To save The New Penelope
Date: August 22, 1968
Credit: La Presse newspaper, v. 84, no 196, p. 10
This article in La Presse newspaper presents The New Penelope’s financial difficulties and announces fundraising event for its support.
Transcription (translated from original text in French):
To save the New Penelope
The New Penelope is in financial difficulty. The small company on the corner of Sherbrooke and Hutchison, which specialises in what might be called avant-garde popular music, needs $22,000 to meet the demands of its creditors, the company’s director, Gary Eisenkraft, told us at a press conference yesterday.
Mr. Eisenkraft, who is in his thirties, firmly believes in the ‘artistic and social role’ of an institution like the New Penelope. He is surrounded by friends who help him in his work (often on a voluntary basis because they believe in it too!), and he would like the public to follow suit.
“We try to bring the best contemporary popular music artists and groups to Montreal, but we don’t get the public support we need. It’s as if people have become very resistant to anything new, and now more than ever is the time for people to show if they want something like the New Penelope. If they want it, let them show it, otherwise we’ll go out of business.”
The director of the New Penelope points out that his company is registered as a “not-for-profit.”
This allowed him to apply to the Canada Council for a grant, which he is still waiting for.
“We don’t serve alcoholic beverages: just coffee and fruit juices. We have an audience aged between 15 and 40, but mostly in their twenties, of course, and we offer them the best of today’s popular music. I think we play a role in our society that is not insignificant.”
Since it was founded, the New Penelope has presented such well-known artists and groups as The Fugs, Lynn County Blues Band, The Sidetrack, Sonny Terry and Brownie McGhee, Earth Opera, and also Canadians such as Gordon Lightfoot, lan and Sylvia and Louise Forestier.
This week, he presents the Paul Butterfield Blues Band. For the season ahead, a number of other major artists and groups have been approached.
“But to keep us going, we need the support of the public,” says Eisenkraft.
To this end, “a group of sympathetic creditors and friends of the club” (a press release informs us) have formed the Society for the Preservation of the New Penelope.
As the club does not serve alcoholic beverages, its only income comes from admission fees (two or three dollars, depending on the show) and from the sale of coffee and fruit juice. You can become a member of the Society for the Preservation of the New Penelope for two dollars, and the membership card entitles you to certain reductions in the price of admission.
Fundraising evening
On Sunday, from 6 a.m. until after midnight, a big fund-raising evening will be held at the box itself.
Several groups will be performing: Albert Failey Blues Band, The Canna Balie, Steven J. Quertet, Canna Balie, Steven J. Quertet, Three is a Crowd, Willy Dunn and Jesse Winchester,
Eric Randolph Trio and Mozart Group. At the same time, a number of prominent Montrealers will be taking the floor, including impresarios Marc Latraverse and Samuel Gesser and popular disc jockey Michel Trahan. Proceeds from the evening will go to the SPNP.