Kirkegaard & Associates, the acousticians in charge, use these spring mounts to assure isolation between halls and practice rooms, which are fairly piled on top of one another. With Kirkegaard — veterans of the Carnegie Hall reconstruction, Chicago Orchestra Hall, Tanglewood's Ozawa Hall, and the improvement of Davies Hall — overseeing every aspect of the new building's acoustical preparation, there is a virtual guarantee of the city getting some excellent new music facilities.

Attending the long-ago press conference announcing the school's planned move from the Sunset District to the Civic Center, then seeing the plans and models, did not prepare the visitor for the impact of this huge beehive of music now clearly emerging, even if it's still mostly concrete and wires.

The new Conservatory, an $80 million emporium of music, saves the original 1914 building's façade, pilasters, cornices, and ceiling ribbons, but it squeezes in an unprecedented new wealth of facilities. Those PC30N ceiling hangers, being installed by the project's architect, San Francisco's Simon Martin-Vague Winkelstein Moris (SMWM), will prevent sound "leaking" among the 450-seat concert hall, its 120-seat Osher Salon, a 140-seat recital hall, 44 studios (yes, 44!), 14 classrooms, 33 practice rooms, a 6,500- square foot music library, the percussion suite, the keyboard lab, recording and electronic music studios, academic and administrative offices, more than 40 Steinway and Yamaha pianos, and more ...

Under construction too are the Kimball Green Room for artists preparing for a performance, the Richard and Rhoda Goldman Student Lounge, the Phyllis Wattis Atrium (a three-story high entrance space), and the Milton Salkind Terrace.

Once up and running, the new Conservatory — just minutes away from Davies Symphony Hall, the War Memorial Opera House, Herbst Theatre, et cetera — is expected to be the site of some 300 concerts and recitals annually, including many free student and faculty music events. And yes, there will be a school, too, probably in excess of the current roster of 314 in the collegiate and 430 in the preparatory divisions, plus about 400 taking adult extension classes. The current student body represents 21 countries and 31 states; the international publicity generated by the new building is likely to increase both figures.

At the open house, another point of interest was the makeup of the audience: Just about every San Francisco cultural organization was represented, from the Symphony, to the neighboring S.F. Girls Chorus, to French and Chinese-language schools, to the one-person institution of Frederica von Stade, who — of course — is a busy volunteer on behalf of the school. The Conservatory needs all the help it can get: The school itself must raise $65 million of the new building's cost. Significantly, "only" about $10 million separates the drive from meeting its lofty goal.

Meanwhile, the Conservatory is launching a graphics blitz, festooning the city with banners of swirling red sunrise/sunset images. There is also a new "corporate logo," in which the word "music" appears prominently with the "m" and "u" cut in half, a long vertical line leaning against the "i" — the designers taking a giant step backward, in the direction of the S.F. Opera's now-discarded "wedge." What is it about squeezing perfectly good letters into something almost unrecognizable that appeals to the postmodern temperament?