As longtime businesses shutter and sway amid growing wealth disparity and higher real estate prices, local musicians and residents came together to discuss the future of gathering spaces. It’s a conversation that’s been ongoing for years, but with news of the looming closure of Island Music in Vineyard Haven — the Vineyard’s only music store, known for hosting open mic nights — musicians are feeling an urgency to step up and fill a community need.
At a meeting on Thursday night at the Katherine Cornell Theater organized by the Vineyard Haven Harbor Cultural District to discuss Island Music’s future, dozens of locals expressed their desire for shared action to ensure a music store remains on the Vineyard. Andy Herr, musician and tenured music teacher, led the discussion.
For some, access to instruments is crucial to the children of the Island, and they feel a need to continue the store for that purpose. For others, the potential loss of a “third space” — which is a community gathering location separate from work and home — is cause for action, and creates an opportunity for locals to step up and ensure spaces like Island Music stick around.
The conversation comes as more than just Island Music is potentially closing. The owners of Mocha Motts’ year-round location in Vineyard Haven recently announced they will likely be closing in January (or as soon as the building has officially sold). Leslie’s Pharmacy, Beadnik’s, a craft and jewelry store, Humphrey’s Café on State Road, and EduComp, an office and art supply store, have all closed over the past few years, leaving a void that some say hasn’t been filled.
“The local scene and the off-season are really floundering. And it puts a place like this in danger of losing its community, and that community gravity,” Herr said. “It sounds like there are some concerned business owners in Oak Bluffs looking at all these upheavals and scratching their heads about what to do. This reeks of a very similar situation.”
The changing times in the town of Vineyard Haven — and Oak Bluffs, with a new grab-and-go restaurant planned for the former Linda Jean’s location, the closure of Phillip’s Hardware, and Benito’s barbershop moving — were not lost on the attendees on Thursday, or on Herr.
The price of real estate or rent and cost of operations are a huge barrier for many locals, like Herr, who are looking to open a business or keep one operational. According to Island Music staff, the building is in need of repair, and the rent is “prohibitively expensive.” And after a car crashed into the art gallery next to Island Music this summer, there’s even more work to be done. It will be put on the market for an estimated $4 million, which includes seven apartments above the store. But that price doesn’t take into account the amount of work that needs to be put into the property, not to mention stocking and staffing.
Some local musicians said it’s these facts that have made it very difficult for the Island to have a long-standing, large music venue.
Mike Benjamin, who has been playing on the Island for decades, said having spaces to perform is crucial, especially for musicians who are new to the scene. He said there’s been an increase in year-round opportunities to play, but a decrease in venues that can attract big-name performers, like the Hot Tin Roof or Atlantic Connection used to.
“M.V. needs an ‘Island music center,’” Benjamin said. Island Music has filled that role for years, and its closing would leave a huge hole in the needs of local musicians and people who are interested in learning more about music in general. Benjamin said it will take a lot of effort from the community to make something happen to fill the need that Island Music’s prospective closure could leave behind.
“It’s really, really hard to have a venue,” said career musician Jeremy Berlin, pianist (and bassist — watch the left hand on the keyboard) for Johnny Hoy and the Bluefish. “Rent and real estate make it impossible to have a functioning establishment that makes sense for anyone who owns it — unless they’re willing to bleed money.”
And with a median yearly income of a little over $100,000 Island-wide and an even lower median at about $70,000 in the town of Vineyard Haven alone, where Island Music is located, many year-rounders are simply not in a position to lose money. Concepts of a multi-use music business were discussed as a solution to this — an instrument storefront, venue, and café combination was one idea floated at Thursday’s meeting.
“It’s not just about the services and the stuff, it’s about those spaces where community exists. We don’t have that when we’re just at work and at home. We need those third spaces, and they need to be supported somehow,” Herr noted.
Berlin and Benjamin both said music is an essential part of the community, and sustaining that is a worthwhile venture. But the question for many year-round residents has become: Are the changes happening to businesses across the Island resonating for them? And if not, what can people do about it?
At the meeting on Thursday, those questions weren’t fully answered. But Herr said the point is that the conversation continues until headway is made, not just for Island Music, but for the many establishments that have struggled to stay open year-round in recent years.
“Community is precious,” Mark Alan Lovewell said to the crowd at the Katherine Cornell Theater. He added that everyone needs to work together to create “the feeling of home.”
There are just a few community spaces for music in the off-season. Chilmark Potlucks are a yearslong tradition, run by a few Islanders who were looking for a casual setting to display new music; the P.A. Club and the Ritz have hosted bands for years; the libraries and restaurants hold music events; and Pathways Arts has its musical and poetry residency through the year.
But in Vineyard Haven, the list is getting slim, even though in the summer the town was standing out as a growing hub for the music scene. The seasonality of those spaces has not been lost on the year-round community, many of whom cited wanting more “third spaces” in the fall, winter, and spring at Thursday’s meeting. Island Music and S&S Kitchenette are the two main holdouts through the year, and the latter just started music nights last year — owner Spring Sheldon said it was an effort to fill a need, one that still exists.
“Music nights were born out of a community effort. It was a collaborative effort of some musicians who wanted a place to play. They wanted a listening room. They wanted a place that wasn’t a bar,” Sheldon said in an interview.
But she knows well the complications — mainly of cost — that arise from renting a space that’s community-driven and -supported. Her rent rises year after year, and there’s only so much expansion, without driving up prices, in a set square footage. Themed nights are one way of diversifying and reaching out to the community more effectively.
“We need more communal, collaborative efforts to create spaces. And also for the powers that be, like the town, to help us create those spaces. And to make sure that those spaces stay affordable and accessible,” Sheldon said.
Quitsa Cuisine has done a great job of filling the void when Humphrey’s left.
Agreed! Quitsa is terrific. I hope islanders will make sure we support them over the winter.
As the former Artistic Director of The Yard, I am appalled that there is not a multi-town policy consensus to create a multi-purpose music community center. The island created the Y, driven by some heavy hitters who still have burgeoning deep pockets in this economy. A plan for operations of such an institution is not rocket science – creating an island-wide consensus among artists and farsighted underwriters is.
Heaps of praise for the four (more?) musicians mentioned in the article, and many, many others, as well as those who provide the venues (often these same people). The off-season music scene is so amazing while the economics make it so difficult to maintain. I love all you guys.
Great article to bring attention to a lost in community, especially music. One issue not mentioned is that with the advent of the Internet, almost anything can be purchased online now, which must severely harm local sales. This is a nationwide phenomenon. Any business must make money to stay open, unless funded by a donor. Hopefully some celebrity will save Island Music? Or maybe a giant music concert fund-raiser with a name act? If I can help, let me know.
Sadly, the musical scene many of us remember was enabled by a phenomenon that’s vanished: Affordable Rents.
Yes, Julian, your comment about affordable rents is spot on. That factor impacts the amount of disposable income folks have to spend on entertainment, and it has significantly changed the demographics of the population at large.
The owner of the building held rent steady for many years to support local artists and should be commended. I was a tenant for over a decade and really appreciated this. The driver who crashed into that building ruined two art-related businesses that supported many local artists, yet their name was withheld from all reporting. Why?
I’m very sad to hear that Island Music is closing.
It has been so nice to have this business on Main Street—nice to patronize it and nice to walk by it.
Regarding internet purchases, yes that is a fact of life, but don’t underrate the value of advice and assistance available from Island Music employees. The atmosphere of the store, the racks of instruments displayed in the store and the windows—these are concrete pleasures and are educational, too. Recently I decided I needed a piano bench. I could have bought one online, but I got an excellent deal on a very nice secondhand one for sale right at Island Music that I could see before I bought.
We read that Circuit Arts and the MV Playhouse are merging.
Are there any deep pockets out there who could purchase the building and form some kind of performing arts condominium in VH? A music store/center seems like a natural fit with these two organizations. There is so much more that can be done with an arts/music space on Main Street, and a music center is a genuine generator of the “vibrancy” that our town planners keep saying is needed.
Comments are closed.