Lenox Lounge closed

[HLJ]

Read the Lounge closed 12/31. Whats up with that? Peace and all that.

[Ron Thorne]

Lenox Lounge To Reopen

[Valerie]

sounds very sad to me and things obviously will never be the same.

[HLJ]

Ron still looks like it won't be the same.Right after 9/11 I was in New York and me and my cousins went up to Harlem and took pictures in front of the lounge.Man how great it was for a dude from Smalltown USA to be hanging at The Lenox Lounge. Man time passing is a BITCH!! Peace and all that.

[hornplayer]

Only good thing I can see about it is if there are 2 jazz clubs where there was one, it means another place for the cats to play.

[steve(thelil)]

I was looking at today's Village Voice. Weirdly, they have listings for gigs at the Lenox Lounge this week.

[Ron Thorne]

I certainly wasn't trying to paint a rosy picture. I'm just hopeful that something positive may finally come out of these struggles ... more jazz, more gigs. Good food would be a bonus. I'm not too fond of Mr. Reed.

[Jimmy Cantiello]

I'm not so sure that Alvin Reed is the bad guy here. It's a tough situation all the way around. And the gentrification of Harlem continues.

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/...icle-1.1215150

[steve(thelil)]

Ron still looks like it won't be the same.Right after 9/11 I was in New York and me and my cousins went up to Harlem and took pictures in front of the lounge.Man how great it was for a dude from Smalltown USA to be hanging at The Lenox Lounge. Man time passing is a BITCH!! Peace and all that.

Great post.

Birdland is now at it's 3rd location. (I could be wrong and it might be only the second) In any event, to those who saw the great 50's artists at the original Birdland on 52nd street, I'm sure it just isn't the same. But, the current Birdland is a wonderful place with great sight lines and sound and great artists playing all the time, so let's hope the best for the reincarnation(s) of Lenox Lounge.

[Ron Thorne]

I'm not so sure that Alvin Reed is the bad guy here.

Perhaps I was a bit hasty in my remark about Mr. Reed, Jimmy. It's a very complex situation, obviously.

And the gentrification of Harlem continues.

Agreed.

[Pete C]

I'm pretty sure it's the second location of the new Birdland (formerly Broadway and, I think, 104, just a bit south of Smoke) which has nothing to do with the original except the shameless appropriation of the name. But it's a good club, so I won't complain too much about the name. Some friends moved to 128 & Lex. last year and we were talking about checking out Lenox Lounge. I've never been.

[Jimmy Cantiello]

I've been to the Birdland on 44th St. (second incarnation) many times. I always had a good experience and saw some great shows which included bands and solo artists. Even though the venue is in midtown and in close proximity to the dreaded Times Square it's still a nice supper club type place to lay back and listen to music and even have a bite to eat. And as (thelil) mentioned, it has good sight lines anywhere you sit.

[Lois Gilbert]

The landlord of the building that housed the now-shuttered Lenox Lounge is suing the famed lounge's owner for $25 million, claiming that he swiped the jazz club's historic fixtures and decorations to fill his new venue, leaving the historic site "completely bare and empty."
Ricky Edmonds, who owns 286 Lenox Ave., the former home of the historic lounge, Alvin Reed, who owned the hotspot since the 1980s, covertly ripped out the banquettes, wallpaper, bathroom doors and the signage and transferred them to the site of Reed's new Lenox Lounge a few blocks away at 333 Lenox Avenue.
Reed — who claims to own the copyright to Lenox Lounge — was forced to vacate the original location, where jazz legends such as John Coltrane and Miles Davis played, by Jan 1. Reed said previously that Edmonds tried to double the rent on the property.
When Edmonds and architect Huntley Gill walked into the club on New Year's Eve, they saw carpenters and other workmen ripping out the banquettes, etched mirrors and the famed zebra wall for which the Zebra Room was named, according to the suit.
Gill claims that he advised Edmonds that he was not allowed to remove the fixtures because they were the landlord's property. The lawsuit said Reed's attorney called the police and was told the situation was a civil matter, not a criminal matter. Still, they were advised that the exterior and interior could not be altered without permit, the lawsuit says.
At 4 a.m. on Jan. 1, Edmonds returned to the lounge after its final party and claims he saw 10 to 15 workers "carrying out the contents of the Lenox Lounge into two waiting trucks." The trucks traveled to the new Lenox Lounge location at 333 Lenox Ave. and returned for more, the lawsuit says.
"The front facade was removed. The interior and exterior doors were being removed. Fixtures such as mirrors, light fixtures, signs and banquettes were removed," the suit says, "completing their extensive stripping and looting of the property."


By stripping the lounge, which first opened in 1939 and began operating under the name Lenox Lounge in 1943, Reed, who took over the club in 1983, "destroyed "a hallmark example of the few original art deco structures left in New York," the suit charges.
Reed could not be reached for comment and his attorney did not respond to a request for comment.
However, Tyreta Foster, a lawyer for Reed, told DNAinfo last month that Reed owns trademarks on the Lenox Lounge sign, along with the red paneling out front, the Zebra Room and the other historic elements of the interior.
"It wasn't landmarked," Foster said. "The sign will go back up and the Zebra Room will return," at the lounge's new location at 333 Lenox Ave., just two blocks from the original location, she said.
Reed, in a statement last month, said the lounge would live on, just in a new location.
“Just as I restored Lenox Lounge in 2000, I am determined to expand the brand just two blocks away,” Reed said in a statement.
“Of course the famed Zebra Room will get a second act,” he added.
The fate of the lounge has caused concern among Harlem leaders because many thought the famed building was landmarked because of its historical significance but it wasn't. In 2011, Community Board 10 included the lounge in its first-ever historic preservation plan.
Restaurateur Richard Notar is scheduled to open a new jazz club on the 286 Lenox Ave. site.


Read more: http://www.dnainfo.com/new-york/2013...#ixzz2KzWlwr16