Not too many years ago, legendary musical acts ranging from Leonard Cohen to The Police to Muddy Waters to Bonnie Raitt to AC/DC played on a foot-high wooden stage located in an old textile mill just down the road from UConn Storrs. And it was David Foster who brought them there.
On October 22, 1971, Foster and four partners opened the Shaboo Inn in Willimantic, kickstarting an eleven-year run of showcasing world-class music acts for audiences that included countless UConn students. Though the venue closed in 1982, Foster continued Shaboo’s legacy through his band, The Shaboo All Stars.
Emphasizing the close ties between Shaboo and UConn, Foster and The Shaboo Allstars are scheduled to perform The Shaboo Holiday Concert on Saturday, Dec. 13 at 3 p.m. at the Jorgensen Center for the Performing Arts, bringing together an energetic afternoon of live music to benefit the Covenant Soup Kitchen in Willimantic and the UConn Husky Harvest Food Pantry in Storrs.
“It’s a beautiful show, and I love to feature a mix of artists and have my band support them,” says Foster, who is being joined by Curtis Salgado, Jeff Pitchell (Texas Flood), Christine Ohlman (SNL Band), and The Uptown Horns (Rolling Stones) and more.
The story of Shaboo began when Foster was just 18 years old, and sizing up a derelict textile mill built in 1847 that would soon become home to one of the most legendary music clubs in New England.
With a capacity of about 1,000 and a sound system that cost more than a house at the time, the Shaboo drew large crowds of music lovers every week.
“People were glued to that stage, watching it like a class,” says Foster. “It was the best music on the planet, and it was coming here.”
From UConn students to locals, audiences saw a who’s-who of artists from a wide range of genres – often before they became famous.
“We booked Aerosmith for $750 for the week, charging $1 for the show that would be the first time they played ‘Dream On’ live,” says Foster, whose club even got a mention in Aerosmith’s autobiography.
The Shaboo Inn hosted acts from country to jazz to blues to rock and even the emerging punk scene, with The Ramones being the standout at the time.
After watching stars like John Lee Hooker, Janis Ian, Hall and Oates, and more perform on his stage, Foster decided to start a band of his own with other musicians he met through the club, calling themselves the Shaboo All Stars.
Foster and his band toured 47 states from 1980 to 1981 and returned home to continue running the Shaboo. Though the venue burned down in 1982, and Foster continued his career by starting a production company, he remains dedicated to giving back to the community that has supported him and the legacy of his club for generations.
Benefitting from Saturday’s performance will be the Husky Harvest Food Pantry in Storrs, which opened in 2023 to address food insecurity in the UConn community, following the successful example of Husky Harvest food pantries at the regional campuses.
“When we started three years ago, we weren’t sure how it was going to impact,” says Tracey Roy, the senior associate director of procurement at Dining Services. “While we haven’t grown in the size of the space, we’ve grown in the fact that we’ve had more partners come to help make donations for us.”
Husky Harvest is 100% donation-based, relying on the support from the community to keep its shelves stocked.
“Benefits like this one help us fund the items that we don’t get on a regular basis. A lot of our partners generously give us food, but we very rarely get household items that people need for personal hygiene,” explains Roy. “When we get these funds, this is what we can spend them on.”
For his part, Foster says he’s looking forward to bringing his passion for the music and community philanthropy to Jorgensen.
“I’ve channeled all the fame into good charities, and I can’t think of anything better to do,” says Foster. “There’s no greater joy for me than to spend the rest of my life trying to make a difference.”
And, while the Shaboo Allstars are the physical legacy of their iconic namesake venue, the cherished memories from the club itself have persisted for decades among those lucky enough to have been there.
“I can’t believe how many people met, and even fell in love, at the Shaboo,” says Foster. “The amount of people who come up to me at concerts, or if they see me in the Shaboo truck, to tell me how they met their husband or wife at this place is incredible. It’s such a beautiful feeling to have watched those things happen.”
For more information and tickets, visit the Jorgensen Center for the Performing Arts.
Jorgensen Concert will be one to remember – and for a good cause
By Ken Best for UConn Today
A long-established force in the Connecticut music scene, David Foster will be performing with his group of top-notch musicians, The Legendary Shaboo All Stars, and special guests for the event at the Jorgensen Center for the Performing Arts that will include Jeff Pitchell, Christine Ohlman, Curtis Salgado and The Uptown Horns, and more to be announced. Foster has organized several concerts to benefit the Covenant Soup Kitchen.
Foster will perform with his longtime bandmates Mitch Chakour on piano and keyboards, Cliff Goodwin on guitar and Al Copley on piano.
Jeff Pitchell is an internationally acclaimed dynamic singer, songwriter and guitarist who achieved national recognition when his album “Heavy Hitter” reached #7 on the Billboard Charts. He has recorded with such greats as J. Geils, Rick Derringer, Dave Mason, James Cotton, and Clarence Clemons. He has won the Best Guitarist in the State of Connecticut competition as well as two songwriting awards from the Great American Songwriting Contest. Blues legend John Mayall recorded Pitchell’s song “An Eye for an Eye” on one of his albums.
Christine Ohlman is an American singer, songwriter, guitarist, recording artist and music scholar known as “The Beehive Queen,” a tribute to her distinctive platinum beehive. She leads the band Christine Ohlman and Rebel Montez, which has recorded six albums. Additionally, she has been the long-running vocalist for the Saturday Night Live Band for over 30 years, and appears annually at the W.C. Handy Music Festival in Florence/Sheffield/Muscle Shoals, Alabama.
Curtis Salgado is an award-winning vocalist, instrumentalist and songwriter. He has been nominated three times for the Blues Music Award, winning Song of the Year in 2018 for “Walk A Mile in My Blues.” He has won 13 Blues Music Awards including the B.B. King Entertainer of the Year.
The Uptown Horns were formed in 1980 by Arno Hecht, Crispin Cioe, Bob Funk and Paul Litteral in New York City. The group is known as a premier horn section backing artists including Big Joe Turner, the Neville Brothers, Ronnie Spector and David Johannsen. They toured with The J. Geils Band and appeared live with the Rolling Stones, Robert Plant, Ray Charles and B.B. King, among others. Their recording credits are on more than 150 albums, including James Brown’s Grammy Award winning “Living in America,” and tracks for Tom Waits, Joe Cocker, Albert Collins, Bonnie Raitt, Robert Palmer, Lou Reed and R.E.M.
Heidi Slater, area manager in UConn Dining Services, spoke about the Husky Harvest Food Pantry with WHUS earlier this week on the Good Music show (Wednesdays from 3:00 p.m. to 5:30 p.m.):
