THE VILLE NIGHTCLUB PLUS

Villa Madrid AirВ conditioningВ was installed and the basement of 818 Liberty Avenue became the Villa Madrid nightclub in 1941. Band leader Ed Flynn took over the Music Box after the flood 1936.

Joe went into the booking agency business taking on young Pittsburgh singers Perry Como and Vaughn Monroe as clients. The piano and the furniture of the Music Box floated away. The muddy waters destroyed the basement club. The Music Box became a popular spot to catch dinner and watch a floor show. Eddie Loughton and his Aristocrats of Rhythm were also headliners. He booked Pittsburgh singing star Jackie Heller for a two week stay in December of 1934. The first floor show featured Alfredo and Delores, the Rumba Dance Team, the Four Rhythm Queens, and music by Buzzy Kountz and his Orchestra. Dora Maughan, a night club and vaudeville star from London, headlined the opening night. The grand opening was held on November 9, 1934. In 1934 Hiller rented the empty basement store of 818 Liberty Avenue and opened his own floor show nightclub вЂњJoe HillerвЂ™s Music BoxвЂќ. Hiller booked and managed the Show Boat night club from 1928 through 1931. With the decline of sheet music sales to phonographs and radio he became a booking agent and a night club manager. Returning to Pittsburgh in 1926 he bought three вЂњSong ShopвЂќ music stores in Pittsburgh, started his own music publishing house, and hosted the вЂњSong ShopвЂќ live music radio show on KQV. He discovered and promoted million selling hit songs. Promoted to the New York headquarters of the Song Shop, at Waterson, Berlin & Snyder, Inc., Hiller marketed the music of Irving Berlin and became a very successful song picker.

Working with composer George Olcott, Hiller wrote the lyrics to several hit songs that sold millions of copies across the country. Joe Hiller was a nationally known music impresario who began his career in 1907 singing with piano player Chico Marx at the Song Shop music store and an Italian restaurant in downtown Pittsburgh. The first nightclub to bring customers to the basement of 818 Liberty Avenue was Joe Hiller's Music Box which was opened in 1934. The basement of 818 Liberty was a cafeteria during the 1920s.

THE VILLE NIGHTCLUB PLUS

With the building of the much larger 3,000 plus seat Stanley and Penn Theaters in the late 1920s, the Liberty Theater was converted into offices and stores and renamed the Baum Building. Sometime later it became Harry WilliamвЂ™s Academy Burlesque. The grand opening was held on April 8th 1913. Operated by John Harris it offered vaudeville acts and movies. The lobby was decorated with brown terra cotta tile and the auditorium was draped in yellow and green curtains. Stretching from 812 to 818 Liberty Avenue it had a 100 foot long entrance, Inside it was small and cozy with 700 seats on the ground floor, another 700 on two balconies and dozen more in four private boxes. The terra-cotta-clad beaux-art theater was an intimate 1,400 seat vaudeville showcase. The building that housed the Staircase Lounge was constructed in 1913 as the Liberty Theater. The corner of Liberty Avenue and Strawberry Way has been a center of entertainment for 100 years. They followed in the footsteps of several generations of Pittsburghers who descended those same steps for entertainment, diner, and dancing at the posh night spots Joe HillerвЂ™s Music Box, the Villa Madrid, L enny LitmanвЂ™s Copa, and the Pin Up Lounge. At the Staircase they also came to hear the rock bands the Racket Squad, Sweet Lightning, Sweet Breeze, Windfall, Diamond Reo, WHAM, and Wild Cherry. Sharply dressed they descended the steep steps into basement nightclub of 818 Liberty Avenue to dance to the soulful R&B tunes of PittsburghвЂ™s hottest band the Jaggerz. On weekend nights during the late 1960s and 1970s Pittsburghers lined up under the bright blue and yellow neon Staircase Lounge sign that hung high over the downtown sidewalk of Liberty Avenue.

The ville nightclub