Howard Solomon, 75, Owner of Famed Village Nightcl

[Brownian Motion]

Howard Solomon, 75, Owner of Famed Village Nightclub, Dies

By JESSE McKINLEY

Published: June 16, 2004

[H] oward Solomon, the mild-mannered owner of the Cafe au Go Go nightclub in Greenwich Village who became an unlikely First Amendment crusader when he was arrested with the comedian Lenny Bruce on obscenity charges in 1964, died on June 3 at his home in Crestline, Calif. He was 75.

The cause was a heart attack, said his son Jason Solomon.

At the height of the 1960's music scene, Mr. Solomon's basement club on Bleecker Street played host to dozens of influential music stars, including John Lee Hooker, Jimi Hendrix, Bob Dylan, B. B. King, the Blues Project, Stan Getz and Joni Mitchell. Renowned for its fine brick-wall acoustics and groovy coffee concoctions (no alcohol was served), the club was the site for numerous recordings, both official and bootlegged, particularly of the blues performers who favored the club.

But perhaps no performance was better remembered than Mr. Bruce's appearance on April 3, 1964, just two months after the club's opening. Mr. Bruce, who had already been charged with obscenity and narcotics charges in California and obscenity charges in Chicago, was arrested before he even hit the stage for his 10 p.m. slot.

Mr. Solomon and Elly Solomon, then his wife, joined Mr. Bruce in handcuffs. They soon learned that vice officers had attended and recorded two of Mr. Bruce's shows at the cafe earlier in the week to make their case.

Mr. Bruce, then 38, pleaded not guilty to the charges and was released on $1,000 bail. Mr. Solomon, then 35, was charged with allowing an obscene act to be performed in his club; he also pleaded not guilty and was released on his own recognizance.

The next day, Mr. Bruce returned to the cafe and played to a partisan crowd, who watched him gently thumb his nose at authority by spelling out the dirty words in his act rather than pronouncing them. Still, three days later, Mr. Bruce was again arrested on obscenity charges.

The case went to trial that summer before a three-judge panel in Criminal Court. The defense for Mr. Bruce, who was ill with pleurisy, called more than a dozen artists and critics to the stand to defend his act and Mr. Solomon's right to present it, but to no avail.

On Nov. 4, 1964, the panel reached a guilty verdict, voting 2 to 1 against both Mr. Bruce and Mr. Solomon; Ms. Solomon was acquitted.

Mr. Bruce was later sentenced to four months in jail, while Mr. Solomon faced a $1,000 fine or 60 days in jail. Both men continued to fight the convictions in court, though Mr. Bruce's fight ended in August 1966, when he was found dead in Hollywood Hills, Calif., of a morphine overdose. He was 40.

Mr. Solomon won an appeal in 1965, and in February 1968 his conviction was overturned by a state appellate court. That decision was later upheld by the New York State's highest court.

Mr. Bruce's conviction of criminal obscenity remained officially on the books until last December, when he was granted a pardon by Gov. George E. Pataki.

Mr. Solomon sold the Cafe au Go Go in 1969 and moved to Florida, where he worked quietly as a real estate developer in the Coconut Grove section of Miami before retiring to California in the early 1990's.

In addition to his son Jason, of West Hollywood, Calif., and his former wife, of Crestline, Calif., Mr. Solomon is survived by another son, Sheppard Solomon, of London; a daughter, Candace Solomon, of New York City; a sister, Iris Poland, of West Palm Beach, Fla.; and a grandson.

One of Mr. Solomon's contemporaries, Manny Roth, the onetime owner of the Cafe Wha?, said Mr. Solomon's stand had been an inspiration.

"We had crusaders down there, but he wasn't one of them," Mr. Roth said. "But Howard went to bat for Lenny."

Edited June 21, 2004 by Brownian Motion

[Dan Gould]

One of Mr. Solomon's contemporaries, Manny Roth, the onetime owner of the Cafe Wha?

Is that how they answered the phone?

Hello, Cafe Waaaa"???