“I’ve kept it a little incognito,” said Rubin, a middle-aged jazz guitarist with gray hair and a scruffy beard. “People know about it mostly by word of mouth. I’m not looking to be flooded with tourists. I’m more interested in people that are really interested in the music.”

On most days, Rubin, also a music engineer and producer, uses the space as a recording studio for his production company, Zebulon Light and Sound. But Zeb’s is known among local jazz fans for its weekly Jazz Vocalists Series, which features one or two singers followed by a professional open mic night—with an emphasis on the “professional.” “[It’s] not just for people who sing in the shower,” Rubin said.

The gig has become quite popular, with anywhere from 25 to 60 people, mostly musicians, filling the narrow, high-ceilinged loft every Wednesday night. It is a casual affair, an intimate scene where those with similar interests can mingle with one another and share their appreciation of live jazz.
“I was really interested in the community aspect of it,” said Rubin. “People can get together and it’s not all about just one person. It takes the onus off of everybody’s egos, and then it becomes more of a community.”

Often, said Rubin, jazz musicians don’t socialize with other jazz musicians—they’re too competitive and focused on their own careers. With Zeb’s, he is trying to create an open, welcoming space where artists can perform and listen to one another without being judged. So far, it seems to be working.
“It’s a cool thing, to have all of the musicians here,” said Angela Roberts, a jazz singer who was one of the featured vocalists at the Jan. 18 show. “It’s got a nice little family vibe.”

As people filed in before the show that night, they greeted one another warmly, chatting and playing with Honey, a small, excited dog that belongs to a friend of Rubin’s. Sipping red wine from a plastic cup, Roberts floated between the crowd and the stage area, where Rubin and the other musicians were setting up. On one of the couches, a young man in a tweed jacket, who later joined Roberts for a song, played his trumpet to a few listeners—including Lezlie Harrison, the second featured vocalist of the night, who was wearing large gold earrings in the shape of G-clefs.

The entrance fee for the  is $10 a person, which seems a steep price compared to other jazz spots in the city. But with just a few events per week and such a small crowd of regulars, Zeb’s is hardly a cash cow. Rubin uses the money from the entrance fees to pay the musicians, and if he doesn’t have enough, he pays out of his own pocket.

“We don’t make any money off of this place. It’d be nice, but that’s not the point,” said Rubin’s daughter, Jennifer Arrigo, who helps run the Wednesday shows. “It’s about worshipping music. That’s his life.”

A jazz vocalist herself, Arrigo has been a featured artist at the Wednesday night gigs and often participates in the open mic portion. On Jan. 18, she sat at the door, knitting a fuchsia scarf and taking patrons’ entrance fees. Her father doesn’t like to deal with the money, she said, so she charges patrons and pays the musicians. Instead, Rubin is focused on the music and the atmosphere.

“The caliber of musicians that are playing here—they wouldn’t work other places for the money I’m paying them,” said Rubin. “But they’re my friends, and they like the scene.”

About 25 people had arrived at Zeb’s when Roberts took to the stage, and they quickly hushed and sat down as the show began. With shiny, dark hair, bright, blue-green cat’s eyes and a seductive, melodious voice, Roberts wooed the room with six songs, including covers of Doris Day’s “Secret Love” and The Beatles’ “I Will,” accompanied by a bassist, a drummer and Rubin on guitar. Other than applause and some playful banter between songs, the room was silent.

“I like to call it a performance space, not a club,” said Rubin. “There’s no margarita machine making noise or martini shakers in the background.”

This, too, differentiates Zeb’s from other jazz spots in the city. Other than a few bottles of wine and the sculptures that hang from the walls—all made by Rubin himself—there is little to distract visitors from the music. Rubin said that this is a nice change from places like Fat Cat, the West Village pool hall where he plays at least once a week.

“A lot of great musicians work there,” said Rubin, “but the music is secondary. When I started playing [here] on a regular basis, I was like, ‘Wow, I can hear myself!’”

A large, underground bar, Fat Cat offers customers both pool and ping-pong, which makes for a noisy atmosphere. On Jan. 17, Rubin played there, accompanied by a bassist and a drummer. Although some patrons stood and listened, most were preoccupied—it wasn’t until Rubin and his group played Jimi Hendrix’s “Purple Haze” that the music became the focus of the room.

The atmosphere at Zeb’s the following night was vastly different. Although friendly and lighthearted, the crowd arrived with the sole intention of listening to music. Everyone seemed to hold a feeling of mutual respect for their fellow musicians, and all expressed their appreciation to Rubin for creating this communal, open space for jazz lovers.

“It’s a really beautiful scene. We’ve all made a lot of new friends,” said Rubin. “There are so many great people in New York, and we all learn from each other.”

—Kimberly Lightbody

By Kimberly Lightbody

Pinpointing exactly what makes Bonnie Slotnick such a fascinating person is difficult. Her store, Bonnie Slotnick Cookbooks, is a miracle: a tiny shop of used cookbooks that has somehow survived the gentrification of the West Village. Her personality is warm and therapeutic, and encourages customers to spend hours sharing their life stories with her. Her own life story is itself captivating, a history of the West Village, modernization and change in microcosm.Slotnick evokes memories of a time when everything was peaceful and comforting and homey. Stepping into her store, a narrow, dusty space stacked with old books and knick-knacks, is like stepping into a different world.

Part of Slotnick’s charisma is her memory. She has an astonishing ability to recall quotes from 50 years ago, to describe scenes from her childhood in vivid detail. She still remembers the name of the librarian from her childhood library.

“It was a wonderful library that I still dream about, one of those old Carnegie libraries,” she said from the swivel chair behind her desk. “The children’s room was in the basement. I haven’t been back there in quite a while. But it haunts me.”

Sitting behind an enormous desktop computer, wrapped in a dark purple sweater and scarf, her voice takes on a dreamlike quality as she talks about her childhood in southern New Jersey. As soon as she could read, she said, she began scouring her parents’ book collection, hiking herself up onto the kitchen counter to look at her mother’s cookbooks. She still remembers one in particular, The Settlement Cookbook, by Mrs. Simon Kander.

“There’s a recipe in there for a flour ball. I’ll never forget—I was so fascinated with it,” she said. “And then there was one for beef tea, for someone who is frail. The book has an entire section dedicated to invalid recipes, for people who are sick or weak.”

Slotnick’s passion for cookbooks, however, doesn’t stem from a love of cooking, but a love of history. She is drawn by the stories behind recipes, by the way that old cookbooks can paint a picture of different time periods. When she was 9, she found a copy of Emily Post’s Etiquette, the 1922 book that details how members of high society should behave. She was enthralled.

“We lived in a split-level house on a little piece of property, and then all of a sudden I’m in here, reading about how to present the breakfast menu when people are staying with you in your country house,” she said. “I used to stretch out under the dining room table and read it.”

It was a different book, however, that turned Bonnie onto cookbooks—a small, pocket-sized booklet from World War II called Good Ideas. Inside were hundreds of short recipes and housekeeping tips meant to help the reader endure rationing during the war. This was what attracted Slotnick; she loved to read recipes that began with phrases like, “If you’re lucky enough to find this sweetened canned milk…” Now the booklet is brown and the binding is long gone, worn down from over 50 years of handling. It sits on Slotnick’s desk in a plastic case, with a label that reads, “Our Founder.”

Slotnick interrupted her reminiscences to assist Elaine, a customer in her thirties who has been searching for cookbooks from the early 1900s. As she pays for her purchases, Elaine tells Slotnick how comforting the store is, something Slotnick has heard before. On Sept. 13, 2001, lots of people came in and spent hours just reading through books. It made them feel better.

Elaine had only come into the store to buy one book. She’s leaving with three.

“Not that I have the time to make all of these things, but I just like reading through them,” she said. “Before I go to sleep I like to read them. It’s very relaxing.”

Slotnick laughed. Many of her customers admit to reading cookbooks in bed, for enjoyment rather than practical purposes. She, too, reads the cookbooks for pleasure.

“Before the turn of the century, the whole recipe was written as a narrative,” she said. “And I just find that I can read those like a narrative.”

There’s also the historical aspect: cookbooks are like family Bibles, Slotnick said. She scans a shelf for a moment before pulling down Miss Parloa’s New Cook Book and Marketing Guide by Maria Parloa, printed in 1880. Slotnick flipped through a few pages before she found what she was looking for—a pressed flower that was in the book when she bought it.

“You don’t get that in your Kindle!” she said with a laugh.