NASHUA – Studio 99, one of downtown Nashua’s core venues for live music, closed its doors Wednesday , facing a combination of financial problems and difficulties related to its location.
One of the main contributors to Studio 99’s closure, owner Elise MacDonald said in a phone interview Friday afternoon, was the harassment her patrons received from drunken individuals passing the venue at 17 Factory St.
“We had to put film on our windows because kids literally dropped their pants and mooned us,” she said. “That happened more than once.”
Other incidents included banging on the venue’s large glass windows and screaming at the performers and audience from the sidewalk.
MacDonald informed the police about these issues, as well as several aldermen.
“The problem with Factory Street is that it has just little enough traffic that it’s possible for people to pull stunts like that and feel like they’re not going to be seen by anyone who could identify them,” she said.
Financial difficulties rounded out the rest of the factors in MacDonald’s decision to close Studio 99, with high rent, insurance payments and payments to performance rights organizations taking their toll.
Studio 99, a listening-room-style venue designed to allow audiences to focus on music without other distractions, brought a variety of acts to Nashua, including Boston-based female Celtic roots quartet Long Time Courting and performers from the N.H. Jazz series.
The venue’s location, however, made patrons “sitting ducks” for disruptive incidents, MacDonald said, noting that the Arena Sportsbar and Nightclub is diagonally across from Studio 99.
Patrons of local bars also contributed to the difficulties, she said, with people generally “drunk and disorderly on the street.”
“Nashua’s really hitched its wagon to this severely alcohol- fueled nightlife,” MacDonald said. “It’s become really routine.”
The nearby High Street Garage has posed a challenge, as well.
“That’s gotten pretty rowdy in the last couple of months,” she said.![]()
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