Peach Buzz: Sugar Hill may be shutting down at Underground Atlanta
Sugar Hill’s days at Underground may be numbered
Throughout the day Friday, multiple Internet social networking Web sites were swirling with rumors about the influential downtown music venue Sugar Hill shuttering its doors at Underground Atlanta.
Here's what we know for certain: On Tuesday, the intimate nightclub will host its final Tuesday Night Live Jam, a weekly see-and-be-seen affair for the city's R&B and neo-soul scenesters.
But according to Underground Atlanta spokeswoman Tara Murphy, that may not spell the end of the club.
"As far as the club has informed Underground, they're not closing," Murphy told Buzz. "They just want to re-evaluate their music programming."
Murphy says the club still has a lease with the downtown tourist attraction.
Sugar Hill opened its doors in the fall of 2006 and ever since has helped to introduce Atlanta's cutting-edge music fans to acts such as Dwele, Estelle and Joi , along with playing host to an evening with Oscar winner Jennifer Hudson and supplying a stage for soul legends such as Gil Scott-Heron and Frankie Beverly.
The hipster hangout has also served as ground zero for the city's music insiders, who often meet to check out up-and-coming talent and to update one another on Atlanta's ever-growing influence as a national music mecca.
While nightspot Web site Metromix Atlanta reported Friday that the club was definitely closing Tuesday, Sugar Hill's official Web site and MySpace page remained up and running with no notice about a possible closing.
The club's co-owner, Richard Dunn, did not return a call to Buzz by deadline Friday.
Overscene
Actor Tom Selleck (who will forever be remembered as Hawaiian shirt-clad detective "Magnum P.I.") dining at Chops in Buckhead with a guest. We're told they each noshed on the restaurant's signature steaks and the dashing, vertically blessed actor "set the dining room a-twitter, even though he was low key," a witness at Chops dished. Sous chef Lisa Allen even created a special dessert for Selleck (strawberries and cream) solely so she had a reason to visit the table. We hear the gracious actor shook hands with and thanked his servers by name. He mentioned that he'd definitely be back when he's in town.
Selleck is here filming the upcoming Lionsgate comedy-drama "Five Killers," with Katherine Heigl, Ashton Kutcher, Catherine O'Hara and Martin Mull. Selleck and O'Hara are playing the parents of Heigl's character, who's married to a former hitman (played by Kutcher) who is retired to suburbia. Interestingly, Heigl's real-life father, Paul Heigl, resides in the metro area. The "Grey's Anatomy" actress is married to musician Josh Kelley, a former Augusta resident, who started out gigging in clubs like Eddie's Attic in Decatur and Smith's Olde Bar in Midtown.
A jump on jazz
OK, OK, we know some of you may still be griping about the scaled-back, downsized 32nd annual Atlanta Jazz Festival set for Memorial Day weekend in Grant Park. (Well, OK, maybe that's just us...). Regardless, Camille Love, the city's grande dame of cultural affairs, wants you to know that despite our current economic woes, the city's jazz lovers will still get their money's worth this year. In fact, the festival's 31 days of jazz actually starts this weekend.
And today, for free, you can catch the talented Karri Gaffney Quartet and vocalist Kathleen Bertrand onstage at the festival's former stomping grounds in Piedmont Park. The event runs from 9 a.m. to 4 p.m. The gigs are in partnership with the Piedmont Park Conservancy's weekly Green Market and offer an opportunity for locals to snap up some organic produce and jazz. On Sunday, 255 Tapas Lounge will play host to an all-afternoon session featuring Jazspects. For more info on jazz, leading up to the Memorial Day weekend finale featuring acts like Dionne Farris, Hiroshima and Atlanta's own legendary jazz pianist and vocalist Freddy Cole, go to www .atlantafestivals.com.
Contributing: news services
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