London’s Guildhall School of Music Receives Half a Million Pounds

The school will use the funding to renovate and update its electronic music studio

London’s Guildhall School of Music & Drama has secured nearly £500,000 to fund the remodeling of the studio and teaching spaces for its Electronic & Produced Music (EPM) department. 

The financial support will enable the Guildhall School to accommodate over 200 students in state-of-the-art studio facilities across its growing EPM programs and electives, including Film Music, Game Audio, Songwriting, and Live Electronics. 

Beginning this summer, 120 square meters of the School’s Silk Street building will be remodeled into acoustically isolated and controlled spaces for specialist teaching and practice. The school will also purchase and install equipment for the new studios. 

From September 2024, Guildhall will welcome an expanded cohort of EPM students into the enhanced building. Currently, Guildhall is the only major educational institution for EPM training in conservatoires — the new facilities will also establish the school as “a global market leader in this field.”

A breakdown of the funding includes £200,000 from the Wolfson Foundation, £100,000 from the Foyle Foundation, and £50,000 from the Garfield Weston Foundation. A further £137,500 was provided by The Guildhall School Trust; additionally, the Guildhall School will be investing £125,000 in essential new hardware and software. 

Guildhall is also continuing to raise funds to ensure the completion of the remodeling project, and will be announcing further financial support as it occurs. 

“This is a major investment in Guildhall School’s infrastructure,” said Guildhall School’s Vice-Principal and Director of Music, Armin Zanner in the press release. “It’s also an investment in our vision for the future of conservatoire music training — bringing new forms of performing arts presentation for a digital age together with the traditions of performance and composition for which we have long been renowned. We are deeply grateful for the financial support of all four foundations and trusts, enabling our Electronic & Produced Music students to take their rightful place in high-spec working spaces at the heart of our community.” 

“I’m extremely grateful for this generous support, which will bring so many benefits to our diversifying student body,” added Mike Roberts, Guildhall School’s Head of Electronic & Produced Music. “The value of state-of-the art mixing and editing spaces, tailored to the specific needs and expectations of our high-tech artistic pathways, cannot be overstated. This development represents a significant milestone in the School's ability to provide the highest level of training for our students by placing the necessary ‘instruments’ of our practice within their reach. The new studios will greatly increase the amount of time our students can spend refining their artistic output in an environment that meets and exceeds the expectations of the industry into which they can emerge as pioneering artists.”