Grand Lady of the West Village, The Cornelia Street Cafe, Turns 40

Forty years ago, three struggling artists (writer/director Robin Hirsch, actor Charles McKenna, visual artist Raphaela Pivetta), opened a one room storefront café on Cornelia Street in the heart of the West Village. With a toaster oven and an espresso machine, Cornelia Street Café became a magnet for artists of all genres, who soon found a home, and a willing and appreciative audience. That was on July 4, 1977.

Over time the Cornelia Street Café grew, expanding to accommodate three rooms; a fully staffed kitchen serving up delicious American bistro cuisine; and a performing arts space in the basement where a rich tapestry of artists from every conceivable medium; from theatre to jazz, from poetry to comedy and science appeared. Through the Café's doors came Nobel Prize Laureates, Pulitzer Prize-winners, Presidential candidates, members of Monty Python and the Royal Shakespeare Company, visitors from around the world who had heard of this wonderful place in Greenwich Village, and neighbors from around the five boroughs and across the country.

The brilliantly powerful singer/songwriter Suzanne Vega can trace her early career to the Café. Eve Ensler launched The Vagina Monologues in the basement performance space. Dr. Oliver Sacks, physician/best-selling author of "Awakenings", made into a movie starring Robert DeNiro and Robin Williams, made numerous appearances at the Café, as a guest of Entertaining Science, a monthly curated series, and as a patron. John Oliver, before achieving his present success could often be found performing his comedic routines at the Café.

Musical legends like Sheila Jordan, considered one of the most gifted jazz vocalists and pioneer of a unique blending of bebop/scat jazz styling; and David Amram, a musical genius who played with Charles Mingus, Dizzy Gillespie and Lionel Hampton - a composer who scored numerous films including The Manchurian Candidate and Splendor in the Grass, are regulars at the Café even today. Amram along with Jack Kerouac are credited with staging the first jazz-poetry reading in New York back in the late 50s.

Songwriters who gathered at the Café in its early days, would by their own rules perform songs they had written that week. Out of those sessions came some 5,000 original songs. In 1980, an LP with twelve of those songs came out on the jazz label, Stash Records - this would be their only non-jazz album titled, Cornelia Street: The Songwriters Exchange. Some of the artists included on the original recording were Rod MacDonald, David Massengill, Cliff Eberhardt, Carolyne Mas, Elliot Simon, Lucy Kaplanski and Martha Hogan, to name but a few.

Cornelia Street Café continues its tradition - serving up delicious food for the body (not to mention drinks), and nourishment for the soul. On July 4th, beginning at 1:00pm - until (at 29 Cornelia Street, NYC), the Café will celebrate 40-years of doing what it does best, with some of the artists and friends who were there in its early beginnings, and others who have become part of the family more recently.

You are invited to join in celebrating a place unlike any other in this grand metropolis - The Cornelia Street Café. There will be Stilt walkers, music, comedy and so much more!

The Cornelia Street Cafe is on the cusp of an important change. For 40 years, the Cafe has managed to produce what is perhaps the widest variety of performance in New York. Now under the aegis of Fractured Atlas, we have formally named the performance space/arts program - CORNELIA STREET UNDERGROUND. Under this status what will now be possible is that individuals, corporations, foundations, and government agencies will be able to make tax-deductible contributions to the continuation of artistic development and quality programming at Cornelia Street Underground.