One of San Francisco's hardest working local music promoters spends his days doing x-ray crystallography. Christian Cunningham, a graduate student at the University of California, San Francisco, spends his nights managing The Bay Bridged, a website and podcasting empire focused on the San Francisco Bay Area independent music scene.

“We're trying to spread the word about what Bay Area musicians are doing,” says Cunningham, a graduate student in HHMI investigator David Agard's lab. “Great music comes from many places, but it can also come from your home. Our aesthetic has always been to try and promote music from within.” He and business partner Ben Van Houten, an attorney, met as undergraduates at the University of California, Berkeley, where they both worked at the school's radio station.

From a rented studio space in San Francisco's Mission District, The Bay Bridged produces three podcasts: a weekly interview with a local band that showcases four of the band's songs, a monthly DJ-style mix featuring eight bands, and “Live this Month,” which promotes local and out-of-town bands that are performing in the Bay Area. Public radio station KQED began syndicating their podcasts online last year.

The duo also produces live music shows and festivals, including one at the annual South by Southwest music and media conference in Austin, Texas. At last year's conference, The Bay Bridged booked 15 Bay Area bands on two stages, lined up company sponsors, and advertised to potential partygoers. The show, which they called The Bay Area Takeover, was “a massive success,” Cunningham says. “It sold out, it was a ton of fun, and it was written up in all sorts of publications.”

The Bay Bridged has grown so much since it launched three years ago that Cunningham and Van Houten now have a 19-person staff, all volunteers who are as passionate about music as they are.

Illustration: Peter Arkle

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