Jazz will end after six months at Ottawa Tavern.
The Ottawa Tavern’s tenure as a jazz club is ending … suddenly.
Just six months after making the much-celebrated conversion of the downtown watering hole into a place where live jazz could be found several nights a week, The Ottawa Tavern is ending its run.
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Tonight (Saturday) will be the last night that jazz will be featured at the tavern, according to musician Charlie Hoats, who’s been involved with booking bands at the club, including a number of national acts.
Greg Gilmore of the Gilmore Collection which had been leasing the building for the restaurant and bar informed me Friday that “after 10 years at Ottawa Tavern we have decided to not renew our lease.”
Instead, he said, the company is “going to focus on the properties that we own. Our last night at Ottawa Tavern will be Saturday. We will be working with Charlie to either cancel or transfer acts and we will work to continue to have jazz across the collection.”
What will happen with the restaurant/tavern location at 151 Ottawa Ave. NW wasn’t immediately clear, but tonight’s 8 o’clock jazz show by Colorado saxophonist Joshua Quinlan, a Grand Rapids native (with Hoats on bass, Randy Marsh on drums, Steve Talaga on keyboards and Rob Smith on trumpet) will be the last.
Gilmore said there are “interested parties that want to lease the space” where the Ottawa Tavern is located.
The move certainly will come as a huge disappointment to jazz musicians and fans who felt that jazz had found a renaissance of sorts in Grand Rapids over the past year, starting last summer with Sunday night jam sessions hosted by drummer Marsh at HopCat. That Hopcat Jazz Jam series celebrates its first anniversary at 7 p.m. Sunday with a performance by Quinlan, Marsh, Hoats and keyboardist Paul Lesinski. (Get details here.)
But “as far as the Ottawa Tavern is concerned, if you want to see jazz, you better go (Saturday) night, because it’s all over after that. Greg has solid business reasons for his decision, but it’s certainly a bummer,” Hoats told me. “Where jazz will go next remains to be seen, I guess.”
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Not surprising to see this epic failure. Thought it was too stuffy for GR tastes anyway and the service and people there sucked as well.
Please don’t forget that St. Cecilia Music Center has been presenting incredible jazz for that past four years and will continue to bring world-renowned jazz artists to Grand Rapids. So all is not lost and we hope that jazz fans in town will support the concert series in 2012-13 that will bring guitar virtuoso John Pizzarrelli along with his legendary dad Bucky. It will most likely be the last time folks in this area will get to see Bucky as he is 86. We also have Tierney Sutton, the Dave Holland Quintet and the Bill Charlap Trio on tap. All in the exquisite setting of Royce Auditorium located at St. Cecilia Music Center. If you come to the concert you also get to meet these fabulous musicians after the show. For more info about SCMC jazz go to http://www.scmc-online.org.
Indeed, there are some attractive options for jazz in Grand Rapids, with St. Cecilia Music Center central among them, along with other venues which host jazz artists on different days of the week. And there’s Jazz at the Zoo on Monday nights and the Sunday night jams at HopCat. But I know many hope another nightclub “home” for jazz gives the scene the foundation it deserves.
The sad part about this whole affair was the fact most of the audience could have cared less about coming to actually listen to the music and was only there because it was just the hip thing and a new place to be seen (and heard of course). With all the self-serving gabbing and chatter was truly a shame for the few that actually came out to listen to the music and appreciate the art itself. Unfortunately people can’t sit still and shut up for five minutes. Gilmore can tell you what you want to hear but they pulled out because they were realizing that this wasn’t making an immediate impact to the bottom line of their business. The were simply attracted to the hype that a Jazz club could bring the potential revenue envisioned. Doing this for only six months and trying to expect an immediate return on profit is challenging in itself and extremely unrealistic. Obviously there had to some misleading and mismanagement going on between the expectations of management and the personnel empowered to book the entertainment. Additionally, miscommunications, misleading, and backstabbing going on didn’t help much either. Either way, it’s unfortunate that the whole idea had been mishandled the way it was. I’m only surprised it took six months for Gilmore to tuck it’s tail and run the other direction…
I forgot to mention – I listened to the clip on the pianist and the audience is just as loud if not louder than the music itself, so I rest my case. What a shame and total disregard and discredit to the talent and art these musicians attempted to convey to the audience. Great that the place looked pretty full, but the crowd could have cared less. I enjoy going to places where talking is minimal and the artists are engaged with their audience as well. There are a few places out there I’m sure, but rare to find!
Unfortunately, venues like St. Cecilia and Jazz at the Zoo don’t create a scene. You really need clubs that are committed to jazz music. A club doesn’t have to be a bad thing. This is truly a major disappointment and set back for the jazz scene in Grand Rapids. Every new person that I talk to who comes to Grand Rapids always wonders where to go to hear jazz. You need consistent, weekly shows in order to create a scene and clubs are the way to do that.
Gilmore knew if they wouldn’t see a profit to their bottom line shortly after they chose to do the Jazz joint scene, they would have never renewed the lease regardless on what you think. They were probably talked into creating this ‘so called’ Jazz club and thinking it would spark a huge interest, and expecting money would start rolling in a couple of months. Either way, they were at the end of their lease and this was probably taken as a low risk loss the can wash away when they do their taxes anyway. Think just second about this… How unrealistic can you possibly be, featuring very technical and sophisticated music (that most people think is dated anyway) is going to somehow inspire a huge renaissance and draw in sudden popularity, let alone trying to realize a quick profit for Gilmore’s bottom line. Additionally, the two times I went I couldn’t even hear the music above the noisy people and chatter anyway. People are looking more and more for the instant gratification and possess less and less class and sophistication anyway. Those people could have cared less who was playing there and can’t understand what the hell their playing anyway. The music is just noise to them. I even saw people glare at the musicians because they had to raise their voices to talk over them. There are always a small handful of folks who do understand and ‘get it’… and maybe in time this could have turned out with patience in being slow and consistent. Not in this case. I’m not surprised at all.