On a gritty stretch of 2nd Avenue steeped in jazz ghosts and real-world danger, Bill Graham built a rock & roll cathedral. "It was a great event when the Fillmore came to New York. It was in kind of a poetic area. Prior to the rock 'n' roll explosion, Second Avenue have been the home of the Stuyvesant casino where Bunk Johnson, Louis Armstrong's trumpet teacher, first came to play New York. That area, the Lower East Side, was kind of a terrific place to have the Fillmore. There were elements of danger in going there…. But nothing fazed Bill Graham. Nothing. Nothing fazed him." Ahmet Ertegun