Jimmy Mak's Owner Jim Makarounis Has Died

Makarounis, who had been battling larynx cancer, passed away a day after his iconic Portland jazz club closed permanently.

Jim Makarounis in 2011.
By Matthew Singer

Jim Makarounis, owner and namesake of iconic Portland jazz club Jimmy Mak's, has died. He was 53.

As first reported by Oregon Music News, Makarounis, who had been battling larynx cancer the past few years, passed away about 24 hours after his club closed permanently.

Related: "With the Impending Closure of Jimmy Mak's, Portland Jazz Faces an Uncertain Future."

Makarounis opened Jimmy Mak's in Northwest Portland in 1996, where it quickly became one of the West Coast's premier hubs for live jazz. It relocated to a new building across the street from its original Pearl District location in 2006. Following the sale of the building in February, another relocation was planned for next year, but those plans were scuttled due to Makarounis' failing health, and the venue shuttered for good following a New Year's Eve concert.

While his name was synonymous with the club, and thus with Portland's jazz scene, Makarounis, a saxophone player, rarely appeared in front of Jimmy Mak's famous red velvet curtain himself—with at least one notable exception, as he discussed in a 2011 Willamette Week profile:

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