By Casey Rafter

Pink light splashes across 16th Street in Midtown Sacramento, reflecting off the windows of shuttered Simon’s Chinese Cuisine. A neon “The Silver Lining,” sign projects the glow from a neighboring window in a vibrant, retro font reminiscent of the goofy 1987 classic “Mannequin.”

The people in line are nervous and excited for a speed friending event at The Silver Lining, which boasts a streak of sold-out nights for their ticketed dueling piano performances in the space formerly occupied by Luna’s Cafe. It’s a special event put on by the venue who’s calendar also offers open-mic poetry nights, dueling piano performances and piano-accompanied karaoke.

On nights without a planned performance, The Silver Lining’s owner, William Houser, says the pianos remain in place. He says one of the benefits of owning his own piano bar is not only being able to play whenever the mood strikes him, but being able to offer that opportunity to any bar patron keen on impressing crowds or embarrassing friends.

“That’s something I’ve found at other bars … if they had a piano, I’d ask if I could play and, ‘No. Absolutely not at all,’” Houser says. “We get musicians in here all the time that ask to play piano and I’m like, ‘Of course.’ Some of them, if they’re really good and they’re enjoying themselves, we’ll book them to come in — pay them for a 2, 3-hour set.”

At the start of The Silver Lining’s run, the building’s previous tenant, Art Luna, advised Houser on how to transition from Luna’s Cafe to The Silver Lining. In a Sacramento News & Review story, Luna said he’d work with Houser to help with booking and act as a consultant of sorts once he sold Luna’s.

According to Luna, The Silver Lining dove in with a schedule very similar to the one he maintained before Luna’s Cafe ended its 30-year residency in August 2023. He says the first few weeks of business, he was helping Houser book jazz and poetry, but once it was clear that The Silver Lining was keeping some of the old Luna’s crowd, while developing a fresh and hearty new audience for itself, he didn’t feel the need to be as hands on.

“Initially, I was there a couple times a week for jazz,” Luna says. “I wanted to be there to make sure that people felt like things are still happening. But then, slowly — this was going to happen anyway — he moved on to other types of things. [Houser] got his feet under him. He’s taking it over.”

Though he’s able to manage things independently now, Houser says having a connection with Luna was important to networking with the roster of Sacramento poets and musicians who had frequented Luna’s Cafe and might enjoy returning now that The Silver Lining is in full swing.

“I didn’t know the music scene here or how to find people and he helped a ton with that,” Houser says. “He’ll come in and tell us about a band he knows about. I’ll listen, but not everything he would have in here still fits. We want to change it to the vision of what The Silver Lining is.”

On Instagram, local singer, songwriter and champion of the arts Ninefingers named The Silver Lining’s piano karaoke nights as one of his favorite things to do in Sacramento. After getting requests for a karaoke version of his recent single “Only Baddies Get the Saddies,” he went home and spent the night making an instrumental with lyrics for a social media campaign.

Lizz Shine, who had taken the stage at Luna’s Cafe, now returns to perform at The Silver Lining. Shine, an accomplished musician with 20 years of experience playing piano, had a trial run at the bar in January, which evolved into a recurring themed event. Her first few shows at The Silver Lining featured Ninefingers as an opener.

“The first one went really well,” Shine says.“Starting on Valentine’s Day, I started a monthly show over there that’s called the ‘Lizz Shine Rainbow Bash.’ We decorate the whole place … I bring in local artists.”

Shine’s current band is all female and features queer musicians. During the pandemic, Shine took a brief break from music to focus on family, but ended that sabbatical right in line with The Silver Lining’s first month of business. Not only has she booked regular special events at the bar, but she and Houser have become close enough allies that her children call him “Uncle William.”

“I play a lot of pop-up shows at The Silver Lining, because I’m really good friends with William,” Shine says. “He’s a piano player … we hang out all the time and we’ve started this thing in the morning we call music therapy — because it’s stressful being a business owner — so we’ll have hangout sessions where he sits in and we play together.”

Houser says he enlisted the help of Brass Rose Studios’ Jessica Marshall to tackle redesigning the interior of The Silver Lining. Marshall also helped Houser find local artists to display their work, with 100% of art sales going to the artists. Among the portraits at The Silver Lining are a few by Shine’s wife, Eudora Star. He says he has the same philosophy with performers booked at the venue — taking no profit from ticket sales — and supporting the space with bar sales.  . 

“Shasta [Malcom] is one, Donutart Man [Chris Jonas] is another,” Houser says, naming some of the local artists with work hanging at the bar. “They kind of collaborate on what their theme is going to be — they’ll change out most of these paintings in probably a month or two.”

The bar’s following on social media has opened a channel of constant inquiries from musicians and artists interested in performing there. Even though legacy talent from the Luna’s Cafe days still book gigs there, Houser says he receives a bit of flack on platforms like Reddit from Sacramentans who appear feverishly loyal to the bygone era of Luna’s Cafe.

“My phone’s on do not disturb because I’m constantly getting texts, calls and emails,” Houser says. “Sometimes there has been some animosity towards me from some of the existing customers that were huge Luna’s supporters. I think they’re just mad it’s not the same. We’re doing our best to still offer poetry. There has to have been a change to make it work.”

According to Luna, Capitol Area Development Authority, which owns the building, has been supportive of the piano bar’s early renovations.

“You know, he took a risk making the changes that he did,” Luna says. “I love what he did with the space. People that I know from days at the cafe are performing there, so I’ll be keeping in touch.”

Luna’s enthusiasm for success at The Silver Lining is palpable. He says he’d seen Houser at Luna’s Cafe off and on for 10 months leading up to the cafe’s closure.

“He enjoyed the events we were doing and was going to continue some of them,” Luna says. “I liked that idea. And then he made an offer that I couldn’t refuse. I was not ready to retire, but I just figured I’m going to be out four or five years earlier, I might as well.”

A neon sign greets guests upon entry at the The Silver Lining piano bar on 16th Street in Sacramento. (Photo by Cristian Gonzalez)

This story was funded by the City of Sacramento’s Arts and Creative Economy Journalism Grant to Solving Sacramento. Following our journalism code of ethics and protocols, the city had no editorial influence over this story and no city official reviewed this story before it was published. Our partners include California Groundbreakers, Capital Public Radio, Outword, Russian America Media, Sacramento Business Journal, Sacramento News & Review, Sacramento Observer and Univision 19.