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Date: 10/6/2023
NORTHAMPTON — After being mostly closed for almost three years, the Calvin Theatre is in the midst of being purchased by a New York City music venue operator called The Bowery Presents and Alex Crothers, the owner of Higher Ground in Burlington, Vermont.
“We’re happy that after many, many months, an extended period of review and back and forth that we have come to an agreement with an excellent operator for the theater and for the full operations and booking and continuing the Calvin as a venue in Northampton,” announced current Calvin owner Eric Suher, during a meeting of the License Commission on Oct. 2.
The Bowery Presents, which was founded in New York City in 2004, operates 30 venues across the Northeast, according to their website, including venues in Massachusetts, Connecticut, New York, Rhode Island and many more. Some of their venues include the Roadrunner in Boston, Terminal 5 in New York City, The Sinclair in Cambridge and Westville Music Bowl in New Haven, Connecticut.
Jim Glancy, a co-president of The Bowery, stated at the License Commission meeting that nationally-known acts like LCD Soundsystem, The Strokes, Interpol and My Morning Jacket got their start performing at Bowery venues.
“We envision running the Calvin for decades to come,” Glancy said, of his hopeful partnership with Crothers for the property.
“We’re excited at the possibility of coming in and taking over the Calvin and continuing the legacy,” added Crothers, during the meeting.
Glancy told the commission that the plan is for the Calvin to exceed the 60-plus shows a year Suher was running before the coronavirus pandemic.
“Hopefully we have some more ability to get different genres of music in there,” Glancy said during the meeting. “We still envision very much a singer songwriter, all-seated scenario. We envision taking the seat down, down front, letting people dance and move around. I would say there’s no genre that Eric was doing before that we wouldn’t want to do and we would hopefully be just delivering even more shows.”
Glancy said the all-alcohol license is “critical” for the theater and added that the goal is to have all of the paperwork finalized by Nov. 1.
“What we don’t want to do is get off to a bad start with the city by saying November 1 and then Oct. 25 we call and say we’re going to miss it by a week or we’re going to miss it by two weeks or something like that,” said Glancy.
Even though the License Commission did not know of the prospective buyers of the Calvin until the night of the Oct. 2 meeting, all of them expressed excitement in some way for The Bowery and Crothers’ interest in the property. A couple of them said they have been to several of The Bowery’s venues and came away impressed.
“I’ve been to every one of these venues in Boston, and I think this is an incredibly exciting opportunity for downtown Northampton to have this caliber of professionalism and success interested in this venue,” License Commission Chair Natasha Yakovlev said. “That’s pretty amazing.”
Suher’s announcement of this deal comes after the city spent months trying to get him to either reopen or sell his music venues — which include The Basement, The Green Room, Calvin Theater, Pearl Street Night Club and Iron Horse.
In February, the city’s License Commission decided to revoke one of his liquor licenses attached to one of his properties. Suher then appealed the revocation to the state before he and the commission came to an agreement in May that gave him until Sept. 29 at 5 p.m. to either open the venues himself, sell them, or risk losing the all-alcohol liquor licenses attached to the venues.
Suher reached agreements to transfer the licenses for The Basement, The Green Room and the Iron Horse before the deadline but failed to do so with the Calvin and Pearl Street.
Because this announcement of the Calvin sale came after Suher’s Sept. 29 deadline, the License Commission had the authority to cancel the Calvin alcohol license based on the agreement they had with Suher.
Instead, however, the License Commission decided to extend the deadline for the Calvin license to Dec. 1 to give Suher and the prospective buyers time to submit paperwork. If the commission does not have the transfer application by Dec. 1, the license will be canceled.
The other licenses/venues
Suher’s venues have been mostly dormant since the start of the pandemic except for a few shows at the Calvin and Pearl Street. The Green Room, in particular closed last fall due to what Suher described as a lack of staff.
A deal was made hours before the Sept. 29 deadline for The Basement’s liquor license to be transferred to John Piskor, the owner of Gombo Nola Kitchen & Oyster Bar on 159 Main St.
Although The Basement is still closed and under Suher’s ownership, the transfer of the liquor license to Piskor allows Gombo to serve more than just beer and wine.
“When you’re serving hard liquor versus beer and wine, you’re probably creating a profit margin of at least 10 to 15% more because we pay a lot more for beer and we pay a lot more for wine,” Piskor told Reminder Publishing. “So that should help us.”
When the license is eventually transferred to Piskor, the Gombo owner will hold two licenses, including the one he currently has from opening the restaurant. When that happens, Piskor said he will have to forfeit the license he has now unless he finds another location to sell it or transfer it to. He could also buy a second property and transfer one of the licenses to that location.
Piskor said he has had thoughts of possibly opening another location, but as of right now, he is not ready.
Suher said during the License Commission meeting that another local entity now owns The Green Room liquor license and plans to open the venue in early winter. That deal was also made right before the Sept. 29 deadline.
The Parlor Room, meanwhile, bought the Iron Music Hall and its accompanying liquor license.
Although Suher was able to reach agreements for the Iron Horse, The Green Room and The Basement before his Sept. 29 deadline, the License Commission still had the authority to cancel those licenses since outstanding paperwork like certificates of compliance were not submitted yet.
The commission, however, chose to delay the cancellation of these three liquor licenses until the License Commission meeting on Oct. 18. The commission will either approve the transfer of the licenses during that meeting or decide to cancel them.
“Technically, we can cancel everything and say, ‘let’s call it a day,’ we’re taking all five licenses back,’” said Yakovlev, during the License Commission meeting on Oct. 2. “But I really want to shine some light on the fact that we have not just the folks who are here to talk to us about their plans for the Calvin, their hopes for the Calvin, but we have people investing in downtown Northampton at a time when we need and want people investing in this great downtown that we have and coming out of the pandemic and everything leading up to it.”
According to Yakovlev, the licenses have to be renewed prior to being transferred. Suher responded by saying he will make sure all of those licenses are renewed.
The Pearl Street license was officially canceled during the Oct. 2 License Commission meeting, as a buyer has not been found yet.
According to Annie Lesko, the administration, licensing and economic development coordinator for Northampton, The Basement license cost $35,000, while the license and business assets for The Green Room cost $75,000.
The License Commission meets again on Oct. 18 at 4 p.m. over Zoom.