If the news is true about Ye Olde Brunswick House becoming a pizza emporium, then the Bloor Street West perennial is soon to be a memory, nestled among other memories of Hogtown musical dives like the Matador. The Brunswick a musical dive? Yes. Downstairs, back in the day, there was Rockin' Irene (who died this year) and her pianist indifferently pounding out show tunes, pop songs and World War I ditties to a usually drunk - or getting there - audience of students, working stiffs, scoundrels, pensioners and others too, ah, unusual to categorize.
And no Friday or Saturday night was complete without Donnie Sinclair, the small man (he was a dwarf, but that's now a pejorative) who lived at the bar, ran the shoeshine stand and did a wildly funny but wildly inept Elvis impression about 11pm. There were amateur performers too who, just drunk enough or just brazen enough, got up on stage and sang and pranced for all they were worth. There was the elderly woman who came in from Niagara Falls? and opened her two or three-song act with the greeting, "Hello, suckers." There was another elderly woman who sang a show tune or two and was called - behind her back - Juanita. Why Juanita? She only had one tooth in her whole mouth. Or Mr. Bones, drunk out of his mind, and clacking away with handheld wooden sticks (idiophones). How about Carlos the Portuguese? He always sang Mammy, the Al Jolson song, assuring us that instead of walking a million miles for one of her smiles he'd "walk a million blocks for a smell of her socks."
So, yes, downstairs at the Brunswick - never the Brunny in my day - was inexpressibly vulgar, but vastly entertaining. Upstairs, at Albert's Hall, the musical scene was something else again. Peter Appleyard the vibes player and his band were regulars and filmed a TV series there, bringing in the likes of Blossom Dearie and Cab Calloway. The Climax Jazz Band was there frequently, and so was Downchild. The incomparable Etta James played Albert's Hall a week at a time. And no hard workin', travellin' bluesman - or woman - would pass up a gig at the room if offered one. Neither did K.D. Lang. This was back in her 'cow punk" days, when she was fresh out of Alberta and wearing castoff wedding dresses and Dame Edna-style glasses.
I haven't been in the Brunswick in years. I got older, the ownership changed, the vibe changed. But if the building does become a pizza joint, why not leave the folks and their pies downstairs and keep the upstairs as a musical venue for local talent? The pizza people would rack up a big PR score for one thing. Or how about music and pizza in the former Albert's Hall? I'd pay to hear a good local performer and tuck into what my friend Bill calls the perfect food. At the very least the new owners, whoever they are, should have an all-week Brunswick farewell. Round up the old timers still with us, offer customers cheap beer, get some local blues and jazz talent busting it up, warn the neighbours there's going to be a party. The Brunswick, if it's going, has to go out covered in glory.
And no Friday or Saturday night was complete without Donnie Sinclair, the small man (he was a dwarf, but that's now a pejorative) who lived at the bar, ran the shoeshine stand and did a wildly funny but wildly inept Elvis impression about 11pm. There were amateur performers too who, just drunk enough or just brazen enough, got up on stage and sang and pranced for all they were worth. There was the elderly woman who came in from Niagara Falls? and opened her two or three-song act with the greeting, "Hello, suckers." There was another elderly woman who sang a show tune or two and was called - behind her back - Juanita. Why Juanita? She only had one tooth in her whole mouth. Or Mr. Bones, drunk out of his mind, and clacking away with handheld wooden sticks (idiophones). How about Carlos the Portuguese? He always sang Mammy, the Al Jolson song, assuring us that instead of walking a million miles for one of her smiles he'd "walk a million blocks for a smell of her socks."
So, yes, downstairs at the Brunswick - never the Brunny in my day - was inexpressibly vulgar, but vastly entertaining. Upstairs, at Albert's Hall, the musical scene was something else again. Peter Appleyard the vibes player and his band were regulars and filmed a TV series there, bringing in the likes of Blossom Dearie and Cab Calloway. The Climax Jazz Band was there frequently, and so was Downchild. The incomparable Etta James played Albert's Hall a week at a time. And no hard workin', travellin' bluesman - or woman - would pass up a gig at the room if offered one. Neither did K.D. Lang. This was back in her 'cow punk" days, when she was fresh out of Alberta and wearing castoff wedding dresses and Dame Edna-style glasses.
I haven't been in the Brunswick in years. I got older, the ownership changed, the vibe changed. But if the building does become a pizza joint, why not leave the folks and their pies downstairs and keep the upstairs as a musical venue for local talent? The pizza people would rack up a big PR score for one thing. Or how about music and pizza in the former Albert's Hall? I'd pay to hear a good local performer and tuck into what my friend Bill calls the perfect food. At the very least the new owners, whoever they are, should have an all-week Brunswick farewell. Round up the old timers still with us, offer customers cheap beer, get some local blues and jazz talent busting it up, warn the neighbours there's going to be a party. The Brunswick, if it's going, has to go out covered in glory.
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