The crowds that gather in front of the Calvin Theatre are often homogenous—very often, it's the crew who isn't afraid to wear tassle loafers, the same folks who regularly chuckle at Guy Noir, Private Eye. They come to see the comfortable acts that no longer fit the Iron Horse, the acts who have perhaps also discovered that loafers offer a quality footwear option they hadn't previously considered. Other times, the herbal scents and hemp crowd shows up to see a band of jammers hold court.
Sometimes the lines blur and it's much harder to see a common thread. That brand of ambiguity should be in evidence when Billy Bragg comes calling this week—he has fans old and young, fellow political agitators, college students, and the 40-plus crowd that, somewhere in the attic, has an old vinyl copy of Back to Basics.
The old Calvin Theatre, the flagship venue of businessman Eric Suher's Iron Horse Entertainment Group, also evidences a bit of ambiguity, an identity crisis of a particularly Valley kind. It's a far pricier ticket than anywhere else in Northampton, despite the larger number of seats with which to gather revenue; it's a restored theater in the middle of a gentrified small town; it counts on outside acts in a Valley full of musicians. Such endeavors as restoration and booking of big acts require large sums of money, clearly, but a place awash in artistic talent is usually not a place with a moneyed population.
So who goes to the place? Do many of the folks who make Northampton such a good home for the arts have the dough to attend? It is, of course, impossible to know save for anecdotal evidence.
Regardless, the Calvin provides something that never hurts: a venue that can draw big names to a very small town and make it worth their while. If it weren't for the theater, Valley residents would no doubt have to travel a long way to see bigger names like James Brown or Loretta Lynn. It's a rather large perk to live in rural splendor while remaining within an easy drive of big-name concerts. The Mullins Center at UMass-Amherst draws its share of even bigger names, but it's not in a particularly convenient or homey locale.
Perhaps it's a reach to worry overmuch about who inhabits the seats of the vaulting old hall. It was, unquestionably, a worthy effort to restore the theater and offer a sort of bookend to downtown Northampton, opposite the yet more palatial Academy of Music.
The place seems, on the other hand, to provide a fascinating microcosm of Northampton's longstanding convergence of demographics and identities, its sometimes uncomfortable mix of Hamp and Noho, of rich and poor, artist and consumer, cheap and pricey, business and entertainment. Its revival in the late '90s was itself a manifestation of the changing face of the town in a time when the fragrance of high-end retail, mixed with a whiff of bohemia, was being perfected.
I'm sure Billy Bragg doesn't usually know the exact context of a stage onto which he steps, or whether he'll face a crowd full of socialist agitators, earnest artists or moneyed tourists. He just knows the place fills up with people who appreciate the unique sound he makes. He's a great example of why it's often wisest to simply be glad there's a place so nearby to hear such an important musical voice.
The Iron Horse Entertainment Group and Eric Suher himself get plenty of critique, and sometimes become the screen onto which people project their frustrations or joys about the evolution of Northampton. But if there were no Calvin, would we be able to get our electric guitar-wielding, busking slice of Cockney political agitation, not to mention "The Milkman of Human Kindness"? Because we need that. Unless, that is, he shows up in loafers.
