Glenn Korff School of Music dedicates renovated Westbrook Music Building
Our BNIM team is honored to help celebrate the dedication ceremony for the University of Nebraska-Lincoln Glenn Korff School of Music’s Westbrook Music Building on October 1st!
The new Glenn Korff School of Music’s Westbrook Music Building is a premiere creative center for music and dance excellence, redefining what it means to be a collaborative, inclusive, and healthy environment for performing arts education.
Read the full press release, “Westbrook Music Building to be dedicated Oct. 1” below:
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September 25, 2026
Originally published by Hixson-Lied College of Fine and Performing Arts Glenn Korff School of Music
Lincoln, Neb.—The University of Nebraska–Lincoln’s Westbrook Music Building will be dedicated on Thursday, Oct. 1 at 4 p.m. in the atrium of the new building, which is located at 10th and Q streets in Lincoln. The event is free and open to the public.
The event will feature remarks by University of Nebraska President Jeffrey P. Gold, M.D.; Interim Chancellor Katherine S. Ankerson; Hixson-Lied College of Fine and Performing Arts Dean Andrew Belser; and undergraduate student James Rasser, of Papillion, Nebraska; as well as a special performance of “Nebraska Fanfare” by the University Singers, under the direction of Professor and Director of Choral Activities Peter Eklund.
The new Westbrook Music Building is an $81 million, 103,000-square-foot, state-of-the-art facility that replaces the former Westbrook Music Building, which opened in 1967. It is home to the Glenn Korff School of Music.
The project was made possible by $75 million in support from the Nebraska Legislature through LB 384, a deferred maintenance bill.
Belser said the new building creates opportunities for collaboration and innovation.
“With spaces such as our new recording studio and immersive performance environment, Westbrook creates opportunities for musicians to collaborate with filmmakers, emerging media artists, designers, sound engineers, visual artists and others across our college and university,” he said. “The future of creative work belongs increasingly to people who can move across disciplines, bring different perspectives together and imagine possibilities that none of them could create alone. This building gives our students a place to do exactly that.”
Designed by BNIM of Kansas City and Sinclair Hille Architects of Lincoln, the new building features acoustical design by Kirkegaard Associates.
Glenn Korff School of Music Interim Director Tony Bushard said the new building has energized faculty and staff in the school.
“With ample daylight shining in and plenty of new spaces for students and faculty to gather and create community, it has been a joy to watch faculty and students make themselves at home in the new building,” Bushard said. “It’s very exciting to think about what new kinds of music-making and community engagement will happen in this building.”
Music has been a part of the University of Nebraska–Lincoln since 1894. Westbrook Music Building is named for Arthur E. Westbrook, who served the university as director of the School of Fine Arts, professor of music and chair of the Department of Music from 1938 until his retirement in the 1950s. In 2013, the School of Music was renamed the Glenn Korff School of Music following a transformational $8 million gift to the University of Nebraska Foundation to support the School of Music by University of Nebraska alumnus Glenn Korff, who died in 2013.