The piano bar as neighborhood hangout

This venue is closing, a victim of rising real estate and fewer people stopping in, but places like this are still needed.

Singing a Sad Song for Their Piano Bar - New York Times, 7/19/07:There was the story, for example, from about 10 years ago, where a glassy-eyed gentleman wandered in, steadied himself against the bar and with little ceremony unburdened himself with the force of a racehorse.

Kristine Zbornik, a professional singer and actress, was at the microphone at the time. When the gentleman’s stream advanced toward her, she raised her left foot and switched songs midway through and started belting out, “Cry Me a River.”

When news of the closing of Rose’s Turn spread last weekend among the bar’s longtime patrons, many say they felt devastated. Susan Finkelstein McElroy, 50, a regular patron who lives in North Babylon, on Long Island, received a diagnosis of breast cancer in 2004. She credits song-filled nights at Rose’s Turn with helping her endure the rigors of chemotherapy.

When she read the bad news in an e-mail message on Saturday, Ms. Finkelstein McElroy wept.

For 56 years, since it opened during the Truman administration, 55 Grove Street in the West Village has been a piano bar, cabaret and comedy club for the quick-witted and full-throated. First it was Upstairs/Downstairs, then the Duplex (which remains open at another location), and finally it became Rose’s Turn."

Where to put some music venues

I've started to do a bit of research for a project I am working on. And I just discovered this. It's a good place to find info on what Denver urban areas are being redeveloped.

DenverInfill.com: Downtown Denver and Its Urban Infill and Redevelopment Projects

Leisure: How People Spend Their Free Time

Here's a good resource to get you thinking about American society and what we do and don't do with our free time.

Focusing on music, or even entertainment, can often be too limiting. If you are selling these concepts, you need to take into consideration all the various activities competing for a person's time, attention, and financial resources. The academic field of leisure studies gives a broad overview of time/recreation consumption.

In particular you might want to look at the PDF file, "Leisure in America: Searching for the Forest Amongst the Trees." It has culled data from a number of different research studies to give you an overview of American culture and leisure time activities.

The Compleat Leader (Getty Leadership Institute)

A showcase for teen art and music

5/19/07, SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER'All Ages Art Night' offers teens space to make music and fashion statement: "In one corner: teen bands covering Nirvana and The Killers.

In another: a hip-hop fashion show with local youths in their modeling debut.

In between those two areas: spoken-word performances, masters of ceremonies spitting original verse and 60 community organizations that brought together hundreds of teens from all over the city.

'Seattle is really successful at creating innovative programs to work with teens, but there are not a ton of places to show what they've done,' said Jennifer Bisson, who organized the annual 'All Ages Art Night' at the Central Library and helped transform it into a performance venue Friday afternoon and night. 'There are so many negative images about teens. This is a positive thing in a public forum, which is serendipitous, because it also builds community.'

Under thousands of diamond-shaped glass panes in the Fifth Avenue lobby, roaming bands of teens wandered to tables piled high with information and talked with helpful volunteers from groups such as Readergirlz (a local writers collective for teen girls), Youth Speaks and Emerging Voices (poetry workshops for teens), Skate Like a Girl, the Girl Scouts, the events-and-program-packed Redmond Old Firehouse and the Richard Hugo House.

Programs such as this, Bisson said, give them a sense of ownership, especially with the Teen Advisory Board the library created to help bring more teens into the system."

Revitalizing Denver's "Harlem"

A new theater is opening in what was once Denver's center for black culture. Now the neighborhood is a mixture of 25% black, 43% Latino, and 27% white, so this theater plans to draw upon its neighborhood history but also expand to showcase a variety of cultural influences.

5/10/07, The Denver Post - New theater opening in Five Points neighborhood: "The Denver neighborhood once called "the Harlem of the West" is enjoying a cultural renaissance of its own these days....

Another person who sees the upside on the cultural front is Denver lawyer Kurt Lewis, who sold his house to open a new live theater, Crossroads at Five Points Theatre....

Five Points developer James Ellis is one of his biggest fans.

'One of the things we really like about Crossroads is that there are no boundaries, and that is implied by the name,' said Ellis, who plans to restore the facade of the historic Rossonian Hotel next door and reopen it as a live jazz venue with an upscale restaurant by summer 2008....

Five Points once boasted more than 50 jazz clubs and earned the city's first-ever designation as a neighborhood of 'cultural significance,' Ellis said. It was not only a favorite destination for such legends as Nat King Cole, Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, Dinah Washington and Billie Holiday, it was a respite from the racism that pervaded just 10 blocks to the south....

And now Lewis, a white man, has leveraged his future to build an 84-seat, $450,000 theater in a building owned by a black man.

Everyone involved with Crossroads believes the theater, and the neighborhood, can best survive into the future if it celebrates its cultural past while also welcoming, even encouraging, all those who dared not go there before. That means celebrating diversity in a rainbow of colors.

That's one reason Lewis' 3,600-square-foot theater is opening with an Irish play. 'Bold Girls' will be followed by a one-woman jazz musical, and the world premiere of 'The Sisters, Sweetwater,' the story of two black women in the 1920s written by Hugo Jon Sayles of Shadow, Denver's only black theater company.

But Lewis envisions a melting- pot community resource open all day every day for classes, jazz, cabaret, poetry, fashion shows and even weekly 'open- mic dance.' Theater performances will start no later than 7 p.m., followed by late-night spoken- word artists Café Nuba and late- late-night screenings of the cult film 'The Rocky Horror Picture Show.'

Allowing many visions

'Denver doesn't really have a place that embraces the creative class, and it doesn't have a place that celebrates ethnicity,' Ellis said. 'Crossroads is a place that plans to do that and then some.'

Crossroads board member donnie l. betts said the theater will be unique because it seeks a convergence of creative cultures with differing values."

What's a college town?

This is a very thorough look what creates a "college town" atmosphere.

Macon.com | 05/06/2007 | Is Macon a college town?

According to Blake Gumprecht, an assistant professor at the University of New Hampshire who studies college towns, a college town usually has at least 20% students. But the article outlines other factors that create a college town atmosphere, which could be adopted no matter the size of the school population.

Entertainment/eating establishments that are open past 2 a.m.
Bars and clubs for ages 18+
Low-cost/free entertainment
Small, funky shops
Large college sporting event
Strong independent music scene
College radio station
Community/college partnerships

Also mentioned in the article, but not listed above, is a specific district, within walking distance to campus, that caters to students.

Commutes, radio, and live music

I stumbled across this article in a blog about radio. That blog suggested that long commutes encourage radio listening because people want to feel connected. By that same token, long commutes probably discourage going out to catch live music because there just isn't time (unless it's a local concert where kids are welcome, which gives families an opportunity to do something together).

The creative class concept, where you encourage people to live at higher densities closer to cultural settings so they spend less time on the road and more time at clubs and in third places, is an attempt to counter the trends described below.

Annals of Transport: There and Back Again: Reporting & Essays: The New Yorker, 4/16/07: "Roughly one out of every six American workers commutes more than forty-five minutes, each way. People travel between counties the way they used to travel between neighborhoods. The number of commuters who travel ninety minutes or more each way—known to the Census Bureau as 'extreme commuters'—has reached 3.5 million, almost double the number in 1990. They’re the fastest-growing category, the vanguard in a land of stagnant wages, low interest rates, and ever-radiating sprawl."

One of Denver's legendary music dive bars

Here's a good profile of Cricket on the Hill in Denver. It's one of those rough-and-tumble neighborhood bars that has attracted its share of "street life" tales, but through it all, it keeps going as a music venue. I'm not sure if Kerouac actually did ever go there, but it is easy to imagine him having spent time in a place like this.

The Denver Messageboard: "Dates and heresay about Kerouac and Ginsberg and Dylan and Hendrix and Judy Collins and Clapton hanging out, here, have been withheld to make a point. I could've killed myself researching such- and I started to- but once my sources proved to be exclusive- and largely irrelevant, upon meeting 'The Man'- I decided to skip all of that."

Heavy metal in church

Hard-core for Christ: Churches cater to 'gutter punks' across U.S. |Dallas Morning News, 3/25/07: "'In every metro area in America, there is at least one church that appeals to heavy metal fans,' said Dave Travis, executive vice president of Leadership Network, a Dallas-based church-growth think tank.

'It's a subculture,' he said. 'As each new generation of believers gets excited about their faith, they invent new churches for their lifestyle. American Christians are very entrepreneurial in reaching young people.'

The Sundance Channel is paying attention to this trend as well. It recently aired the six-part documentary titled One Punk Under God , about Jay Bakker (son of Jim Bakker) and his struggle to plant a church for outcasts in New York.

Mr. Thumma, a sociologist of religion, said that Deliverance Bible Church is part of a vast movement of individualism in American Christian churches that started several decades ago. He said U.S. Christians have a tendency to adapt their spiritual experiences to their lifestyles, whether they're gay, bikers or gutter punks.

'These congregations that have arisen around subgroups in evangelism – and what probably started with the 'Jesus people' in the late '70s to early '80s – have gotten more diverse, doing it in their own idioms and their own ways,' Mr. Thumma said."

church
third places

Turning a third place into a brand

Here is a good explanation of the appeal of Starbucks. Some of these concepts could be applied to other venues, like music.

The Modesto Bee, 3/25/07, Why do so many of us pour into Starbucks? It's become a lifestyle: "'Starbucks has a strong emotional connection with their clients,' said Alan Siegel, brand consultant with New York's Siegel+ Gale.

'They have been successful because people liked going into that environment and liked how they were treated. It is a place to have coffee with some style.'

It's more than that, added Ron Paul, president of Chicago restaurant consultant Technomic. Starbucks has transcended its retail origins and become a 'third place.' It's not your home or your office, but a zone in between where you can decompress. 'It's a refuge,' Paul said.

Clients appreciate company's values

In Starbucks-speak, executives say customers have given the company 'permission to go beyond coffee' and use its own 'curatorial voice' to select other things they might like.

How did Starbucks come to wield such authority? First, its baristas taught you the difference between an espresso, a cappuccino and a latte.

Then, maybe you were impressed with the quality of Starbucks' employees and how the company treated them, even the part-timers.

Finally, Starbucks does good things in the world, promoting coffee beans that come with the promise that the workers who harvested them were treated well. That makes its customers feel good."

third places

The hunger for community

This is about an art gathering rather than music, but I think the same concept would work. People want a community, and it could be built around music. Bring them together, have them share food, and have them bond over creativity.

Slideluck Potshow - New York Times, 3/27/07: "The main attraction, a two-hour slide show of work by 37 artists, drew nearly 800 people, representing a jaunty cross section of the city’s young creative class.

It was the possibility of a lively communal viewing experience that inspired the series. Casey Kelbaugh, a goateed freelance photographer who has worked for publications including The New York Times, founded Slideluck Potshow in his tiny backyard in Seattle in 2000 with a simple invitation to friends and colleagues to bring slides and food. The idea caught on quickly, and he held 20 slide show parties there before moving to New York in 2003.

'I got here thinking, well, I have this thing that’s very popular in Seattle, but the idea of a potluck dinner in New York would never get off the ground,' said Mr. Kelbaugh, 32.

Still, he spread the word and held a Slideluck Potshow in his East Village apartment in early 2004. He was surprised when 120 people arrived, obligingly toting home-cooked dishes as well as images of their work. The event mushroomed into a kind of open-mike night for photographers and other artists, who would show up with trays of slides or CDs to show.

'The whole thing is that it’s participatory, and it’s about creative expression,' Mr. Kelbaugh said. 'It’s a little bit outside the photography establishment.'”

New York
creative class
third places
creativity

The Design Economy

I just found this, which is another entry on the concept that we have already moved beyond the Information Age into the Age of Creativity, or, as it is called here, The Design Economy.

This quote comes from an article in the Minneapolis Star-Tribune, but I found it on a blog about media, religion, culture.

There's something happening here. While the Religious Right is getting all of the mainstream press coverage, people are looking for ways to connect with each other through arts and culture and churches are providing those places.

ryan torma: The Design Economy: [Quoted from the Minneapolis Star-Tribune] "The information economy is still with us. But the paradoxical effect of the Internet is that it has made information so widely available that it holds no real economic value. Everybody can get incredible amounts of information, so there's no competitive advantage of having it. The idea of the design economy is that, for developed countries like ours, which cannot compete in a global marketplace on price or even quite often on the quality of a product, we have to compete on the basis of innovation, creativity and imagination, which takes you to design. By design, I don't mean just aesthetics but function and cultural adaptability."

From the blog that cited the above quote:

"Jesus is a commodity. No one needs churches or clergy to tell them about Jesus or any other religion for that matter, it can all be found somewhere else. The design economy holds true for faith communities as well, churches will be judged by how well, or not, they help live their faith, not on their ability to provide information."

creative class
third places
church

Another music venue sponsored by a church

This one is in Fort Collins, Colorado.

Rocky Mountain Chronicle - PSST : "Everyday Joe’s is a non-profit, Old Town coffee shop affiliated with Timberline Church, the sprawling mega-structure on Timberline and Harmony roads that, minus a huge cross, could be confused with a sizable public high school. Timberline Oldtown is an offshoot congregation that meets at Everyday Joe’s on Sundays. During the week, Hess says, the space is open to all, like 'a community center with a coffee bar in the corner' that is 'not going to slam Jesus down someone’s ears when they walk in the door.' ...

" ... Everyday Joe’s frequently books events that are of interest to non-Christians. Many local and national musicians with offbeat, artistic approaches are overlooked by Fort Collins bars and end up soliciting Everyday Joe’s for exposure. The catch is, those who want to play Everyday Joe’s may have to edit their expression.

“'We have a usage agreement that anyone who performs here signs,' Hess says. 'And so they understand that changing a lyric — you know, not dropping the f-bomb in the middle of a song — is worth doing to help out what we are trying to do, which is to just give back to the community.

“'When people think Everyday Joe’s is not Christian enough and other people think we are too Christian, that’s when we know we are in the right spot.'”

third places
church

Arts and religion

In my blog I have highlighted a number of churches that are also serving as music venues. It's not that I am a spokesperson for the religious right. Rather, what I see is that churches are moving into a void left by a lack of "third places" which bring people together around music.

Bars are not appropriate places for many people to enjoy music. The alternative (coffeehouses and all-ages clubs) can't always make it if they have to bring in a certain amount of income.

But churches, which exist to serve people on Sunday, but sit empty much of the rest of the week, offer available venues.

This particular article talks about the need to foster both creativity and Jesus. What caught my eye was the quote below.

I have written extensively about people in the information society, and I have seen many engineers laid off as jobs are outsourced overseas. So I have questioned the wisdom of encouraging students to specialize in science, math, and engineering careers when those offer no more lifetime job security than less "practical" endeavors.

The quote below is the first I have seen to suggest that the information age is already over.

Refractions: Being a Child of the Creative Age: "The Information Age is behind us, and yet we, in America, are educating our children to thrive in that past. The skills and knowledge for Information Age are now outsourced, but we are ill equipped to lead in the age of imagination, the age of synthesis."

creative class
third places
creativity
church

Small towns can have great performance arts centers

Some good information on how a small (but wealthy) ski town was able to build a state-of-the-art performance center.

Jackson Hole Guide News & Guide, 2/28/07 - Jackson Hole center for the arts opens: "Off Square Theatre Company, one of the Center for the Arts’ 17 resident organizations, will rent the pavilion’s rehearsal hall, adjacent to the lobby, as its own space for classes, auditions, rehearsals and more. It currently pays $16,000 a year for its offices in the Arts and Education Pavilion, and will pay $15,000 a year for the rehearsal hall. Charges for nonprofit use of the Center Theater for ticketed events amount to $500 a night for rehearsals and technical run-throughs and $1,000 a night for performances. The center charges slightly more for non-ticketed events as it will lose revenue if not handling ticket sales, for which it charges a 10 percent surcharge. For ticketed events, the facility provides box office and marketing services, concessions and ushers.

Commercial renters of the Center Theater will pay $2,500 a night. ...

The Center for the Arts’ capital campaign to raise $35 million completely paid for the Arts and Education Pavilion and for the design, engineering, construction and equipment in the Performing Arts Pavilion – 'everything down to the piano,' Berry said proudly of the newly acquired 9-foot Steinway grand. ...

The Center for the Arts’ project started as an ad hoc collection of Jackson Hole arts organizations in 1991. Following several years of feasibility studies, the center incorporated in 1995 and embarked on the design and fundraising process. A dedicated board and staff were assembled and, through a public/private partnership, the center was funded by its $35 million, seven-year private capital campaign. In total, the Center for the Arts encompasses 15 studios, 21 administrative offices, three classrooms, three conference rooms, two galleries, five outdoor public spaces, two lobbies, six theater support rooms, one darkroom lab and one theater."

economic development
creative class
third places
Jackson Hole

Family friendly venues may be the future of live music

Just as megachurches have expanded beyond church services. Rocketown is leading the way toward family entertainment. What makes this an interesting business model is that it isn't tied to a particular demonination, which may make the concept more inviting than venues located at specific churches.

STLtoday.com, 2/24/07 - Old mall to house Christian music club: "The 40,000-square-foot entertainment center has an indoor skate park, coffee bar and three stages. It is the brainchild of Christian music star Michael W. Smith.

Since opening in downtown Nashville about four years ago, Rocketown has attracted 100,000 to 125,000 visitors each year, development director Audra Davis said. Although the club's target age group is 12- to 20-year-olds, the venue hosts shows for all ages that are smoke- and alcohol-free, she said.

At first, Rocketown had a difficult time attracting bands because some groups feared they wouldn't sell as many tickets with smoking and alcohol restrictions, Davis said. But after booking a few big names for successful concerts, the venue and its staff built a good reputation with musicians, she said.

Now, Rocketown staffers enjoy lending their knowledge and experience as their venue becomes a model to developers such as the Atkinsons.

Davis said: 'We've had, literally, hundreds of folks contact us who wanted to do something similar in their community. It's been fun to share our experience and kind of create a network of organizations trying to do this and make an impact for teens. For adults, I think it's great that there's a place where you don't have to worry about drunk folks being around while you are trying to enjoy a concert.'"

third places
church
Nashville
all ages
live music
clubs

Rock bands in a building that also serves as a church

Another example of a church, this one in Hanover, PA, that doubles as a music venue.

Evening Sun, 2/18/07 - Center transforms for music: "Bombshelter events feature Christian hardcore bands, independent groups, acoustic artists, open mic nights and other happenings. Some of the acts are Christian, but not all....

And Freedom Valley, an Assemblies of God church, is often the place where that stigma is broken. The same room that usually holds about 90 churchgoers during Sunday morning services is turned into a completely different environment when The Bombshelter fills up. ...

Organizers understand that not all Bombshelter patrons are active Christians. So they try not to force religion down patrons' throats.

Aside from a few wall posters, the venue doesn't have much religious iconography.

A black sheet hangs behind the bands, and the event sometimes features acts who aren't much different than those found at a non-Christian rock show. Patrons pay to get in, then go crazy as hardcore rock is spewed from speakers on stage.

But Bombshelter Community shows are a different animal altogether.

Admission is free and patrons share a community meal. And concertgoers get to have a question-and-answer session with one of the bands in attendance.

... when Freedom Valley moved into a former restaurant last spring, Bombshelter organizers realized they had another venue to hold shows.

The remnants of the restaurant add to the building's charm. Aside from the bright green booths and kitchen equipment, music fans dance on the same carpet that restaurant patrons once spilled drinks on. The venue also has separate rooms for bands to leave their equipment, something organizers say they didn't have in the past. ...

'We wanted somewhere else where kids can hang out,' Wilson said. 'There wasn't any other place.'"

church
all ages
third places

Training teens to be music entrepreneurs

The lack of all-ages venues around the country, and the fact that live music is so closely tied to liquor sales, are mistakes. Here's a project that realizes running music events can provide learning experiences for teens.

Seattle Post- Intelligencer, 2/17/07 - Vera Project trains teens for music industry: "But in 2007 Seattle, at the Vera Project, 17 means being around people who let you run the show.

So you run it.

Adults respect you, trust you and collaborate with you to make the music center and organization a place where music belongs to everybody. It also is a training ground for the next generation of the music industry. Someday, you might run the world.

You'll do that from a new home as Vera moves to a 9,000-square-foot, revamped, two-floor Snoqualmie Room at the Seattle Center that will house classrooms, offices, a recording studio and a venue for live all-ages shows. ...

To new board member and attorney Jerry Everard, who co-owns Neumo's, Vera works because of the bonds it forges.

'The emotional and intellectual experience of connecting with others your age is vital to the music industry,' he said. 'I don't think we want kids to be spending all their time at their computers, downloading music. We want kids out in the community, connecting with the community.'

Vera kids, Hong said, are all over the city using the training Vera provided. They are releasing records on their own labels; working at Bumbershoot, Seattle DIY.com, KEXP, the Stranger, Neumo's and OneReel; organizing events such as the Bend-It Fest; starting non-profits such as the Bikery; and teaching and mentoring at teen centers.

'Anywhere you could possibly look, youth are taking the stage and running the show around town,' Hong said."

Seattle
all ages
third places
economic development

Reinforcing a sense of community

The music store Amoeba is thriving in LA.

2/5/07, ABC News: Eschewing MP3s for a Modern Music Bazaar: "As owner Marc Weinstein explains, Amoeba's collection is so broad that just about anyone can go there to sell CDs, which drives its reputation as the central music trading post in Los Angeles.

Many of us also go there in search of something new. The store even maintains several unprofitable departments -- like posters and seven-inch records -- simply because no one else does.

Because the music is housed under one very high roof, Amoeba acts like a magnet for die-hard music fans or even casual listeners who want some exposure to coolness.

'There's a huge social event built in. It's the distillation of all the music-loving people around town all in one place shopping for music,' Weinstein said. 'What person from L.A. wouldn't be proud to look out and see all the way-into-music wackos out on the floor of that store?'

'It's like you're in New York,' he said.

What draws people to the store is a kind of network effect. That is, the more people use a certain service, the more useful that service becomes to others. Being around other Amoeba shoppers is desirable on its own."

music scene
third places
Los Angeles

Music in a barbershop

I suppose I should have put two-and-two together and figured out that the term "barbershop quartet" probably linked music and barbershops in some fashion. But barbershop quartets didn't have any cachet when I was growing up so I never paid any attention to them.

This article isn't about those a cappella groups, but it is about a long tradition, in at least one Appalachian town, of having morning live music in a barbershop. Maybe it is time to get back to this in more places.

KnoxNews, 1/31/07 - Barbershop offers southern musical heritage along with clean shave: "Each Thursday, for the past half-century, musicians of various stripe and age have arrived at 8 a.m. at the barbershop on West State and 10th Street to pick and sing for three hours. Then, they pack up and leave, just as leisurely as they arrived.

If you go there, make it by 8 a.m., or you might not get in. Some Thursday mornings, Boyd's barbershop is so jammed with jamming musicians that finding a seat is all but impossible. One side of a wooden partition separates those waiting for a haircut and those playing music. There is only one barber chair used for cutting hair....

[Bill] Bowman says that Thursdays are not the only events in Bristol where musicians gather. It all began, he says, in the 1920s outside the Hickory Tree Grocery. Today, several other places around Bristol provide venues for musicians to pick and sing, but Star Barber Shop is probably the most popular because of Boyd and tradition.

'Music just seems to be handed down through families here,' says Bowman. 'It is just part of our lifestyle. You grow up with it. I think music is something you are born with.

About 80 percent of all musicians who have made big names hail from within 100 miles of here, he says.

'At one time, we had live radio shows out of here,' he says. 'That was the only entertainment there was.'"

third places