Graham, Bill

Graham, Bill (b. Wolfgang Grajonca) (1931–93) rock music promoter/manager; born in Berlin, Germany. His Russian-Jewish parents fled the Nazis and he arrived in the U.S.A. in 1941, becoming a citizen in 1953. He served with the U.S. Army in Korea, then drove a taxi to pay for his business studies. In 1965 he began as the manager of the San Francisco Mime Troupe and moved on to present rock bands in concerts in his own venues, first a San Francisco club hall renamed the Fillmore, then the Carousel Ballroom in San Francisco renamed (1967) the Fillmore West. A mixture of hard-driving entrepreneur and idealistic counter-culturist, by 1968 he was so successful with his concerts that he opened the Fillmore East in a former movie house in New York City. In 1971 he closed his theaters and shifted to managing various groups and stars and promoting large arena concerts and tours, many of them featuring the biggest names in popular music including the Band and the Rolling Stones. Throughout the 1980s he continued to produce various concerts including a big 4th of July 1987 rock concert in Moscow.