Mac Rating: 5.00 | Votes: 1 | Date: 03/07/2026 01:32:00

The previous venue died of a divorce - Anthology, the plush jazz supper club, closed abruptly on New Year's Day 2013 and sat dark until new owners tripled the capacity. Music Box, at 1337 India Street in San Diego's Little Italy, reopened the three-level room in September 2015. The transformation was structural: Anthology's fine-dining format held just 272; the 2015 remodel stripped the fixed seating from the 13,000-square-foot building and rebuilt it as a 705-capacity concert venue - tables on the ground floor, opera boxes on the mezzanine, couches on the third level. The acquisition was a foreclosure play: San Diego investors bought the property for over 1.55 million dollars in 2014, with veteran promoter Tim Rinaldi programming an opening sprint of 28 shows in nine weeks and building toward the three-to-five-a-week rhythm the room now runs. The booking is deliberately broad: national touring acts across rock, electronic, Latin, reggae and tribute productions share the stage, with a 16-by-9-foot LED video wall, professional lighting and an outdoor terrace - the venue doubling as one of the city's busiest private-event spaces. The location closes the sale: Little Italy's restaurant rows surround the block between downtown's core and the waterfront, making the dinner-then-show circuit effortless - a neighbourhood that has boomed since the Anthology years, exactly as the new owners bet it would. Practical notes: street parking frees up after 6 p.m. with seven lots within a block; the three levels sell differently - floor standing, mezzanine boxes reserved, third-floor couches first-come - so reading the ticket tier matters, and the India Street coffee and cocktail strip handles both ends of the night. The predecessor left a high bar: Anthology's in-house production team earned multiple Emmy nominations for its broadcast work during the jazz years, and the Music Box kept the technical DNA - a 24-by-17-foot stage, branded digital marquee and buyout configurations that stretch to 2,700-plus when the outdoor spaces open for festivals and corporate takeovers.