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Press Release
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Lib at Large: Marin Rocks rolling again  By Paul Liberatore, Marin Independent Journal  January 4, 2013 - A skate boarder rolls past the planned location of the Marin Rocks museum in 2010. The project was delayed after a funding problem. (IJ photo/Alan Dep) (Alan Dep).IN THIS FIRST COLUMN of the new year, I have some good news to report. Marin Rocks!, the rock history museum project that ground to a halt two years ago when it ran out of money, is rolling again. A new group, headed by former Circle Bank CEO Kim Kaselionis, has been formed to give a fresh push to this ambitious effort to celebrate Marin's rock heritage while inspiring future generations of Marin musicians. "I'm very excited," Kaselionis says. "I think it can evolve over time to be something quite spectacular, something very unique, as unique as Marin is."Some years ago, I wrote about the need to preserve Marin's rich rock history while we still can. It's a proud heritage that includes such stars as the Grateful Dead, Santana, Van Morrison, Steve Miller, Journey, Metallica, Janis Joplin, Huey Lewis, Bonnie Raitt, and on and on. No other community in the country has a legacy like we have. Those columns generated an enormous amount of reader response and excitement. As it turned out, the Marin History Museum was already thinking along the same lines. Taking the initiative, it began work on a local rock history project, calling it Marin Rocks. But the history museum was not immune to the devastating effects of the recent economic downturn. After raising $2.5 million, the museum ran into a financial brick wall in 2011, forcing the layoff of half its staff, including its executive director. Under the circumstances, there was no choice but to stop work on the $4.7 million interactive rock history exhibit it had hoped to open in a former auto parts store on San Rafael's Fourth Street. But Carleton Prince, president of the history museum board, was not ready to let the moribund project fade away that quietly. "With the outpouring of support we got from the music community, from the community in general and from the quality of the artifacts that were offered to us to display, I realized this had a life of its own," he says. "It's a big program that deserves to see the light of day." He approached Kaselionis about taking charge of an independent new group, completely separate from the history museum, to explore the feasibility of the Marin Rocks idea, to find out whether it's something that has a reasonable chance of being successful. An experienced businesswoman, Kaselionis took on the job with the infusion of energy it needed as well as reality-based approach that keeps an eye on the bottom line. "This organization needs to be run like a business," she insists, coming to the conclusion that, for the most part, the project needed to go back to the drawing board. "It's a really great idea, and kudos to everyone who expended the effort to get it to this point," she says. "But the reality is it really needs to be scrapped and started from zero. We need to take a fresh look at the whole thing." She brought together an exploratory group that includes, among others, Prince; David Warner of Redhorse Constructors, who was instrumental in producing the Metallica concert that raised $250,000 for the museum; Circle Bank corporate secretary Diane Gasson; Tom Renshaw, owner of the 850 Fourth Street building that has been proposed to house the museum; and Dean Weldon, president and CEO of Academy Studios, the Novato company that has fabricated the exhibits for Marin Rocks. Because I've covered the Marin music scene for a long time, I was asked to meet with the group as well. The fledgling organization is now in the process of looking at candidates for an official founding board of directors. Even with all that local knowledge, Kaselionis realized that we also needed outside expertise, hiring Museum Management Consultants. The San Francisco-based firm has been researching other music history organizations and will oversee a "visioning workshop" scheduled for the end of January. Prominent people from music, business, finance, education, social service and other walks of life are being invited to the three-hour session to give their views on what Marin Rocks should become. "The people who are coming to the workshop are crucial to helping us better define what it means to have a cultural organization that concentrates on rock 'n' roll," says Adrienne Horn, president of the consulting company. "What we're going to try to do is be much more detailed about the kind of experience the visitor might have coming to this place." After the workshop, a strategic plan and a timeline will have to be put together, laying out the steps needed to get Marin Rocks up and running. At the same time, a financial plan will be drawn up, taking a look at how much it's going to cost to operate something like this and where the money is going to come from. According to the consultants, those pieces should be in place over the next couple of months. "Those things were never done before," Horn says. "And we now have people who are very serious about what this means and are ready to try to make something happen." Since the first attempt at Marin Rocks fell by the wayside, I've been asked over and over again by people in the community if it was ever going to become a reality. I've been as disappointed as they've been, and never know quite what to tell them. But I can now say with some confidence that Marin Rocks has got a shot, as good a shot as it's probably ever going to get. I'll keep everyone in the loop as this thing unfolds. "Projects like this take effort," Kaselionis reminds us. "They are not linear. You have setbacks sometimes, in business and in life. But we have an opportunity to create something that celebrates our music history in a living, robust way. And it's going to take time to put together if we want to do it right." |