The Royal Irish Academy of Music (RIAM) has announced a donation to the academy of a collection of music owned by the late opera singer and teacher Veronica Dunne. The collection – which includes scores, recordings, personal musical memorabilia, photographs, and a Petrof grand piano – was donated by Dunne’s family and will be housed in a dedicated room named after the late soprano in RIAM’s redeveloped campus on Westland Row, due to open in spring 2022. 

Dunne’s family also plan to establish scholarships for RIAM students in her memory. 

Commenting on the donation, Professor Deborah Kelleher, Director of RIAM, said: 

Veronica Dunne was a most beloved and revered member of the RIAM’s Vocal Faculty. Teaching with us until just last academic year, and with all her energy and passion for vocal students and opera, she continued to inspire us all. Hers is one of the most important legacies in Irish vocal pedagogy, and the history books will mark her contribution to music in Ireland as immense. We are so grateful to her family for gifting us such an important and personal archive of her life’s work which we will proudly house in the Veronica Dunne Room at the RIAM.

Judy Gaughan, Dunne’s daughter, said: 

My brother Peter McCarthy and I are so delighted to hear that our mother’s extraordinary legacy and generous spirit will be indelibly marked by the RIAM’s dedication of a room in her name when its redeveloped campus opens in 2022. We are delighted to gift a vast and personal collection of our mother’s personal musical memorabilia and that her beloved piano will continue to sound in a space that recognises the significant contribution she made to Irish musical life.

In 2018, RIAM was granted €9 million in public funding towards its redevelopment. In addition to the €7 million already raised by the academy, the funding will go towards doubling the amount of teaching rooms, a 300-seat concert hall, five acoustically-treated faculty zones, an opera studio, and a music therapy facility among other developments. 

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