School of Music and Dance trying to raise $4.5M more for new dance, opera theater

Students and faculty members of the School of Music and Dance will learn within the next six weeks whether they'll have the funding for a state-of-the-art performance facility on the UA Mall.

Robert Cutietta, the University of Arizona's interim director of the School of Music and Dance, said plans are in the works for a $10.5 million theater that would be added on to the east side of the Ina Gittings building, which sits on the east end of the Mall. An anonymous donor gave the school a $3 million gift earlier this year to help build a new dance facility. That money was then matched by the UA, upping the total to $6 million.

To raise the remaining $4.5 million, the school is looking for more people and families to donate money. A potential hurdle for the plan involves a condition set by the donor when they gave the money to the UA.

Jory Hancock, a professor of dance, said the donor requested that any project funded by their gift had to be completed by January of 2003. In order to accomplish that with the new theater, all funding would have to be locked up by mid-November.