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Sam Stehle, Will Harrington and Ray Satchwell wanted the memory of their music venue, The Harrington, to last forever. So all three got the logo, which happens to be of Harrington’s face, tattooed on their legs.

“We had been talking about getting the tattoos for a few months and it was really just a spur of the moment thing,” Stehle said. “Having our friend’s caricature permanently on our legs was just such a fun memory for us that we’ll have forever.”

The Harrington, a house show venue run by Syracuse and SUNY ESF students, was co-founded by six people: Stehle, Harrington, Satchwell, Jack Filkorn, Jake Ryerson and Tim Dean. With four of the co-founders graduating at the end of this spring term, the venue is closing after their last show this Saturday.

The venue has created a space for musicians and staff to grow in their professions and appreciation for music, as well as for students to safely have a fun time, Stehle said. The venue opened for business three semesters ago, but experienced the most growth during the last year, Dean said.

“It went from us just playing music for 50 people off the speaker from a computer to a lot of meticulous planning,” Dean said. “We wouldn’t be able to fly by with no planning anymore.”

The group had the dream of starting its own venue from the members’ freshman year, when they had gone to a few house shows together, Filkorn said. Their own shows started as more of a party, with pre-recorded music instead of live bands.

Advertising for the first show consisted of a simple poster with The Harrington’s logo and a date for the show that they put in mailboxes and doorsteps around Euclid, Stehle said.

On Halloween 2022, The Harrington hosted a show in collaboration with the Summit, a production team that organized house shows itself, said Joshua Feldman. Feldman worked for the Ark, a retired house show venue, before starting the Summit with his friend Buddy Murphy.

One of the co-founders’ favorite parts of show nights is their post-event recap meeting, which sometimes lasts hours. They evaluated the success of that day’s show, as well as laughed about interactions and experiences that they had with guests throughout the night.Cassandra Roshu | Asst. Photo Editor

“(Stehle) has been going to my personal shows kinda since I started,” Feldman said. “It was exciting for me that somebody was in a sense recognizing what I do and was like ‘I wanna help you out’.”

The Summit previously organized its own shows, but after the success of the Halloween show The Harrington became its regular venue.

Feldman and his team used their connections to bring artists to The Harrington. They gave the venue all of the resources it needed to run the show and The Harrington provided the space. Both businesses wanted guests to have an experience where they could purchase a ticket, food and merchandise all for an affordable price.

“We kind of put the festival experience into a house,” Feldman said.

The shows also acted as a safe and fun alternative to other parties, which can make people feel pressured to drink and often seem exclusive and unmemorable, Feldman said.

“We want to create these nights where you can show up stone-cold sober and that’s going to be the best night of your life,” Feldman said. “Nothing to do with any sort of substance, you’re living off of people, you’re living off the now, the moment, and that alone is so amazing when you really indulge yourself in it.”

Jacques Megnizin | Design Editor

Stehle said that the group had no expectations at the start of the business, but never thought it would be capable of the amount of success and popularity that they have reached. Harrington initially suspected they would run out of money after three or four shows, but the number of guests that regularly purchase a ticket has gone above and beyond his expectation.

Unlike other small venues, where the artists come on stage and then leave with minimal fan interaction, the artists that perform at venues like The Harrington will perform and then be in the crowd with everybody else enjoying whichever artist is next, Feldman said.

“It makes it more personal to be able to sit down with these artists and have a conversation with them before they go on and destroy a set,” Stehle said. “It’s mind boggling to talk to them afterwards and be like, ‘that’s the same guy.’”

Shows at The Harrington have not only provided students with the chance to interact with their favorite local artists, but have also created a unique opportunity for musicians to publicize themselves, Feldman said.

Sam Parrish, a singer in the Studio89 band, considers The Harrington to be one of her favorite venues because of its efficiency, kindness, cleanliness and energy, as well as being the venue where they played their first show with fourth band member Jesse Herman.

“When I first started playing in house shows, especially with Studio 89, The Harrington was the place to be. That date that we played there is actually on one of our shirts because it was such an important show to us to play with the four of us for the first time,” Parrish said.

Parrish says that playing at The Harrington felt like the closest thing to playing at an actual venue. The band recently opened its own show venue, The Oz, and applied what its members saw and learned at The Harrington into their own business.

This semester, The Harrington has made enough of its own connections and built enough credibility that it could run entire shows on its own, Stehle said. The venue’s priority of promoting student vendors like the Pits Vintage and Self-Loved was its first move toward being independent, he said.

“The time that we spent with the Summit was all about learning, making mistakes and finding ways to do it better,” Dean said.

Another feature that The Harrington incorporated within the hospitality of its shows, with the help of the Summit, was a green room for its musicians and staff where it provided food and beverages.

The Harrington’s renowned logo is a drawing of Will Harrington’s face, which Jack Filkorn drew. “I told him to draw a Will and he drew the most uncanny picture of Will that I’ve ever seen in my life, which is the logo,” Sam Stehle said. Cassandra Roshu | Asst. Photo Editor

“Up there is where a lot of pictures were taken, where a lot of people were hanging out, and a lot of laughs were had,” Parrish said.

With the growth of The Harrington’s brand recognition, agents for smaller bands and people from Buffalo, Albany and Rochester have reached out to offer shows. Students have increasingly begun to network with the organizers after their shows and musicians would reserve their space for practice, Stehle said.

The Harrington’s shows were fueled by its members’ passion for the music community at SU and ESF. Feldman says that production companies that throw shows are primarily doing it for money, but the passion is what sets The Harrington apart.

“Even on hour 14, when we’re extremely tired, there’s still a smile on our faces because we are at a music event, curating music, giving people an experience that they’re going to remember hopefully for the rest of their lives,” Feldman said.

Stehle says The Harrington’s members are hopeful that newer students will take inspiration from what they have done with their venue and go on to open their own.

Though the venue will close this semester, Harrington said he now has a new perspective on the concept of making memories.

“Memories hold pieces of your soul. If a lot of people have memories of you then your soul is going to be continuously living,” Harrington said. “We want to have a lasting impression.”

Published on March 29, 2023 at 12:53 am