AUSTIN, Texas — Famed Austin nightclub and music venue Antone’s Nightclub has secured a lease to remain at its current location for another 50 years, long enough to celebrate a 100th anniversary in 2075, according to an article in the Austin American-Statesman.
The iconic club, founded by Clifford Antone in 1975, will remain at 305 E. 5th St. for the next half century. Additionally, according to the article, they have secured $1.3 million in funding from a real estate nonprofit called Rally Austin to create the “Antone’s World Famous Museum of the Blues.”
Rally Austin is a nonprofit that works with the City of Austin through the Austin Cultural Trust. They will partner with Antone’s to begin displaying artifacts related to blues music beginning in 2027 on the second floor of the club. A portion of the museum’s proceeds will be donated to the Rally for Live Music Fund.
The city established the Iconic Venue Fund in 2020, which is administered by Rally Austin. It is funded by the city’s hotel occupancy tax as well as a bond passed in 2018, which added $12 million to be spent toward creative facilities. The first recipient of money from that fund was the iconic Hole in the Wall on the Guadalupe Street drag at the University of Texas at Austin campus.
Antone’s will also establish the “Antone’s Forever Fund,” which is meant to help sustain the Antone’s brand over the course of the next 50 years.