Jack Reich

Jack Reich is one of the people behind the music in Rhode Island. There aren’t many major bookers here; if you’ve been to a national act that visited our little state, often on their way from New York to Boston, the odds are good that you have Jack Reich to thank. He’s the primary booker for venues near and far, including The Strand, The MET, Toad’s Place in New Haven and the music at the Wilbur in Boston. He also regularly sets up shows at The VETS, the Dunk and various other venues around New England. He was the booking agent at Lupo’s for most of its 40+ year existence, across multiple locations, and has directly managed internationally touring bands like RIZZ, which was recently inducted into the RI Music Hall of Fame, and, currently, the Sun Ra Orchestra, a 15-member jazz ensemble that mostly performs internationally, led by 95-year-old master musician Marshall Allen. Jack’s been booking them for 35 years.

“I prefer to play the low profile,” says Reich, explaining why he didn’t really want to talk to us about his career. “Jack doesn’t like to leave the house, unless it’s for a good show,” adds Rich Lupo, who spoke with us on condition of anonymity.

“I believe I met Jack in around 1976,” says Lupo. “I remember I’d booked this piano player named Sweatpea. We had a respectable lunch thing going on back then, and he was a piano player that performed in a jock strap. He’s sitting on our barstools, and I’m thinking ‘My God, I hope he doesn’t scare everyone away,” and then Jack walked in. So in the span of five minutes I ran into probably two of the strangest people I’ve ever met,” says Lupo.

“I remember the first time I met Rich Lupo, he just said, ‘I don’t work with agents’ and turned around and walked away.” Adds Reich. “Eventually, though, not only did he book RIZZ through me, but I became his booking agent.”

Reich started out with an interest in sports and sports management. He was helping the basketball coach market the team and bring fans to the games, and that led to organizing halftime shows, getting bands in to play in the gym and then in local coffeehouses. After graduating, he planned to get a masters in special education, but connected with a college friend from Little Compton. “He [Ned O’Hara] convinced me to get into the music business as a concert promoter, and I moved to Providence. This was 1975. We thought the barriers to entry were lower than in New York or Boston, and Providence really wasn’t on the map yet — the original Lupo’s hadn’t even quite opened then. Providence was mostly men’s bars and a couple of restaurants, nothing like today.

“Our first show was a Tom Rush performance at PPAC [called the Ocean State Theater at the time]. He was a really talented performer, but it wasn’t a big enough act for that venue, so we got off to a rough start. But soon we were working with Brown and Providence College booking Spring Flings and shows like that. URI and also at RIC, where we ended up bringing in Elvis Costello and J Geils. Not long after that we met Rich Lupo. He was really running a lunch place/bar, and was booking his love, roots and R&B acts.”

Many of the acts Reich booked for Lupo’s were on their first national tours. He acknowledges that many of these did go big later. Dave Matthews recorded his breakthrough hit at Lupo’s [1995], but he’d played the MET before that.

“[Jack]’s the most responsible for transforming a predominantly blues club into a rock club. That was his influence on Lupo’s, and on Providence. He brought in the Ramones before anyone had heard of them. In 1980 or 81 he brought in the Pretenders… Jack booked a young Bruce Springsteen for a small club in India Point, back in 1974. He’s always had a keen ear for musical talent. And then that whole rock insurgence happened. Then Jack was bringing in the big rock acts. And he still is.”

“It’s the personal touches where Jack really distinguishes himself,” says Lupo, “I don’t remember which band it was, but it was the bassist’s birthday and somehow Jack just knew. So Jack called me on his way to the airport to pick them up, and had me pick up a giant truffle cake for the guy’s birthday. He was thrilled. Jack … was always looking for things that would get the band excited and happy or make them feel warm.”

“There are thousands of details that go into putting on a music snow. A lot of people want to be in the music business, but it’s a lot more intricate than just hiring a band… Everything has to come off right so the artist and the audience are pleased,” Reich says.

Why does he do it? “I love music. With my talents, I couldn’t really make it as a musician, but I can recognize a good song and a good band, and bands that will have careers and not just be one hit wonders.”

I recently saw Bonnie Raitt — she opened for James Taylor at the Dunk. She is as great an artist as any I’ve ever worked with, and as great a person as I’ve ever worked with. To see her on a stage like that and remember when I saw her playing coffeehouses in Cambridge long ago, and she is still as soulful and real as she was then. That’s what makes being in this business amazing — seeing a show like that.

“I organized a youth center trip when I was 13 for us to go … see Grand Funk Railroad. And I remember trying to sell the last few tickets, and having to promote the opening act. And I’m still doing the same thing now, at 66.”