Hugh Hodgson Hall

Named for the founder of the University of Georgia's school of music, Hodgson Concert Hall opened in 1996 as the centrepiece of a new performing-arts centre in Athens. Thompson, Ventulett, Stainback and Craig Gaulden Davis designed it; Jaffe Holden Scarbrough shaped the acoustics. Its 1,096 seats wrap partly around the stage in festival arrangement. The opening week ran to more than thirty concerts and a gala with Jessye Norman, and the hall has since taken touring orchestras and opera alongside the school's own ensembles, with the 358-seat Ramsey Concert Hall next door for chamber music.