A great example of building a team to promote the music you love.

I met Keith around 2000, when I did a show at the Moonlight Music Cafe with James Casto and J.P. Williams. Three unknown acts playing Birmingham for the first time. It was great show, enjoyed by all 7 people who attended. Yet Keith was friendly before and after the show, and didn’t complain about his overhead not being met by his 20% of the $35 gross.

It was obvious that Keith loved music, and really cared about artists. After shutting down the “Moonlight” a few years later, I’m glad to see that he embraced house concerts as a way to continue his passion for live music. Here’s a short interview from our recent conversation.

CIYH - What was your first music industry “job” - anything prior to Moonlight?

Keith - I was a Beatles-era kid, fourteen when they hit the Ed Sullivan show - so of course I grabbed a bass guitar and joined a band. Played for five or six years, until I was old enough to recognize the limits of my talent. I became a writer, then photographer, making my way as a creative for about 35 years - always stayed tight with musician friends, though, and sharpened my interest in folk and acoustic songwriters. I was hospitality manager for a huge summer music festival here all through the nineties, tending to the temporary needs of hundreds of visiting performers. That’s what taught me how to make traveling artists feel welcome and cared for.

CIYH - How long did Moonlight Music Cafe last? Describe some highs and lows of that experience…

Keith - We lived out our entire three-year lease, from our first show with Cliff Eberhardt in November 2003, to our closeout with Stacey Earle and Mark Stuart in October of 2006. We started out with live music six nights a week, emphasizing traveling players, but giving our local performers equal access to the stage…. we presented over a thousand different artists in that time. The best part was getting close to so many gifted and grateful musicians, giving them a clean, quiet, and friendly room to play in, and growing an audience for what they do.

The tough part was presenting them to so many empty seats, and knowing after a while that The Moonlight was not going to be around forever. Though I traded a couple of pieces of real estate for the experience, I’m very glad to have done it… we made a lot of folks very happy, and created a lot of special memories. In addition, I found a new identity for myself, and discovered something for which I seem to have a natural aptitude!

CIYH - When and how did you discover house concerts?

Keith - My friend Lee Hurley began to publish LEAK Magazine here in 1994, which featured a dozen or more original artists in printed articles and on an included CD (!), the first I had ever seen in connection with a periodical. I became part of a small committee who staged house shows for some of those artists, and we continued in that activity for several years, long after the magazine ceased publication in 1998. After an initial period of enthusiasm, though, the house shows became less and less frequent, and I got more and more serious about opening a full-time folk venue to pick up the pace.

CIYH - Did you attend any before starting your house concert series?

Keith - We had some great ones - Malcolm Holcombe, Greg Greenway, Chuck Brodsky, The Nudes, Darryl Purpose, Barbara Kessler - I was sold on the idea from to get-go. The Moonlight was an attempt to create a house concert atmosphere at every show.

CIYH - How many people are you working with (hosts/volunteers)?

Keith - Our Small Stages committee is only four people, with each person handling a particular corner of responsibility - booking, website/email list, reservations, and secretary/treasurer duties.

We were just granted our non-profit status through Folk Alliance, so 2008 will see us generating a lot more paperwork for compliance’ sake - maybe we’ll even have some money left over to report! It’s been our intent to move the official monthly show from place to place, in the belief that new hosts mean new audience. So even though we have a go-to living room that holds up to seventy people, we like to encourage our core supporters to offer their own homes or place of business as a venue in the future. Because there are so many deserving artists we want to present, I facilitate additional concerts on my own, in the hopes that we can build momentum for small acoustic shows, without diluting the base audience for the Small Stages flagship presentations. We’ve now got a dozen or more places to consider doing shows, with ever more people warming to the idea.

CIYH - What would you tell club-owners who believe house concerts do more harm than good?

Keith - We don’t have folk clubs here that do anything like what happens at a house show - well, not anymore, we don’t. If I were back in business with The Moonlight, I’d encourage any activity that strengthens the audience for original music, and try to establish a helpful, symbiotic relationship with the house concert series… paying listeners are hard to come by under any circumstances, better to share the little pie than fight with anyone for tiny pieces.

Clubs typically book music to sell drinks - house shows attract an altogether different clientele, for a different purpose… there’s no real threat, and certainly nothing to get ugly about…. we ALL got a big job to do for these artists.

CIYH - Personal stuff: Married? Kids? How do you pay the bills?

Keith - No kids, and not married, though very grateful for the tireless help of my partner Joni, whose every spare hour apart from HER full-time job was devoted to keeping The Moonlight upright… she continues to be a big part of producing these house shows. As an old hippie, I’ve long since learned to get by on very little, and have been practicing those skills since closing the club - knowing I’m not constantly losing money on a business makes me feel positively rich! But I miss the mission of a full-time venue, and spend lots of time scheming how to get up and running again… I feel sure it will eventually happen.

CIYH - Most interesting house concert story/event?

We’ve had eleven Small Stages shows, in a variety of places, and each time we worried over the standard fears - will we have enough people to cover our artist’s guarantee? Or will we have more than we can fit in the space we have? As it’s turned out, in every case, we gathered exactly enough people to fill the room, with one or two standing in the back. Now I don’t even fret about it - long as you can get to the bathroom and back to your seat, it’ll be just as we planned, and that’s what I look forward to happening this year, too.

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It’s inspiring to discover the many ways that music fans find to keep art in their lives, and comforting to know that artists are not alone in the struggle to create memorable musical experiences. If you have a unique story about how you keep the music a-live in your community, please share your story with us. — Fran

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