The Christchurch School of Music is set to receive $4 million in ratepayer funding, matching funding the school has already secured, toward the construction of a new $12 million home on Armagh Street — a building designed to anchor the city's Performing Arts Precinct and give the school a permanent, purpose-built facility for the first time.

The council vote on 26 May approved the School of Music funding as part of the same $35.8 million heritage and culture package that backed Christ Church Cathedral and Canterbury Museum. Unlike the cathedral and museum grants, the School of Music funding was not conditional on government matching, but does require the school to demonstrate it has sufficient funds to complete the project.

The new building on Armagh Street will place the School of Music at the centre of the Performing Arts Precinct, alongside the Isaac Theatre Royal, the Court Theatre, and other cultural facilities clustered in the post-earthquake rebuild area east of Hagley Park.

School of Music director Rachel Thomson said the funding was transformational. The school had been operating from temporary and dispersed premises since losing its original building in the 2011 earthquakes. A permanent, acoustically designed home would allow the school to grow its programmes, attract new teachers, and provide a better experience for students of all ages.

The Performing Arts Precinct, as it takes shape, represents one of the clearest expressions of Christchurch's post-earthquake urban vision — a deliberate clustering of arts and cultural activity in a single walkable precinct that did not exist in the city before the disasters.

Arts Centre and Canterbury Provincial Chambers, the two other major heritage buildings that were part of earlier discussions, did not receive funding in this round. Council indicated those projects would need to secure alternative funding pathways.

"A permanent, acoustically designed home will allow the school to grow its programmes and provide a better experience for students of all ages." — Christchurch School of Music director