“Skip Scirocco Music Hall” Dedication in Saratoga Springs Feb. 29 

SARATOGA SPRINGS —A ceremony at the Saratoga Music Hall will take place Feb. 29 when the 153-year-old hall will be re-dedicated as the Skip Scirocco Music Hall.

The hall will be named after Anthony “Skip” Scirocco, a lifelong Saratogian who served the city professionally – first as the animal control officer, then as elected Saratoga County Supervisor – from 1998 to 2005, and as a standing Commissioner of Public Works, starting in 2008.  Scirocco died in April 2022 at the age of 74 following a brief battle with cancer. 

Scirocco was born on Feb. 29, 1948, and Feb. 29 is why the date for dedication was selected, said current DPW Commissioner Jason Golub. 

Saratoga Music Hall has been around since construction of City Hall was completed, at a cost of $110,000, in 1871. The building was first known as Town Hall – Saratoga Springs was not yet a city – and the third-floor hall was used as a courtroom in 1872 for the sensational murder trial of Edward Stokes. The trial, in connection with the shooting death of the New York City financier James “Diamond Jim” Fisk, attracted large crowds and newspapermen from across the Northeast. Stokes ultimately was convicted of manslaughter in the case.

Over the years the theater hosted conventions, minstrel shows, early movies, events associated with Saratoga Lake rowing competitions, and performances by actors such as Sarah Bernhardt, Raymond Hitchcock, and Irish tenor Chauncey Olcott. The theater also was the site of the founding meetings of the American Bar Association and the American Banking Association in the late 1800s.

The original Town Hall Theatre was home to the Town Hall Players, one of whose members was George Hyde Pierce, the father of actor David Hyde Pierce, who grew up in Saratoga Springs and is perhaps best known for his portrayal of Niles Crane on the television sitcom “Frasier.”

In 2016, fear grew that the 300-seat hall was in its last days as a community gathering space, with the venue targeted by the city – in accordance with a state mandate – for conversion into a courtroom. At a public hearing hosted by the city, dozens of people spoke in protest of the council’s suggestion to turn the hall into a courtroom space, and an online petition titled “Save the Music Hall!” garnered more than 370 signatures in the three weeks in advance of the hearing. 

Saratoga Springs City Hall – which houses the music hall on its uppermost floor – sustained extensive damage following an August 2018 lightning strike, and the council subsequently determined a building-wide multi-million-dollar renovation and restoration project was appropriate. 

“The emergency following the lightning strike along with the mandates from the courts and legislature were circumstances outside of our control, but this Council has worked collaboratively to keep this project moving,” then-DPW Commissioner Scirocco said at the time. “It’s the largest and possibly the most important project the city will undertake in our lifetime… and I think the public will be pleased with all the improvements in their City Hall.”

The newly restored Saratoga Music Hall opened to the public in late 2020.