Individual Customers

In this first teaser volume, local journalist and radio DJ Erin O'Hare focuses on Twisted Branch Tea Bazaar, an eclectic venue with an equally eclectic history and cast of characters. As a longstanding non-corporate, open-minded pillar of the Charlottesville music community, Tea Bazaar has for more than twenty years held shows ranging from the strange to the sublime. Full of the personal charm that characterizes Tea Bazaar itself (and a liberal dosage of f-bombs) O'Hare's writing perfectly emulates the ethos of this wonderfully weird, welcoming place.

In the second volume, local journalist and radio DJ Erin O'Hare focuses on two longstanding, homey venues in the Charlottesville music scene: Miller’s and Fellini’s No. 9. As pillars of Charlottesville jazz for over four decades, hosting some of the most longstanding gigs in the country (including a 40-year-long gig led by the renowned trumpeter John D’earth), these venues have helped create one of the best, and most underrated, meccas for jazz on the East Coast. O’Hare perfectly captures both the master musicianship and the intimate hometown atmosphere that these venues, and the artists they support, have fostered. Recommended for those who like the amber reflection of old drug store lights in a saxophone’s bell, the friendly chaos of a folk-jazz-funk fusion group over the din of a late-night crowd, or the sound of an upright piano through the open windows of a homegrown, renowned Italian restaurant.

This bundle offers all volumes of Under the Table and Screaming: volume 1, focusing on Twisted Branch Tea Bazaar, volume 2, focusing on Miller's and Fellini's, volume 3, focusing on Old Cabell Hall & The Paramount Theater, volume 4, focusing on The Front Porch, C'Ville Coffee, and Jefferson School African American Heritage Center, and volume 5, focusing on The Southern, The Bridge, and Magnolia House.

In volume three, local journalist and radio DJ Erin O’Hare focuses on the University of Virginia’s Old Cabell Hall and Charlottesville’s Paramount Theater. These two venues have served for decades as a premier home for many local music scenes, especially the classical, jazz, and experimental crowds. They’ve brought together the world-class and the local alike for both singular, memorable shows and cozy annual traditions. Much beloved, both storied venues look to remain hubs for Charlottesville’s music and arts community for years to come. Recommended for those who like swimming in the reverberations of a gilded mid-century theater, learning a century’s worth of music history all in one auditorium, or experimental music through speaker arrays on the same stage as a symphony.

In volume four, local journalist and radio DJ Erin O’Hare centers The Front Porch, C’ville Coffee, and Jefferson School African American Heritage Center. These three venues have been vital to Charlottesville’s homegrown folk, world, soul, R&B, and other roots music scenes, and are especially important in making space for the excellent Black music and musicians in town. They also continue the legacies of longtime cultural institutions, like the Prism Coffeehouse, who were integral to music, art, and culture in Charlottesville for decades. Recommended for those who like music schools for master instrumentalists and five-year-olds alike, a legendary decades-long concert series in cozy coffeeshops, or a multi-generational tribute show for the local jazz theorist who taught John Coltrane.

In volume five, local journalist and radio DJ Erin O'Hare tells the story of Magnolia House, The Southern Café and Music Hall, and The Bridge Progressive Arts Initiative. For years, all three venues-especially Magnolia and The Bridge-welcomed the genres and crowds that otherwise had little space in Charlottesville, from punk to hip-hop to goth to out-there experimental. And The Southern, though linked to the commercial music business, has often used its resources and bigger platform to boost the profile of local acts and support ongoing community traditions. Recommended for those who like multi-band shows on Halloween with costumes encouraged, learning about the most wholesome and hard-core DIY punk crowd around, or eating grilled cheeses made by rubber pigeons while computer music plays.