Fresno’s longest-running music venue going up for sale. Here are the $4 million details

Fresno’s longest running, and perhaps most iconic, live-music venue is being listed for sale.

The Rainbow Ballroom, built in 1918 on what would become Broadway Avenue and the cultural arts/mural district, is being sold for $3,995,000, according to Jared Ennis with KW Commerical. The 18,750-square-foot building includes two parking lots, a liquor license for on-site consumption and almost a century’s worth of musical history.

The building originally opened as The Fresno Natatorium, an indoor swimming complex with a 40- by 100-foot pool, high dive platform and spring dive boards, trapeze rings for stunts, 165 dressing rooms, a roof garden and walls of windows to light the three-story building.

The remnants of the pool can still be seen in the basement.

Venue was a hub for big band, emerging rock and roll scenes

It was rechristened as a ballroom/dance hall in 1924 and became a stopping point for big-name acts like Glenn Miller and Duke Ellington as they traveled from San Francisco to Los Angeles. Through the ’40s big-band era there was music at the venue almost every week.

In 1958, comedian Jerry Lewis hosted a Triple X charity ball at the ballroom: a benefit for the Fresno County Society for Crippled Children and Adults. More than 1,000 people showed up to hear Lewis crack jokes, sing and dance.

“He ended the show sitting in a spotlight singing an Italian lullaby he sings when he puts his children to bed,” according to a review in The Fresno Bee at the time.

In the 1960s, the Rainbow Ballroom became a hub for California’s burgeoning rock and roll scene, playing host to the up-and-coming artists of the day, including a young Janice Joplin. She played a double show with Big Brother and the Holding Company in 1968. Tickets were $2.50 or $3 at the door. Other artists who played the venue around that time include Carlos Santana and Fleetwood Mac.

The venue was also the go-to spot at the time for local garage rock bands like The Brymers and The Roadrunners.

In the late ’90s and early 2000s, following the sale of the nearby Wilson Theatre, the promotions company Goldenvoice (best known for Coachella Music and Arts Festival) had a run at the the ballroom.

It became a hot spot of alternative and rock music. No Doubt played there in the band’s ska heyday. So did Morrissey, Garbage, The Offspring and Slipknot. Snoop Dogg played a rather infamous gig at the ballroom, but not until 2011. The show didn’t start until after 1 a.m.

Under its current owners, Valdivia Enterprises, the venue became a center for Hispanic entertainment in the Valley, bringing in a consistent flow of big and small-name regional Mexican music, and with it large crowds.

Banda MS played the Rainbow Ballroom before it sold out at The Big Fresno Fair and well before it was ever scheduled at the Save Mart Center.

Bud Light used the ballroom as the backdrop for its “Todos Toman” ad campaign in 2003 and as one of the stops on the Bud Light Party in 2016. The headliner was Alfredo Rios, aka El Komander, a guy that NPR once called “the Jay Z of Mexican drug balladeers.”

Hardy’s Theatre, Tower Theatre, have also been sold

While the sale comes at a hard time for local entertainment venues, Ennis said the owner is simply looking to retire and would love to see a venue operator take over the space to continue the legacy.

The Rainbow Ballroom is the latest historic venue to be up for sale in Fresno.

The Liberty Theatre, now known as the Hardy’s Theatre, was sold to the Universal Church in February. That property was also owned by the Valdivia family.

And, of course, the Tower Theatre, which is in escrow to be sold to Adventure Community Church. Mere rumors of the sale caused concerns among community leaders and area businesses. The city said the church is operating against the zoning code for the neighborhood and that the building would need to be rezoned and get a conditional use permit to continue holding services at the theater.

The church has said it will continue to use the theater as an entertainment venue, with the theater’s current management handling all booking concerns.

This story was originally published January 14, 2021 at 5:00 AM.