Buddy Charles: Like Fine Wine—Old but Oh So Good!
Just when you think the world’s going to hell in a handbasket, along comes Buddy Charles.
In the unlikely setting of Niles, Illinois, just northwest of Chicago, in the comfortable sort of place that might once have been called a supper club, the singer/pianist Buddy Charles performs each Tuesday and Wednesday nights in an open run. The place is called The Chambers and it’s on the east side of Milwaukee Avenue, about a half mile south of that god-awful fake stone fountain at the intersection of Touhy and Milwaukee.
Why is Niles an unlikely setting? Well, you’d think that a place where you could cuddle up with a brandy to hear Noel Coward and George Gershwin sung and played with the rarest of wit and pianistic skill would be in downtown Chicago, right? But no. The elegant cognac-and-piano bars—Toulouse and the Gold Star Sardine Bar, for example—are gone for now, ... Read More...
