're deep in the fall, I want this done," said Kujavsky. "I hope people are excited, that the prospect of this sounds so positive that everyone will want to be part of it."
