Melba Conservatorium of Music

The Melba Memorial Conservatorium of Music was a school of music located in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. During its early days it was closely associated with opera diva Dame Nellie Melba, after whom it was later named. In 1994 it became affiliated with Victoria University. Founded in 1901 as "The Conservatorium of Music, Melbourne", the Melba Conservatorium ceased teaching at the end of 2008. However, it finds its continuing expression in the form of Melba Opera Trust.

The Melba was established as a private Conservatorium in 1901 after breaking away from the control of the University of Melbourne, where it had been founded in 1895. George William Louis Marshall Hall, its first proprietor, named his institution The Conservatorium of Music, Melbourne, and operated it initially within the Victorian Artists' Society Building in Albert Street, East Melbourne. The Conservatorium continued to function as a private Conservatorium with a Sole Proprietor through its second Director, Fritz Hart and on to its third Director, Harold Elvins.

When Elvins purchased the Conservatorium business he set about forming the Conservatorium into a nonprofit company. This was achieved in 1944 and the Melba has continued to run since that time as an incorporated company with a governing Council. Several further Directors and a change of premises for ten years to 16 Hoddle Street, Abbotsford, saw the Conservatorium, by 1983, purchase accommodation at 45 York Street, Richmond, where it remained until its closure in 2008.

Australia's famous diva, Dame Nellie Melba, associated herself closely with the Conservatorium, teaching here from 1915 until her death in 1931. Madame Melba prolonged her link with the Conservatorium after her death, through the provision of a generous bequest and it is her association with the Conservatorium which was responsible for the change of name of the institution, in 1956, to the Melba Memorial Conservatorium of Music.

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