Club Quarter to see changes

By G. Michael Dobbs

Managing Editor

SPRINGFIELD The city's entertainment district will see some changes in the next few months.

The Board of License Commissioners approved a license transfer for the former Art E Pasta/ Opal on Worthington Street to Virtuoso. Kevin Cousin, the former executive chef at Sonoma on Main Street, will manage the new restaurant which attorney Frank Caruso described as having a "contemporary modern approach" aimed at a 25 year-old-plus audience.

Cousin explained the hours would be from 4 p.m. to 1:30 p.m. to start and he hopes to expand the hours to include lunch. There will be a television at the bar, but no entertainment and no dance floor.

Renovations are now going on and the restaurant is expected to be open for the first week of August.

Rain, the nightclub at Sterns Square, is closing to under-go a format change and the Board also approved a request to expand the service area to the building's roof. Attorney Melinda Phelps explained that owners Mike Barasso and Steve Stein want to draw more business people to the club.

To do so, Rain will be closed for renovations. The new club will have one area feature "retro music" from the 1980s and another area with country and western. The main attraction of the new club, dubbed Skyplex, will be the roof area. The club is scheduled to re-open in July.

Phelps said the roof would be open only from May through October. She submitted a report from a sound specialist who said that the speaker system to be installed on the roof would not disturb either other businesses or downtown residents.

Around the roof will be a 48-inch tall metal fence topped with an additional two-foot tall barrier of Plexiglas.

Although Board Chair Peter Sygnator expressed some concern about the safety of the club, he did say it was "a kind of wild idea for little old Springfield."

Phelps said the owners would be happy to appear before the Board in the fall to review the club.