St David’s Hall which has been allowed to deteriorate over several years, has been privatised by the city council and will now be shut for the foreseeable future for extensive repairs.
That leaves the BBC National Orchestra of Wales without a performing venue.
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No it doesn’t – they have a perfectly good performing space at Hoddinott Hall, their studio in the Millennium Centre. Audience capacity there is much less than at St David’s Hall (350 as against 2,000), of course, and some works may be tricky to accommodate: Mahler 3 had to be postponed for the opening of the season, but an alternative programme using the same soloist (singing Mahler!) was given instead. I can imagine that visiting orchestras may be less willing to play other than in St David’s Hall – though there’s the Brangwyn Hall in Swansea, and the main auditorium at the Millennium Centre might sometimes be available – but to say that the BBC NOW is left ‘without a performing venue’ is far from the truth. As for St David’s Hall, the way it has been dealt with by Cardiff Council is a disgrace and a major blow to the cultural life of Wales – and in the capital city of all places! (Sorry, I think I’m going to have to go and lie down . . . )
Not to mention Royal Welsh, The New Theatre, The Sherman and Llandaff Cathedral. BBC NOW has good options to keep its programming strong for the next couple of years. It is a complete and utter failing on the part of the SDC management though not to have planned for this scenario in advance.
My company were talking about RAAC and concrete renewal in 2010…
St David’s Hall was built on the cheap for only £12million on a cramped site, it was unsatisfactory from the day it opened, and now looks a mess. Despite this it puts on a huge range of entertainment and is excellent for classical music concerts. Pop music gets all the money in Cardiff with plans to spend £300 million on an unneeded Arena building in the Bay. The centre of Cardiff with swathes of empty shops, fast food outlets, bars and dodgy clubs has become a dump and is best avoided.
Well, if it hadn’t been for the emergency review of public buildings to see if they’d been constructed using RAAC (Reinforced aerated autoclaved concrete), St David’s Hall may still have been open, but in danger of sudden catastrophic failure. Safety last unfortunately – the potential for disaster from this material identified far too late.
This was known as far back as 2020 yet concerts have been allowed to continue.
Work on it then would have been completed by now as I believe it only affects part of the roof.