Virginia and Simon Ramo, longtime supporters and benefactors of USC and the Thornton School of Music, will fund the phased conversion of Booth Memorial Hall into a performance venue aimed at adding to the concert experience for Thornton faculty and students.

The project, to begin next summer, will convert the existing Booth Hall, a rehearsal space, into the Simon Ramo Recital Hall, a stand-alone venue. In addition to acoustical treatments, stage flooring and lighting upgrades, the renovated space also will include a small recording studio and green room.

Dean Robert Cutietta said he hopes the new hall will provide a central space for students to showcase their work.

“Recital halls in a music school are where students celebrate what they have accomplished. Every student performs a variety of recitals while they are students,” Cutietta said. “Parents, family, friends, other students come to support them. Therefore, the new Simon Ramo Recital Hall will be at the core experience for all music students for decades to come.”

Simon Ramo said he hopes the new hall will add to the performances given there.
“We hope the recital hall will permit the performances of faculty and students to be enhanced by its availability and its architecture,” he said.

The $800,000 donation is the most recent gesture of the Ramos’ enduring commitment to USC, Thornton and music. Virginia Ramo, a former teacher and patron of the arts, medicine and education, was elected to the USC Board of Trustees in 1971 and is now a lifetime trustee. Simon Ramo is a scientist, industrialist, educator, author and serious violinist who lends his last initial to TRW Inc., the aerospace corporation he co-founded. In addition, he was a trustee of the National Symphony in Washington, D.C. and a board member of the Los Angeles Philharmonic.

In 1971, the couple established the annual Ramo Music Faculty Award, given to a faculty member in the USC Thornton School of Music who has made an outstanding contribution through teaching and professional work in music. It is the highest honor a music faculty member can receive, and the recipient is recognized at the school’s annual honors convocation in May.

Simon said he and his wife are grateful to be involved with USC and the Thornton School of Music.

“My wife, Virginia, a USC trustee, and I are very appreciative of our good fortune in having had the privilege of a close relationship with USC’s School of Music for many years,” he said. “Music has been an important part of our lives. We are proud of the school’s international standing and of the immense contributions of its faculty and graduates. We hold ourselves very lucky to have been able to provide the earlier Virginia Ramo Hall of Music and now the Simon Ramo Recital Hall.”