A truly great loss of a pioneer and visionary. Chet was at the forefront of the San Francisco Ballroom movement(yes...even before Bill Graham), He found Janis. He provided us with the Clash..
The Father of the "Summer of Love" Chet Helms Dead From Stroke at 62
By Lee Houskeeper at San Francisco Stories
Born August 2nd, 1942 Died June 25th, 2005 San Francisco‹Impresario Chet
Helms who was known at the "Father of the Summer of Love" and was the
manager & founder of "Big Brother & the Holding Company" with Janis Joplin
as well as the first to produce psychedelic light show concerts at San
Francisco's Fillmore Auditorium then later at his own Avalon Ballrooms
passed away at 12:35 AM, Saturday, June 25th at San Francisco's Pacific
Medical Center from complications due to a stroke Helms suffered on Tuesday,
August 21st. Helms was surrounded by his brother John Helms and six close
friends at the time of his death. Helms was born August 25th, 1942 in Santa
Maria California but lived much of his youth in Austin Texas.
A press conference will be announced Sunday, August 26th and plans for his
memorial will be announced at a later date. PHOTOGRAPHS OF CHET HELMS by
ROBERT ALTMAN
http://www.altmanphoto.com/chet_helms/
No discussion involving the Sixties, the source of the "San Francisco sound"
or the "Summer of Love" can take place without mentioning Chet Helms, a
front-line contributor to the people, ideas and events surrounding the most
dynamic decade in American history.
Chet Helms and his production company, the Family Dog, turned small
get-togethers of local musicians and artists into a scene that eventually
produced the great, legendary gatherings of the Summer of Love. Rock
promoter Bill Graham first turned to Chet Helms and his well-connected
family of artists and audiences in San Francisco to build his own
promotional empire, well after the local "scene" had been established and
nurtured in coffee houses all over the city.
Helms was born in Santa Maria, California, in 1942, and spent most of his
youth in Texas and Missouri. While attending the University of Texas in
Austin, he was drawn to the civil rights movement bubbling under in the
South. A stepchild from a mixed-race marriage, Helms became actively engaged
in organizing benefits for non-profit civil and human rights groups, all the
while learning and using the tools of the trade he would later apply to the
world of rock concert promotion.
Helms moved from Austin to San Francisco for the first time in the summer of
1962. He returned to Austin briefly in 1963 to beckon then-unknown
folksinger Janis Joplin to hitch-hike back with him, telling her he would
help promote her career in San Francisco.
In the basement of 1090 Page Street at the center of the colorful
Haight-Ashbury neighborhood, Helms organized informal jam sessions, out of
which the band Big Brother and the Holding Company was formed. He later
added Joplin as the group's lead singer and managed the band through its
formative years.
Through his relationships with such celebrated figures as Ken Kesey and The
Grateful Dead, Helms found himself at the center of it all, a willing
coordinator of the era's new interpretation of music and youth culture. By
February 1966, Helms started producing shows for many bands under the name
Family Dog Productions at the Fillmore Auditorium, on alternating weekends
with Bill Graham Presents. By April, Helms secured permits to run his own
dance hall, The Avalon Ballroom on Sutter Street.
For three years, Helms and the Family Dog hosted some of the most
influential events in San Francisco rock history, including free events in
Golden Gate Park in 1966 and during what has now become known as the "Summer
of Love" in 1967. From The Doors to Bo Diddley, Helms created a unique
atmosphere at the Avalon which encouraged immersive experiences among the
artists and audience. Psychedelic light shows have evolved into what we now
know as "multi-media." And the trademark posters have skyrocketed in value
over the years in the rock memorabilia market. It was a formula duplicated
by rock promoters all over the country. Helms also opened up Family Dog
dance halls in Denver and Portland before deciding in 1969 to run his
operations out of one ballroom in San Francisco, on the Great Highway next
to Playland-at-the-Beach.
By the end of 1970, the small local scene Helms helped create had grown into
a cultural phenomenon exploited globally by a wide variety of entrepreneurs,
for better or for worse. He decided to take a break, and would not return to
concert promoting until 1978, when Family Dog produced the 1st Annual Tribal
Stomp at the Greek Theatre in Berkeley.
After producing another Tribal Stomp in 1979 at the Monterey Fairgrounds -
highlighted by the first-ever California appearance of The Clash - Helms
retreated from active promotion. He came out of retirement briefly in
October 1997 to produce the 30th Anniversary Celebration of the Summer of
Love in Golden Gate Park, where 60,000 fans gathered for a day of free
music, with no arrests and no reports of incidents.
Since 1980, Helms had operated Atelier Dore, Inc., an art gallery in San
Francisco specializing in American and European art from 1850 to 1950
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