Music floats out to the center of the library quad as students on the Doudna steps are holding an impromptu concert. But for people who know the history of the campus, they know this is not a new occurrence and that Doudna is only a part of the story. In fact, music at Eastern has a history as long as that of the university itself.

The first music class at Eastern was taught in 1899, the same year the university opened. However, at that time, the school was not known as Eastern Illinois University, but Eastern Illinois State Normal School. At that time, it had one focus: teaching. The school did not even offer degrees, but teaching certificates.

Robert Hillman, university archivist and reference librarian, said Eastern did not always have an official music program, but it did always have music.

“They always had music and musical performances; they brought in performers and concert orchestras,” Hillman said. “They made what they had.”

During the early days of Eastern, the only building was Old Main.

“They used the auditorium,” Hillman said “It wasn’t until 1938 that McAfee Gym was built, and that was built with the intention that performances would be held there.”

According to a thesis tilted “The History of Music at Eastern” by Sue Andra Lackey, after the “crackerbox gymnasium” in Pemberton Hall was built in 1909, performances were also held there.

According to Lackey’s thesis, the first music teacher was Friederich Koch, a German immigrant who was invited by Eastern’s first sitting president, Livingston Lord, to teach at the school when it opened in 1899. He created and directed many of the performance groups at that time, as well set the music curriculum.

Hillman said Koch was revered on campus, but when World War I came about in 1914, controversy surrounded Koch because as German immigrant, he was accused of sympathizing with Germany who was fighting the United States and its allies.

“Some local citizens didn’t like him and called for his removal from the school,” Hillman said. “Livingston Lord fully supported him, but probably suggested he buy war bonds to show his support of the country and the war.”

Koch stayed at the school until he retired in 1939.

Throughout the 1940s and 1950s, the music department grew and moved from building to building.

According to Lackey, they occupied “a three-room stucco building” and “a Quonset obtained from army surplus in 1948” and eventually back to Old Main, where they occupied the third floor until 1959.

In 1959, they got funding for their own building, which eventually became the Doudna. It was later renovated in 1973 and then again in 2001.

“As the university grew, it needed to have designated building for things,” Hillman said. “Formerly it was housed in Old Main, but now they needed more space. It was desirable to have a building specifically designed to be a theater and concert hall.”

He said what most people do not know about the Doudna is that it is not a new building, but a renovation of the old original. In fact, many of the original brick walls still stand in the current design.

“It became in massive disrepair, and when you would go in, you were almost afraid the ceiling would fall down around you,” Hillman said.

The project to make the Doudna what it is today began in 2001 and was completed in 2009.

Lou Hencken was president of the university from 2001 to 2007 said the renovation was not an easy one.

Because of the construction, the three major departments housed in the building — art, music and theater — were housed in other places around Charleston. Art was in a vacated building near the old CVS Pharmacy; theater was in what is now the Twice is Nice thrift store; and music was in McAfee Gym.

Shortly after the work began, the state cut funding on all projects like it, and the building sat untouched again until 2004.

“I felt so bad about the whole thing; it was never meant to be so prolonged,” Hencken said. “The day I got fax from the governor’s office that they were releasing the money, I was jumping around my office like an 8-year-old who just got his first bicycle.”

Construction continued and the building opened in the spring of 2009.

Amy Wywialowski can be reached at 581-2812 or [email protected].