CAMBRIDGE — First-time performers at Club Passim sometimes find themselves intimidated by the history that lives in the walls of the tiny performance space in Harvard Square. A who’s who of folk musicians have performed inside the 100-seat basement since it opened more than 60 years ago, from Muddy Waters and John Prine to Tracy Chapman and Josh Ritter. Most people who descend those stairs know that Joan Baez and Bob Dylan both played the club’s predecessor, Club 47, which opened around the corner, at 47 Mount Auburn Street, in 1958.
To break the tension of heightened expectations, managing director Matt Smith will often crack jokes as he introduces each night’s performers. “Here now for their first show back after three years in prison…,” he might say. Or he’ll try hyping up the crowd like they’re at a massive concert arena.
It’s all in good fun, says Smith, 56, who will be the guest of honor at an all-star show on Tuesday at Arrow Street Arts, celebrating his 30th year at Club Passim.
Folk music, as the club’s staff often says, is music by the people, for the people.
“If you’re trying to play rock star in that room,” Smith said recently, sitting in the nonprofit office upstairs, “you’re doing it wrong.”
Smith first showed up as a volunteer in the mid-1990s, when the club was run by Bob and Rae Anne Donlin. When the Donlins first assumed ownership of the space in the late ’60s, they intended to operate it as a cafe selling books and greeting cards. (“Passim,” a literary term, means “scattered throughout the text.”) But so many young songwriters lugging guitar cases came in asking where the stage was that the couple soon broke down and began letting them perform.
In the early ’70s, up-and-coming songwriters such as Tom Waits and Jimmy Buffett played at Passim. (Another, Bruce Springsteen, was reportedly denied a gig.) The following decade brought Nanci Griffith, Suzanne Vega, and other notables from the next generation of songwriters. By the time Smith began frequenting the place, first as a patron and then a box-office volunteer, the regulars included Ellis Paul and Dar Williams.
The Donlins’s reputation was a curious one: Many artists and customers found Bob to be gruff. Some thought Rae Anne was “an angel,” Smith recalled with a laugh, while others called her “a terror.”
To him, the bottom line was that the couple were always supportive of the creative community: “They had an artistic bent. An arts community, I think, was important to them.”
Bob was in his 70s when he died in 1996, not long after the club was reconfigured as a nonprofit organization, with a board of directors overseeing operations. By then, Smith was emerging as the Donlins’s heir apparent. After becoming assistant manager, he soon took over the top job of running and booking the place.
Since then, Club Passim has enjoyed a steady three decades as one of the country’s premier listening rooms. Audiences are unfailingly attentive, and musicians are consistently grateful.
“We’re not looking for the hot new trend,” said Smith. “We’re just trying to encourage art at every level.”
About a dozen years ago, Abby Altman was a recent college graduate living in Chicago — an English lit major unsure where she’d find her calling — when she caught a gig by a Boston songwriter, Mark Erelli. At the show, he mentioned the blessings of Club Pasim so many times that Altman resolved to visit the place.
Three months later she was in Boston, celebrating a birthday weekend with a visit to Club Passim, where she caught the acoustic musician Jake Armerding. The place, and the town, immediately felt like home.
“Boston felt very European to me,” said Altman, sitting alongside Smith, citing the area’s cobblestones and the public transit.
“I don’t drive,” she said. “I’m an old soul.”
So Altman packed her bags and moved east. She has followed the path Smith laid almost to a T: beginning in the box office, learning the soundboard and staging. She’s now the club manager, and she administers the nonprofit’s grant programs, including the Iguana Music Fund and the Brian O’Donovan Legacy Fund.
Altman has the Club Passim logo — a guitar headstock emblazoned with the letter P — tattooed on her inner forearm. She joked that she was going to insist that Smith get one to match to celebrate his 30th anniversary.
Tuesday’s celebration will feature appearances by more than a dozen artists, including Erelli, Paul, Pamela Means, Mercedes Escobar, Peter Mulvey, and the duo Sweet Petunia. Songwriter Rose Cousins will serve as master of ceremonies, and string bassist Zachariah Hickman is the musical director.
“The hardest thing for me was helping Matt trim his wish list,” said Hickman.
Hickman still recalls — with a wince — the first time he played the club. Many years ago he showed up with a young Josh Ritter, who was scheduled to play an early edition of Club Passim’s long-running Campfire Festival. Playing “in the round,” each participant was not supposed to bring an accompanist.
“So my first experience was Matt being very mad at me,” Hickman said.
They soon got over their tiff, however, and Hickman has been one of the club’s most familiar faces since.
“I’ve found myself at Passim a lot,” he added, “because it’s the best gig in town.”
For Smith, the highlights have been many — Lori McKenna’s annual holiday-season visits, Anais Mitchell playing songs from her show “Hadestown,” or the revelations of one of those Campfire events, in which a young songwriter might debut a stunning new tune, “and the audience just explodes.”
“We’re actively participating in what’s going to be people’s next favorite songs,” Smith said.
After Rae Anne died in 2007, a niece gave Smith a watch that had belonged to Bob Donlin. What does he think about the legacy he’ll leave behind?
“I’ve never thought about it like that,” Smith said. “I’m not a good planner.”
For Smith, the task is simple: “We’re just trying to host a great party every night.”
30TH ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION OF MATT SMITH
Hosted by Rose Cousins and musical director Zachariah Hickman. With special guests including Alisa Amador, Dinty Child, Kris Delmhorst, Mark Erelli, Mercedes Escobar, Kemp Harris, Peter Mulvey, Ellis Paul, and Jobi Riccio. At Arrow Street Arts, 2 Arrow St., Cambridge, Tuesday, May 12. Doors 6 p.m., show 7 p.m. Tickets $60. passim.org
James Sullivan can be reached at jamesgsullivan@gmail.com.