Ash Grove (music club)

Folk singer Ross Altman likened the Ash Grove to a "West Coast University of Folk Music."[1] Ry Cooder first public performance was playing backing guitar for Jackie De Shannon at the Ash Grove in 1963 when he was sixteen years old.[2] Linda Ronstadt got her start hanging out at the Ash Grove. "My goal in those days was just to play the Ash Grove in Los Angeles because that was the center of folk music at the time", she remembered. "The first place I went in Los Angeles was the Ash Grove. That is where I met Kenny Edwards. Kenny liked Mexican music and we started the Stone Poneys."[3] Future Byrds Chris Hillman and Clarence White met at the Ash Grove while both were in high school. They then played there with The Byrds on May 23rd 1969. [4]

While the club was best known for "folk" or "roots" music, such as bluegrass and blues, Ed Pearl also featured socially committed jazz and rock artists, such as Oscar Brown, Jr., Chuck Berry, James Booker and Jackson Browne. And, long before there was a recognized "world" genre in the music industry, the Ash Grove provided a venue in Los Angeles for such diverse performers as Ravi Shankar, Mongo Santamaría, Miriam Makeba and the Virgin Islands Steel Band.

The Ash Grove also became associated with the cultural and political ferment of the 1960s. In the coffee house tradition, Pearl encouraged an occasional mix of music with poetry, lecture, film or comedy. Lenny Bruce, Mort Sahl, the Firesign Theatre, Rowan & Martin and Steve Allen brought their comedy and commentary to the Ash Grove. Luis Valdez's El Teatro Campesino performed, as did Dr. Demento, poet Charles Bukowski and artists campaigning against the Vietnam War, such as Jane Fonda.

When travelers returning from Cuba gave talks or showed Cuban films, the Ash Grove became the target of angry demonstrations and threatened violence by Cuban exiles. A series of fires, including what patrons believed was an arson attack, led to the club's demise in 1973.

Following the military coup in Chile that same year, Pearl lent his expertise to Los Angeles solidarity activists, helping them set up major concerts for such Latin American nueva canción groups as Inti-Illimani, Quilapayún, Los Parra and Los Folkloristas, as well as the first-ever Los Angeles concert by Catalan singer-songwriter Joan Manuel Serrat. These events were part of the gestation of world music in Los Angeles.

Some 3,000 hours of recorded live performances at the Ash Grove have survived. In 2007 Aiyana Elliott, who made an award-winning 2000 documentary about the life of her father, Ramblin' Jack Elliott, began work on a film exploring the history of the Ash Grove. A three-day concert and workshop series commemorating the Ash Grove's fiftieth anniversary was held April 18–20, 2008, at UCLA.[5]

In a way, the Ash Grove was a victim of its own success, helping develop Los Angeles audiences for younger musicians who then needed larger venues for their concerts. But none of the city's new clubs consistently emphasized the roots music that Pearl put at the heart of the Ash Grove's line up. Pearl blamed consolidation in the music industry for undermining the coffeehouse music tradition and closing the door on socially committed artists. The big companies bought up small labels to gain control of their catalogues, he said; but they then did not support or promote new folk music talent. Corporate control of radio playlists homogenized musical culture, according to Pearl. This effect is known as Radio Homogenization.

After the Ash Grove closed in 1973, LA Times music critic Robert Hilburn wrote its obituary, which included an anecdote about the club's influence on the Rolling Stones: "On his way out of the Ash Grove one night, Mick Jagger, a frequent visitor to the club, shook Pearl's hand in gratitude. He simply wanted to thank Pearl for all the entertainment – and no doubt musical education – the club had given him." And, Hilburn concluded, "The Ash Grove's contribution to this city's musical heritage was invaluable."[6]

In 1974, the Los Angeles branch of the New York City-based comedy venue, The Improv, opened in the former Ash Grove space, where it established its own reputation and prominence, up to this day. In 2015, a series of Ash Grove-branded musical events, including a 57th Anniversary Concert, was held at the Improv, under the guidance of Ed Pearl, celebrating the Ash Grove's history and legacy in its original venue.[7] Featured performers for these events included Claudia Lennear, The Chambers Brothers, Roy Zimmerman[8] and Jackson Browne.

• Official web site
• Ashgrove Folk Club (1)
• Ashgrove Folk Club (3)
• Archived live recordings at Wolfgangsvault.com (registration required)
• "Old Time Hits the Big Time in Hollywood USA", by Peter Feldmann, The Old Time Herald