Petaluma nightclub owner isn’t taking it ‘easy’

Roger Tschann’s musical evolution has taken him from playing electric guitar in a teenage punk-rock band to starting his own recording studio to opening a downtown Petaluma nightclub.

Tschann, who was 3 when his family moved to Petaluma, has been involved in music his whole life. He launched Grizzly Studios more than 20 years ago and more recently opened two downtown nightlife hot spots.

The opening of The Big Easy in late 2014 fulfilled a longtime dream for Tschann, who had always wanted to open a restaurant and nightclub. Today, The Big Easy is considered by many to be Petaluma’s premier venue for local and area bands to play.

The stepping stone to opening The Big Easy was Speakeasy, a late-night restaurant on Helen Putnam Plaza that Tschann and his girlfriend, Amber Driscoll, opened in the fall of 2012. The space became available when the previous occupant, a Thai restaurant, closed.

“I always wondered why no place was open to get something to eat after 9 p.m.,” he said. “I thought if we had a place that stayed open until 2 a.m., we could make it work.”

So Tschann and Driscoll made the leap of faith.

Speakeasy has cultivated a clientele of night owls who enjoy their menu of tapas and light fare. The venue is too small to accommodate live music, however.

But Tschann had his eye on the dungeon-like storefront nearby on American Alley that was occupied by an adult-paraphernalia shop.

“We looked at the space and thought that we could create a cool venue in there,” he said. When the shop closed, he reached a deal with the landlord to lease the space.

“The Big Easy is more of the kind of place I imagined originally,” he said. “It brought together two things I like: a nightclub-restaurant and live music. When we launched The Big Easy, the concept was to be like an underground jazz club. I always intended to offer other kinds of live music, but I wanted to put that forward first to establish the vibe.”

One thing that sets The Big Easy apart from other venues is the 1957 Hammond B3 organ that one of Tschann’s patrons found for him.

“He told me, ‘If you’re opening a jazz club, you must have one of these,’” Tschann said. “It’s a very rare and desirable instrument that used to be a fixture in jazz clubs.”

Legendary keyboardist Howard Wales performed at the club recently, enticed by the organ. Other acts have included D’Bunchovus, the Incubators, the Pulsators and Mitch Woods & His Rocket 88s. Music ranges from blues-soul and jazz to Americana-folk and rock ’n’ roll.

The Big Easy recently expanded its entertainment schedule to include stand-up comedy on the first and third Mondays of each month, with a cornhole tournament on the alternating Mondays.

Owning and operating two downtown establishments compelled Tschann to put Grizzly Studios on the back burner for now. In the early years of the studio, he recorded just about every band in Petaluma, including The Velvet Teen, Eric Lindell, Tsunami Bomb and Slow Gherkin.

“Many of them have come and gone,” said Tschann, who estimates he has recorded more than a thousand CDs for various bands.

“Today, computers make recording much more accessible, but back then it was really hard,” he said.

His original studio was in his mother’s garage, but after a few years, he built “a proper studio,” with soundproofing and air conditioning.

“It’s small, but big enough for the average five-piece band,” he said.

Several years ago, Tschann was offered the opportunity to work for a larger recording studio, but he declined.

“It always seemed that I was better off following my own path and doing my own thing,” he said. “Amber and I are both entrepreneurial type of people.”

Looking back on the Petaluma music scene during the last couple of decades, Tschann recalled how the now-defunct Section M magazine helped to make different bands aware of each other in the 1990s and create a lot of cross-pollination.

“We all thought Petaluma was going to be the next Seattle,” in terms of a music scene, he said. “Music has changed, but it always goes on.”

With The Big Easy and Speakeasy firmly established, Tschann is looking forward to the next venture.

“We’re planning to launch a food truck called ‘Easy Street,’” Tschann said. “We hope to be able to help aspiring chefs to get their creations out to the public by being able to get them easier access to the necessary tools such as our commercial kitchen.”

It would be “a sort of small food business incubator,” he said, “allowing aspiring chefs to use the infrastructure we already have in place.”

Clearly, Tschann does not plan to be taking it easy anytime soon.

(Chris Samson is the former editor of the Argus-Courier. Contact him at chrissamson@yahoo.com.)