Medici’s, the supper club at Manoa Marketplace, apparently is shutting down for good, following a performance by the Shari Lynn Trio, tomorrow (March 22) night.
The performance, featuring singer Shari Lynn Acebedo and her backup musicians Jim Howard (piano) and John Kolivas (bass), was to be staged earlier, but was rescheduled because club owner Tim Stanton, and its longtime chef, was assaulted recently.
Medici’s is upstairs from the Manoa School of Music, operated bythe chef’s wife Carolyn Stanton. Nearly 400 students take classes, as a bridge to potential music careers but the school, like the club, will close its doors this weekend, after more than a decade at the marketplace.
“This is very sad,” said Shari, who has staged numerous shows at Medici’s, catering to an older audience who applaud her shows, which features jazz, Broadway favorites, and classics from the Great American songbook. “There are very few cubs in town that feature jazz and cabaret, in such a lovely setting,” she said.
Besides patrons of the evening music, which includes several genres, a network of teachers at the music school “now have to look for another place to teach,” said Shari. “I wish them much success in their quest for a new venue for the school and performance. And I thank them for their great support of me as a teacher and a performer.”
Those who frequent the club, the school and the marketplace have never questioned the safety of the environment, which includes several restaurants, an okazuya, a bakery, a post office and a laundry nestled in the back of the center. The tenants in the front corridor of the marketplace include a Longs, a Safeway, a McDonald’s, a coffee shop and a bank.
Stanton was assaulted in a hallway and believes it was a homeless person who attacked him and escaped. Merchants since have asked Alexander & Baldwin, which operates and owns Manoa Marketplace, to install and increase security measures.
Other acts who had bookings at Medici’s also will cancel their future gigs; there is no immediate plan to reopen at the current site, or in another venue.
Medici’s has an online presence, but regrettably, the website is woefully outdated without a formal notice of its abrupt closing…
And that’s Show Biz…