LOCAL ROCK BAND REVIVES THE COMMUNITY SPIRIT OF ‘THE OLD MILL VALLEY’

By Paul Liberatore

Marin Independent Journal

October 29, 2026

Something phenomenal is happening in Mill Valley.

Hundreds of people crowd into the city’s downtown Depot Plaza on Friday nights for a free outdoor concert by a classic rock cover band fronted by a 72-year-old retired businessman who had never been in a band before in his life.

“This is my first rodeo in a lot of ways,” said John Pearce, founder and leader of Musical Feast, a mostly acoustic group that has been playing on the patio of the Depot Cafe and Bookstore every week for the past four years, attracting a growing audience of fans, friends and families who have been packing the plaza all summer and into the fall.

“It’s been very unexpected and very organic,” Pearce said. “It’s unfolded really nicely.”

The band has been credited with bringing a renewed spirit of togetherness to a wealthy enclave in the shadow of Mount Tamalpais whose citizens have sometimes been stereotyped in recent years as privileged and entitled, isolated in their multimillion-dollar homes.

“This has transformed the community,” said Marie Cannon, a Friday night regular sitting at a front-row table. “When the whole plaza is packed, it really feels like a community.”

It has become such a sensation that the Mill Valley City Council will present the band with an official proclamation on Friday, celebrating its 200th show. The city gave the band a similar honor two years ago for its 100th performance, proclaiming Musical Feast “a beloved weekly cultural and community phenomenon.”

“This is what makes Mill Valley vibrant,” said Mill Valley Councilmember and former Mayor Urban Carmel. “There’s no other city where this is going on.”

Diane and Bob Wagner, Friday night regulars who often bring their children and grandchildren to the shows, cut short a Hawaiian vacation so they could be on hand for the 200th show celebration.

“We have become dedicated followers (along with so many others) and have met so many new friends as well as joining our old friends almost every Friday night when in town,” Diane Wagner wrote in an email. “Enjoy the vibes!”

The city has set up picnic tables in the plaza to accommodate the crowds that show up even before the band starts its first set of baby boomer favorites, everything from Bob Dylan, Van Morrison and Grateful Dead songs to tunes by Canned Heat, Jackson Browne and the Mamas and the Papas.

Last Friday, a balmy October evening, showgoers brought their own picnic dinners or ordered from the Depot’s menu of fare by chef Mikel Waters, who trained at Daniel, a Michelin-starred restaurant in New York City.

There were lots of families with kids running around as well as older folks who sometimes sang along as the band played nostalgic songs from their youth.

“It’s a great place for the generations to come together,” said artist Katie Kuhn, a longtime Mill Valley resident. “You can come here in any mood and you’ll feel better.”

Kurt Jordan, a 66-year-old engineer and sailboat racer, brought a big spread of cold cuts for a party of 25 friends who gathered for the music and to celebrate his wife’s birthday. He had one word to describe the Friday night musical milieu: “Awesome.”

Nearby, 43-year-old Carson Christiano chatted with a friend as she held her 10-month-old son, Arlo, in her arms.

“I always run into people I know,” she said. “It makes Mill Valley feel like a European city.”

Musical Feast concerts have become occasions for single people to meet, and more than one romance has been sparked during the shows.

“We’ve had two marriages that developed from this community scene,” Pearce said. “One of them is my own. I found my wife there and could not be happier. We lived 10 blocks apart in downtown Mill Valley, but I’d never met her before. She just happened to be at the show one night. I looked out as we were playing and saw this gorgeous woman looking at me all dewy-eyed. The rest is history.”

He and Lisa Reed Pearce will celebrate their first anniversary on Thanksgiving Day.

“This has opened up a whole new world for me,” she said, comparing the Friday night action to the rom-com “Love Actually.” “When I look around, all I see is people hugging each other.”

Before moving to Mill Valley, Pearce sold a software company he founded in Cambridge, Massachusetts. He formed Musical Feast, the name a take on the Ernest Hemingway memoir “A Moveable Feast,” after playing during the pandemic for diners at outdoor tables at Vasco, a former Italian restaurant in downtown Mill Valley that’s now the Corner Bar.

When owner Paul Lazzareschi took over the renovated Depot Cafe across the street, Pearce moved with him, playing Friday night shows and gradually adding musicians to his drummerless group. The current lineup features him on acoustic guitar and vocals, mandolinist Brian Judd, violinist Jari Suomalainen, singer-guitarist Sapphire Kohl, bassist Larry Carlin and flautist Patrick LePelch. Ken Martini does their sound. Everyone in the band sings during their marathon two-set, three-hour shows, and they often invite guest musicians to sit in.

“We’re basically doing a Springsteen show every Friday,” said Pearce with a laugh.

His band rehearses once a week in his hillside home a stone’s throw from the plaza. He’d be the first to say he’s living his dream.

“I haven’t fronted a band before, but I’ve played all my life and played with a lot of people,” he said. “But the idea of having a band that’s developing over time is new for me. We’re always working on new material. We’re all in it for the love of what’s happening, and every week we get a little better. Our evolution has been a collective kind of thing. I’m not counting on becoming a global rock ‘n’ roll sensation out of this.”

Mill Valley has a rich musical history dating back to the 1970s, when the town was known as a haven for its resident rock stars. That reputation went national when some of the biggest names in Americana music performed at the original Sweetwater in the 1980s and ’90s. Mill Valley musician Claudia Hampe, a member of the bluegrass group Keystone Canyon, believes the Friday night concerts have captured some of the spirit of those bygone days.

“In this moment,” she said, “it feels like the old Mill Valley is back.”

Details: Musical Feast concerts begin at 5:30 p.m. Fridays in Mill Valley’s downtown Depot Plaza.

Contact Paul Liberatore at libpaul45@gmail.com