Two of the most esteemed music schools in the country will soon be joining forces, as officials from both the Berklee College of Music and the Boston Conservatory announced Friday that the programs would be merging in the near future. The spacial issues involved with combining two campuses won't be too much of a problem, as both are blocks from each other in the Fenway neighborhood of Boston.
"Our goal is threefold," said Roger Brown, president of Berklee, in a statement. "We want to attract the most talented, creative, and motivated students in the world; offer them a challenging, cutting-edge experience; and give them the best possible chance to succeed as professionals."
Richard Ortner, president of the Boston Conservatory, shared similar sentiments.
"Increasingly, our Conservatory students live in a global community," he said. "They want access to the rich performance traditions of other cultures and other genres, as well as access to industry-standard digital infrastructure," said Conservatory President Richard Ortner. "Berklee offers exactly that global outlook and that range of opportunity, right here in our shared four-block campus. Together, we form an unbeatable incubator for student and faculty creativity."
Officials reported to Billboard that the merger would be completed as early as 2016. No official title has been given, although we would imagine that neither school would yield its name entirely. The governing boards of each school signed a memorandum of understanding earlier in June, and now a structuring program for the merger will be created.
Berklee was ranked the no. 2 music school in the world in a ranking done last year by The Hollywood Reporter, thanks to more than 300 Grammys won by its alumni. Although the Boston Conservatory was not within the Top 25, the merger could give Berklee a further advantage over in-town rival the New England Conservatory, which placed at no. 6.
