THE PEOPLE WHO PUT ON SHOWS : PROMOTER’S JOB STARTS BEFORE AND ENDS LONG AFTER CONCERT

Concert promoter Kenny Weissberg is nervously pacing back and forth with a very worried look on his face.

It’s 15 minutes before show time and the first act, a comedian, is nowhere to be found.

A roadie runs up to Weissberg and tells him the comedian has just phoned in from a nearby restaurant, promising to be right there. But Weissberg isn’t taking any chances: he dispatches the roadie to the restaurant to pick up the errant comedian himself, post haste.

As the roadie is about to depart, the door swings open and in strolls the comedian, smiling broadly. With only three minutes to spare, he cockily informs Weissberg that he won’t go on until he is brought a diet Coke with ice.

The Coke is ordered, delivered and consumed. The comedian leaves the room and starts his show precisely on time. Weissberg sighs with relief.

“The audience doesn’t see what really goes on in the life of a concert promoter, and they’re lucky,” Weissberg says. “It isn’t all glamour--it isn’t even one-tenth glamour.”

Half-jokingly, he adds, “Tonight, for example, I was trying as hard as I could to prepare 45 minutes of original comedy, just in case the guy didn’t show up and I’d have to take his place.”

He probably would have. The show, you see, must go on.

During the day, Weissberg, 39, is usually in his Point Loma office. Most of the time, he’s on the phone with agents, trying to secure bookings for the “Concerts by the Bay” series at Humphrey’s on Shelter Island.

Each summer and early fall since 1982, the outdoor facility, which seats 1,000, hosts as many as 50 national touring jazz, pop, country, oldies and comedy acts, from Ray Charles to Emmylou Harris, from the Everly Brothers to Spyro Gyra.

On concert nights, Weissberg is usually at Humphrey’s. Throughout the evening, he flits about with the nervous energy of a corporate efficiency expert, trying to solve little problems before they become big ones--like performers not showing up.

Aside from that, Weissberg carries out a number of routine duties each night there’s a concert at Humphrey’s.

The afternoon before the Dave Brubeck show, Weissberg went to his office to check out the latest ticket count. Out of 2,000 tickets for the night’s two performances, 1,600 had already been sold. Not bad.

After setting aside several dozen complimentary passes for the media, Humphrey’s employees and Brubeck’s friends, he arrived at the concert site around 5 p.m. to arrange a pre-show interview with the classical-jazz pianist and a local TV crew.

Later, Weissberg went to the box office to tally walk-up ticket sales; checked with his production staff to make sure the stage was properly set up and briefly chatted with Brubeck and his road manager.

A few minutes before show time, he walked on stage to announce Humphrey’s upcoming concert schedule and introduce the star of the show, “Dave Brubeck, just back from Russia, in his first San Diego appearance ever.”

For most of Brubeck’s first show, Weissberg was out in the crowd, observing people more than he was watching the concert.

“I always like to see what kind of people come out to our shows,” he said. “That tells me who we’re reaching through our advertising; if I see a lot of new faces, we’re doing our job.”

During Brubeck’s second show, Weissberg closed the box office, took a final ticket count--the total was up to 1,700--and then retired to his backstage room for the customary “settlement” with Brubeck’s road manager.

“Most performers get a percentage on top of their agreed-upon fees if they sell 1,600 tickets or more,” Weissberg said. “During settlement, I sit down with the artist’s representative and go over the figures to see how much the artist is due.

“Then, I hand over the money, either in cash or in a cashier’s check. After that, I finally get to go home.”

Weissberg is a newcomer to the concert promoting business. In the 1970s and early ‘80s, he was a newspaper rock critic and a radio deejay and talk-show host in Boulder, Colo.

For awhile, he even sang with his own rock band, Kenny and the Kritix, in local nightclubs. The group played a mix of originals and covers by such East Coast urban rockers as Garland Jeffreys and Southside Johnny and the Asbury Jukes.

“I never wanted to be in the concert business,” Weissberg said. “As a journalist, I had found most promoters to be greedy and without any aesthetic caring about music.

“But in 1984, a guy who used to listen to me on the radio became partners in the San Diego company that was booking Humphrey’s, and he asked me to come out here and help him.

“I did, and immediately fell in love with San Diego. So I took the job. Little did I know that 12 months later, I would be running the entire company. That wasn’t part of the plan.”

Eventually, Weissberg said, he would like to return to “more creative endeavors, like writing and making music.”

“But for the time being, I’m very happy working 12-hour days, producing this concert series,” he said. “I enjoy the response from the people, and I like dealing with the artists in a way I never really could before.”