The Pasadena Convention Center is a convention center in

Pasadena, California Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commerci ...

, United States. It consists of three buildings.

Pasadena Civic Auditorium

The Civic Auditorium, one of the major structures in the Pasadena Civic Center District, was built in 1931 and is best known for being the home for the

Emmy Awards The Emmy Awards, or Emmys, are an extensive range of awards for artistic and technical merit for the television industry. A number of annual Emmy Award ceremonies are held throughout the year, each with their own set of rules and award categor ...

from 1977 until 1997. It was designed by architects George Edwin Bergstrom, Cyril Bennett, and Fitch Haskell. It is the former home of the Pasadena Symphony Orchestra. It has also been used for some episodes of '' American Idol''. It was used as the show's venue for "Hollywood Week" in seasons 1, 3 and 10. The 3,029-seat

theater Theatre or theater is a collaborative form of performing art that uses live performers, usually actors to present experiences of a real or imagined event before a live audience in a specific place, often a stage. The performers may communi ...

hosts musicals, operas and concerts, among other events, on its stage. The venue's

theatre organ A theatre organ (also known as a theater organ, or, especially in the United Kingdom, a cinema organ) is a type of pipe organ developed to accompany silent films from the 1900s to the 1920s. Theatre organs have horseshoe-shaped arrangements of ...

was acquired in 1979, having been commissioned from American firm

M. P. Möller Mathias Peter Møller, commonly known as M.P. Möller or Moeller (29 September 1854 – 13 April 1937), was a prolific pipe-organ builder and businessman. A native of the Denmark, Danish island of Bornholm, he emigrated to the United States in 187 ...

in 1938 as a touring organ by Englishman Reginald Foort, who attended its Pasadena inauguration on April 23, 1980. It had been used by the

BBC The British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) is a British public service broadcaster headquartered at Broadcasting House in London, England. Originally established in 1922 as the British Broadcasting Company, it evolved into its current sta ...

during and after

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

. In addition to the main auditorium, the Civic Auditorium building originally contained two lecture rooms and an exhibition hall of . The auditorium was famously the site of some of the earliest live performances of

Van Halen Van Halen ( ) was an American rock band formed in Pasadena, California, in 1973. Credited with restoring hard rock to the forefront of the music scene, Van Halen was known for their energetic live performances and the virtuosity of their guit ...

before being discovered. The '' Motown 25: Yesterday, Today, Forever'' special was taped here on March 25, 1983; and aired on

NBC The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a subsidiary of Comcast. It is one of NBCUniversal's ...

in May. The show is best remembered for

Michael Jackson Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and philanthropist. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as Cultural impact of Michael Jackson, one of the most culturally significan ...

's performance of "

Billie Jean "Billie Jean" is a song by the American singer Michael Jackson, released by Epic Records on January 3, 1983, as the second single from his sixth studio album, ''Thriller (album), Thriller'' (1982). It was written and composed by Jackson, produ ...

" in which he debuted his signature dance move the " Moonwalk".

Louis Armstrong Louis Daniel Armstrong (August 4, 1901 – July 6, 1971), nicknamed "Satchmo", "Satch", and "Pops", was an American trumpeter and vocalist. He was among the most influential figures in jazz. His career spanned five decades and several era ...

's 1951 album '' Satchmo at Pasadena'' was also recorded here. The annual

NAACP Image Awards The NAACP Image Awards is an annual awards ceremony presented by the U.S.-based National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) to honor outstanding performances in film, television, theatre, music, and literature. The over 40 ...

have been held at the Auditorium numerous times, including at least (earlier records are incomplete) 1992–2000, 2014–2018, 2020, 2023 and 2025, excluding 1995 (no awards presented), 2021 and 2022 (virtual due to the

COVID-19 pandemic The COVID-19 pandemic (also known as the coronavirus pandemic and COVID pandemic), caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), began with an disease outbreak, outbreak of COVID-19 in Wuhan, China, in December ...

). The auditorium has also been used for the

Miss Teen USA 2007 Miss Teen USA 2007, the 25th Miss Teen USA pageant, was held on August 24, 2007 in Pasadena, California, Pasadena, California. At the conclusion of the final night of the competition Hilary Cruz of Colorado was crowned Miss Teen USA 2007 by outg ...

pageant. The preliminary and final competitions were broadcast live on NBC. From 2017 to 2019, the Auditorium hosted the 44th, 45th, and

46th Daytime Emmy Awards The 46th Daytime Emmy Awards, presented by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS), honored the best in U.S. daytime television programming in 2018. The ceremony was held on May 5, 2019, at the Pasadena Civic Auditorium in Pa ...

alongside their related 44th, 45th and 46th Daytime

Creative Arts Emmy Awards The Creative Arts Emmys are a class of Emmy Awards presented in recognition of technical and other similar achievements in American television programming. They are commonly awarded to behind-the-scenes personnel such as production designers, ...

. The auditorium has hosted the ''

America's Got Talent ''America's Got Talent'' (often abbreviated as ''AGT'') is an American talent show competition, and is part of the global ''Got Talent'' franchise created by Simon Cowell. The program is produced by Fremantle (as well as distributed by) and ...

'' audition rounds since season 11 (2016). It also serves as the main venue for the live shows starting on

season 17 A season is a division of the year based on changes in weather, ecology, and the number of daylight hours in a given region. On Earth, seasons are the result of the axial parallelism of Earth's tilted orbit around the Sun. In temperate and polar ...

(2022). The auditorium hosts the annual

Pasadena Unified School District The Pasadena Unified School District (PUSD) was founded in 1874 and is a unified school district for Pasadena, California, Pasadena, Sierra Madre, California, Sierra Madre, and Altadena, California, Altadena, in the U.S. state of California. A ...

graduation ceremonies for Blair High School, John Marshall Fundamental Secondary School, John Muir High School and Pasadena High School, which takes place after the Memorial Day holiday, since 2000.

Exhibition Building

The Exhibition Building, adjacent to the west side of the Auditorium, features of exhibit space and can seat up to 4,400 for various events. Adjacent to the Exhibition Building is a annex seating up to 600 patrons. The building holds large corporate events, conventions (such as CatCon), along with

trade show A trade show, also known as trade fair, trade exhibition, or trade exposition, is an exhibition organized so that companies in a specific industry can showcase and demonstrate their latest products and services, meet with industry partners and ...

Conference Building

The Conference Building, adjacent to the south side of the Auditorium, has 20 meeting rooms totaling .

References

External links

Pasadena Convention Center

The Pasadena Civic Auditorium
{{Pasadena 1931 establishments in California Event venues established in 1931 Convention centers in California Concert halls in California Buildings and structures in Pasadena, California Tourist attractions in Pasadena, California Multi-purpose stadiums in the United States

Pasadena Civic Auditorium

Exhibition Building

Conference Building

See also

References

External links