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AN INSPIRED SPACE

Case Western Reserve recently opened the Milton and Tamar Maltz Performing Arts Center at The Temple – Tifereth Israel, melding state-of-the-art performance technology with Silver Hall’s historic beauty.

The Temple building was constructed in 1924, seven years after Abba Hillel Silver became its rabbi. An internationally renowned religious leader, Rabbi Silver famously pleaded for Israeli statehood at the United Nations. He led the congregation until his death in 1963, when his son, Daniel, became rabbi, a position he held until his death in 1989. The Temple’s sanctuary is named Silver Hall in their honor.

MGA Partners, Architects designed this project, which includes performance and lecture spaces. The university is raising funds for the next and final phase, which will include teaching and rehearsal spaces, offices, a black box theater and a larger proscenium theater. The Temple will continue to use the building for major religious holidays.

“The marriage of the university and The Temple has produced an extraordinary treasure for our community,” said Milton Maltz, who, along with his wife, Tamar, is a longtime Temple member. The Maltzes and the Maltz Family Foundation of the Jewish Federation of Cleveland pledged $30 million for the new center.

A center that performs

Silver Hall is a soaring concert space—about 80 feet from floor to dome—that can seat up to 1,200 people. It retains the structure’s carved wooden ark and choir loft. The stage can be three different sizes—extended mainly with hydraulic lifts—to accommodate as many as 125 musicians.

The largest new feature is a 66,000-pound, 80-foot-wide canopy suspended above the stage. Made of glass panels and steel tubing, it contains microphones and LED theatrical lighting, as well as speakers directing sound toward the audience.

In addition, eight of the 35 rectangular stained-glass windows at the hall’s highest level have been placed in hinged frames that can be opened to allow for additional lighting or the use of a projector.