Bonnie and Clyde allegedly robbed it, back when the building was a bank. It may be haunted. Stevie Ray Vaughan & Double Trouble bounced between here and Fitzgerald’s as their main local ports of call on the way to stardom, they and hundreds of other artists helping secure Rockefeller’s place on the (very) short list of the most historic nightclubs in Houston’s 180-year history. After the club closed in 1997, it became a successful venue for weddings and other private events under the name Rockefeller Hall, before lying dormant for the past two and a half years. As the owners continue preparing to reopen full-time some time in 2017, Friday evening they offered the media a peek behind the somewhat new-look venue, before the doors swung open wide for SRV tribute act Texas Flood and Houstonian openers Sancho & the Lovetones. One of the Houston Press’s main men about town, Marco Torres, brought his camera.
This article appears in Sep 8-14, 2016.
