Grant's Lounge, Macon, GA

Edward Grant, Sr. ought to be a Georgia Music Hall of Fame nominee. That’s no editorial comment, but a statement that upon examination of his role in etching the city’s public face, let alone Georgia music history, rolls off the tongue, logically and cool.

Such pronouncements come easily, of course, in light of Grant’s death on March 17 at the age of 76. There is a tendency to shroud the deceased in a gentle hue, downgrading the essential matter that all people are flawed and vulnerable, with feet stuck in “the mire-y clay,” as the old hymnal goes, all needing redemption. In the face of death, triumph is preferred, perhaps, more for the living, than the newly departed. So here it goes:

In truth, Ed Grant was an earth-bound pioneer in post-segregationist Macon during the 1970s, when he became an independent businessman, which meant that he was no stranger to danger or peril.

As proprietor of Grant’s Lounge, he was a general, a behind-the-scenes tactician not unlike Eisenhower, Davis, MacArthur and Patton. Grant’s Lounge was the battlefield that helped determine Macon’s contemporary profile, the public image of a city that ultimately chose to issue its raucous, celebrated musical heritage as its calling card, not its racist, mean-spirited, Jim Crow-sodden underbelly.

Indeed, Grant’s Lounge was the site of a microcosmic struggle—but with universal import. It was a struggle to determine Macon’s very soul, a soul that is inimitably wrapped around a clef note, and that makes Ed Grant a kind of local hero.

Grant’s saga mushroomed inside a three-story, brick-faced structure at 576 Poplar Street. The current exterior is so nondescript, so commonplace to the point of being forgettable, a dull battleship gray façade, broken only by a high block of maroon paint, which even covers the doorways. Currently, the nightclub opens two nights a week to a rather tough—some say unsavory crowd. However, it sits inside a smart, interesting piece of architecture, possessing a trio of elegantly arched windows and ornate appointments that bespeak of a finer, grander period.

Grant's Lounge Macon GA
The Original Crew of Grant’s Lounge Macon GA
In the 1970s and 80s, so did Grant’s Lounge. It became the legendary nightspot, where the red and white sign suspended above the nightclub’s entrance, pointing to the entertainment experience in the city. Inside, the joint was practically claustrophobic, a postage stamp of a place that nonetheless brought virtually every name in Southern rock to its stage. That made Grant’s Lounge sort of like Rome.

Indeed, the roll call constitutes its own hall of fame, a collection of Southern rock giants like the Allman Brothers, Wet Willie, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Charlie Daniels, Eric Quincy Tate, even an Allman Brothers knockoff band, called the Almost Brothers. “I think everybody heard about Grant’s Lounge,” says his daughter, Cheryl Louder, who manages Riverview Ballroom, the Walnut St. six-story hotel, as well as the historic nightclub.

Obviously, Edward Grant was molded from a distinctive fist of clay. He learned the mechanics and dignity in matters of business early, primarily from his father, Willie, who operated a small shop on the eastside, according to Louder.

Later, he worked at the most exclusive enclave of Macon, the Idle Hour Golf and Country Club. Here the men – the white business and governmental leaders of Macon – relaxed. Here, they let their guard down, and Grant, clad in the garb of a servant, bartended, waited tables and absorbed it all. He observed their mannerisms and noted their parlance. He listened to how big deals and big plans were constructed, obviously, not always in the boardroom or at the conference table. He discovered that business agreements and community decisions were often cast over a martini or a Delmonico, or between tee times and cigar puffs.