Piano Bars in New York

Marie's Crisis Café

Dive Bar / Gay Bar / Piano Bar

Party Earth Review Located in the historic building where Thomas Paine wrote “The Crisis Papers” during the Revolutionary War, Marie’s Crisis Café is a mellow hetero-friendly gay piano bar that attracts a mix of entertainment and musical types and patrons who just like to get buzzed and sing show tunes. A dark cellar at the bottom of some ... more

Address:

59 Grove Street
New York, NY 10014

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Ella

Cocktail Bar / Live Music Venue / Piano Bar

Party Earth Review The decadent divas of Hollywood’s golden age would feel right at home at Ella, a bi-level art deco lounge attracting a fashionable mix of alternative creative types and music lovers. An eye-catching red, black, and white color scheme featuring ornate chandeliers, theater-curtain wallpaper, zebra print carpeting, and checkered ... more

Address:

9 Avenue A
New York, NY 10009

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NYC Piano Bars Overview

Marie's Crisis Café - Dive Bar | Gay Bar | Piano Bar in NYC

The tinkling of ivory keys in a smoky den of iniquity is a Big Apple tradition, and though the smoke has been taken outside, piano bars in New York still thrive, merging nouveau style with Rat Pack class to create a truly charming experience.

Downtown is still where NYC piano bars do their best to hearken back to the quick-fingered jazz pianists who played beneath the red awning of the Village Underground. Ella on the Lower East Side exudes more of an upscale velvet rope sort of vibe, its crowds of upper-class creative types drinking in the Klaus Nomi-esque zebra stripes upstairs, while those looking for music descend into the basement bar to take in the live pianist of the evening. Marie’s Crisis Café takes a more communal attitude, allowing its gay patrons to circle their piano and regale each other with classics of musical theater. Besides these, there are a few other live piano spots sprinkled around Manhattan, like the vodka-centric Russian Samovar.

New York piano bars may no longer be the standard of cool, but these juice joints still bring in decent crowds of young bucks and old-timers alike who wouldn’t mind hearing a little “Night and Day” over a fine drink.