Renting Out Shrine for Rock Concerts & Selling Beer on Premises

Yet, another Shrine arrogating it's own interests over Masonic Law... DS
By JACI WEBB Of The Billings Gazette Staff

Frank Glasgow figured he hit the mother lode in 2000 when Bob Dylan performed for 2,500 people at the Shrine Auditorium. "That was the first show that put us on the map," said Glasgow, the rental manager for the Shrine, located at 1125 Broadwater Ave. Glasgow concedes that he and the volunteers who run beer concessions and take tickets were rookies back then. They've since learned a lot. "We learned from Bravo how to be a venue," Glasgow said. "I remember for that Dylan show we didn't even realize that you don't sell cans of beer at a concert." Sometimes shows get a little rowdy and concertgoers throw things - it hurts more to be hit by a can than by a plastic cup. Thus, the ban on canned beer.

Bravo Entertainment, a Boise, Idaho-based promotion company, brings many of the shows to the Shrine, including Dylan's concert. Since 2000, there have been dozens of concerts, from hip-hop acts like the Ying Yang Twins and Ludacris to blues legend B.B. King, country stars like Willie Nelson and Big and Rich, and lately, a rash of metal shows starting with Godsmack in 2004 and leading into the trio of hard rock shows over the next week, beginning with tonight's Rob Zombie concert and including shows by Billy Idol and Alice Cooper.

Glasgow said he occasionally takes heat from community members about the types of shows performed at the Shrine, but he points out that legally when a private facility is rented to the public it becomes a public venue and he can't discriminate. As long as potential renters have a $1 million liability insurance policy, the rental fee of $950 plus a $250 cleaning deposit, the building is theirs for the night.

"Once in a while, we get a call, 'How can you have an act like that? Have you heard their record?' Some are more disgusting than others. Alice Cooper and Billy Idol were pretty disgusting in their day." Glasgow said he took the most grief for the Joan Baez, Indigo Girls and Bonnie Raitt concert back in 2000 because it was to help raise money and awareness for the Save the Yellowstone Buffalo Coalition.

Part of the charm of the building, which has 16,000 square feet of space on each of two levels, is that it feels like a high school gym. And, indeed, that was the idea when the building was constructed in 1950 - to put in an all-purpose gym for the community. The hardwood floor was designed to give with the weight of the crowd, giving it a bouncy feel during packed shows. "It can be a bit disconcerting when you're in the basement making cotton candy and the elephants are tromping around upstairs," Glasgow said. Glasgow, a trumpet player in school at West High, remembers Al Hirt playing a show there in the 1960s and, even further back, Louis Armstrong performing. The venue was used throughout the '50s and '60s for concerts, basketball tournaments and the Shrine Circus.

"For years it was a civic hub," Glasgow said. "But with the advent of the Metra, they stopped using it. It sat here from the 1970s to until 1998, and it was used only for meetings and occasional craft shows." Erecting a building to benefit the community is par for the course for the Shrine organization, a nonsectarian men's service group that raises money for ailing children treated at the Shrine hospitals. The local group, Al Bedoo, formed in Billings in 1922, held meetings in the Masonic Hall on North Broadway and Second Avenue North, across the street from the Alberta Bair Theater. The local organization has about 1,000 members, an aging population that is sometimes startled by Glasgow's ideas.

Glasgow joined the Al Bedoo Shrine organization in 1994, about the same time group leaders were wondering what to do with the building. At one time it was going to be put up for sale because it wasn't being used and needed repairs. Glasgow convinced his fellow Shriners first of all to bring back the Shrine Circus. The concerts came later.

"We have all kinds of folks who are here helping out. We have a rugby team that loves to sell beer in exchange for practice space in the winter. We have Boy Scouts and other group selling concessions. Of our 1,000-odd members we can count on 50 to help us out."