A retired University professor is meeting with the Eugene City Council tonight in hopes of persuading them to reopen the Atrium Building downtown, which once hosted free musical performances for the public on weekends but has closed down for unspecified security reasons.
Associate Professor Emeritus Orval Etter is a founding member and organizer of the Emerald Chamber Players, a program of amateur ensemble groups that perform free light classical music throughout public and private locations. He said he hopes his pitch to the City Council will move them to discuss reopening the building on weekends for the groups to perform.
Etter, a longtime cello player, said he started the Emerald Chamber Players in 1962 in order to perform with fellow amateur musicians. The ensembles have since performed
in community centers, residential centers, City Hall and the Hult Center for the Performing Arts and performed regular summer concerts in Washburne Park.
The ensembles began performing for free in the Atrium 30 years ago and also hosted solo performances and concerts in the building until Jan. 2006, when the building was closed for the weekends.
Etter said the Atrium Building courtyard was an ideal place for the ensembles to perform because of the natural acoustics. He said he tried to contact officials in the building to find out why the building was closed but was unsuccessful in getting a response.
Etter said the ensembles have alternative places to perform, but he would like the Atrium to remain as a concert venue.
“It is an asset of the city that most people don’t realize is there,” Etter said. “I see one of the functions of the Emerald Chamber Players to be to make the government realize that they’ve got an asset and not get rid of it.”