So I boldly told my folks that I was going with or without them. They acquiesced and took me on Saturday night, February 5, and it was an awakening that has stayed with me to this day. It ended up being my University later on.

I began working there at the Rolling Stones concerts in August 1972, and by New Year’s Eve, I had a continuing position working a variety of jobs for Jerry Pompili. By 1976, I graduated from my 4 years of studies, taking over for Jerry as manager. When we closed on Dec. 31, 1978, I had gotten my master’s degree in rock ‘n’ roll from the master himself, Bill Graham.

Each night at Winterland was like a turn of the roulette wheel, you just never knew what to expect. It could be a stuffed to the gills Grateful Dead show, or a Tuesday night with Tower of Power, Sons of Champlin, and Booker T & the MG’s. One night when we had the Average White Band headlining, for some reason the local kids decided this was a night to come into the hall and pick everyone’s pockets. Hundreds of people lost wallets, women’s purses, all in the dark on the floor of the arena. By the end, the bathroom floor was piled high with empty wallets and handbags. As only he could, Bill came up with a defense. “Go up to every young local kid and ask them who is performing tonight. if they can’t answer right away kick them out.” As the night wore on, we 86’d hundreds of kids and slowly things came back to normal.

• There was something about Winterland that elicited great performances. I think it was a combination of just the right size, 5,400, just the right shape, with elevated floor seats and an overhanging balcony, and the open floor.

Festival seating is what we called it. There was absolutely nothing like being down front near the stage with 5,000 screaming fans at your back, the band wailing away just above your head, the energy was so present it could elevate you to a realm of human connection that I had not experienced before that night in 1967. What Bill did that was so significant was to eliminate police presence, have a staff of people who looked and talked just like the people coming to the shows, and creating a space where it was OK to express your feelings as long as you didn’t hurt anyone. These simple facts changed everything.

When I started working at Winterland, it was staffed by many hardscrabble guys from the neighborhood, especially on the outside, as it was a tough place to exist in. By the end, we had transformed many of the staff to young college students who could talk you into doing what they asked, instead of forcing you to do as they said. Things were changing, the neighborhood was gentrifying, the old Victorians were being bought up by young gay couples who were starting to fix them up to their former glory, and a rock ‘n’ roll arena in the neighborhood was something that was not being tolerated as before. Plus, the ceiling was starting to fall in, almost every night someone would come into the medical room holding a small chunk of plaster saying “this just fell on me…”. It was time to go.

From that Jimi Hendrix concert in 1967, to night after night in the ‘70s seeing every band that was touring America, to The Last Waltz, to the closing two weeks with a show every night leading up to the final night with Grateful Dead, Blues Brothers and the New Riders, I will always regard Winterland as a special place in the annals of entertainment, a place I was proud to call home.