WHEDco receives $2.5M to complete Bronx Music Hall
The South Bronx nonprofi t
Women’s Housing and Economic
Development Corporation
(WHEDco) has received
a $2.5 million grant from The
Andrew W. Mellon Foundation
to complete construction
of the Bronx Music Hall. The
14,000-square-foot music hall
will be the fi rst newly constructed
music performance
venue to open in the Bronx in
more than a half century.
“We are beyond grateful for
the Mellon Foundation’s support,
which will help bring
this decade-long project to
fruition,” said Davon Russell,
WHEDco’s president. “This
grant will allow us to complete
the theatrical fi t-out of a venue
where Bronxites and visitors
from near and afar can enjoy
live, top-notch performances
and connect to the deep history,
infl uences, diversity and
majesty of Bronx music. The
Bronx Music Hall will be a permanent
state-of-the-art community
cultural asset that responds
to historic inequities in
resources that support true, innovative,
community development.”
The Bronx Music Hall is located
at 438 E. 163rd St. within
Bronx Commons—WHEDco’s
newest award-winning
mixed-use affordable housing
development that dedicates a
half-city-block to affordable
housing, education, culture,
health and small business supports.
The music hall, opening
later in 2022, will offer a variety
of fl exible indoor and outdoor
spaces for concerts, fi lm,
dance, live theater and spoken
word events, as well as music
and dance classes.
In addition to the 250-seat
performance theater, the
Bronx Music Hall includes a
green room, studio, multi-use
classroom, lobby to host exhibits,
receptions and events,
and amphitheater-style seating
in two adjacent plazas for
outdoor performances. It will
serve 20,000 in-person audience
members and students
annually at full capacity postpandemic.
“The Bronx Music Hall is
the culmination of more than
a decade of advocacy, engagement,
and planning by Bronx
historians, musicians, planners,
designers, and community
stakeholders. WHEDco’s
investment in cultural infrastructure
within their broader
neighborhood development
and stewardship work will provide
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the space and opportunity
to maintain and elevate the
art, heritage, and culture of a
wide variety of local and diaspora
communities,” said Mellon
Foundation Humanities in
Place program offi cer Justin
Garrett Moore.
Funding from the Mellon
Foundation will allow
WHEDco to fi nish the main
elements of the $15.4 million
Bronx Music Hall, which will
open later in 2022. Specifi cally,
the support will fund back-end
lighting, theatrical power, rigging
and audio control; fi xtures
and equipment including
projectors and instruments; appliances,
furniture, scissor lift,
doors and walls; canopy/marquee,
plaza truss and pagoda;
acoustical treatments for the
main assembly and lobby; portable
seating risers, stage riser
and accessories; audience seating
and comfort; architecture
and theatrical project management
including start-up
and dry-tech. These elements
will complete the Bronx Music
Hall and provide a state-of-theart
venue for a wide variety of
humanities-focused interdisciplinary
The South Bronx nonprofi t Women’s Housing and Economic Development
Corporation has received a $2.5 million grant from The Andrew W. Mellon
Foundation to complete construction of the Bronx Music Hall.
Rendering courtesy Daniel Ynfante
programs.
“The Bronx Music Hall
is the product of hundreds
of hours of conversations
with neighborhood residents,
their elected representatives,
friends and fans of this storied
place,” said Nancy Biberman,
WHEDco’s founder and president
emerita. “Historians documented
each wave of immigrants
who settled in the Bronx
spanning more than a century.
The traditions and rhythms
they carried have endured and
inspired new generations and
new forms of music. Inside and
out, the Bronx Music Hall was
designed to refl ect and showcase
today’s diverse contemporary
culture. Places like this
Music Hall, designed for crosscultural
and civic engagement,
are essential for dialogue, healing
and democracy.”
-Bronx Times
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