Universal Hub: Boston music crisis: Another large rehearsal space set to close, this time in Charlestown, councilor says

Published in Universal Hub on January 25, 2023; By adamg

On the heels of the shutdown of the Sound Museum in Brighton, the owner of the Charlestown Rehearsal Studio on Terminal Street in Charlestown plans to kick out the musicians who now practice there by June so it can turn the building into a self-storage facility, City Councilor Gabriela Coletta (Charlestown, North End, East Boston) said today.

That could leave up to 1,100 musicians with no place to rehearse - and, when coupled with the Sound Museum closure, would leave Boston with no large rehearsal spaces at all - she said at a City Council meeting.

The council agreed to a request by Coletta and Councilors Liz Breadon (Allston/Brighton) and Tania Fernandes Anderson (Roxbury) to look at ways to help city musicians. Without places to practice, "we are going to lose our artistic community," Breadon said. In their formal request, they wrote:

Boston is home to many incredible artists like New Edition, Aerosmith, Oompa, and many of the upcoming artists who attend the Berklee College of Music. Our city loses many of these artists to Los Angeles and New York because of the lack of resources and support provided by the City of Boston.

Coletta said that R.J. Kelly Co., which owns the current Charlestown Rehearsal Studio at 50 Terminal St., wants the building vacated by June 1. The building now has 95 separate facilities, which tend to be shared by between 5 and 14 musicians or groups.

IQHQ, a California developer that is tearing down the Sound Museum building for a life-sciences complex, says it has acquired another Allston building for Sound Museum musicians, but that building needs to be renovated for musician use first.

City Councilor Frank Baker noted work to bring some of the Allston musicians to Dorchester in a former broadcast building on Morrissey Boulevard.