Schenectady County Community College now has a building that reflects the caliber of the music program it hopes to present, and it is striking a chord with faculty members. Students are already sitting in the lounge area with laptops open and coffee in hand in the college’s new music building, which is a $3.9 million, 12,600-square-foot addition to the current facility. The addition connects to the current music wing, which has also received several updates in the project. Construction started in the spring of 2011 and was nearly completed before the start of this semester. The Dormitory Authority of the State of New York and Schenectady County provided equal funding for the project, with the college shouldering the cost to outfit the modern facility. As SCCC School of Music Chair William Meckley showed off the new space on Tuesday, Sept. 11, he was brimming with happiness and a smile rarely left his face. He called the project “The Great Leap Forward.” “It has changed actually the whole mood of the place, just having a facility like this,” Meckley said. “It also makes the faculty feel good because it makes them feel like people have confidence in what they are doing. To step up like this is quite a big deal.” College Board of Trustees Chairwoman Denise Murphy McGraw said the project has been a “10-year labor of love” for college administrators and faculty. The first floor of the new building has teaching studios, an industry-standard live recording studio, two specialized music classrooms, faculty offices and a student lounge. The second floor includes a recording studio with a separate control room, recital space, teaching studios and faculty offices. The addition is rounded off with eight additional practice rooms and a new façade with towering windows. Construction and outfitting of the recording studio and control room were still ongoing, with workers installing the bamboo floor in the studio on Sept. 11. The new combination space will offer students a place not only in the studio performing, but also wielding the mixing board. On the first floor, there are classrooms offering students digital training in recording and music notation. The college is using Avid Pro Tools for the music production software and Sibelius for notation software. Since the industry has become more digitally focused, it has made keeping up with current technology more affordable. “In the recording studio, it used to be with electronics every five years you got to (replace it), now it is buy new software,” Meckley said. “We are still going to invest significantly in electronics, but so much more of it now is just buy the new software, which is not inexpensive, but it is not like replacing racks and racks of electronics.” The new student housing being offered at SCCC, which Meckley said was a barrier before with the program, complements the new building. He said many students would visit the campus, but a lack of housing would be a deal breaker for people outside of the area. College officials and local representatives formally unveiled the new building with a ribbon cutting ceremony on Wednesday, Sept. 12.