The Sutherland Hotel and Ballroom still stands on the corner of 47th and Drexel, but it’s been a long time since it counted the jazz greats among its guests. For more than 30 years it was a jazz mecca. Located down the street from the old Regal Theatre in a neighborhood known for its nightclubs, the Sutherland regularly hosted such musicians as Louis Armstrong, Miles Davis, John Coltrane, and Thelonious Monk.
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Opened in 1917 as a veterans hospital, the Sutherland was converted into a hotel during the Depression, becoming famous as a “black-and-tan” establishment, one of only two integrated hotels in Chicago (the other was the Blackstone). But as the Kenwood neighborhood hit hard times, jazz did too. The ballroom closed, and the hotel was turned into an apartment building.
Started by actress and singer Rita Warford, the Sutherland Community Arts Initiative aims to stimulate Kenwood’s economy by fostering the arts. To that end, they’ve reopened the Sutherland’s historic ballroom this month for a Thursday night concert series. “The music industry was part of the economy for the neighborhood,” says Thompson, who now heads the group. “What we want to do is to encourage tourism. This place was a tourist attraction, so we don’t have to reinvent the wheel.”
