Editing San Francisco Sound (section)

=== Key venues ===

The development of the San Francisco Sound was inseparable from a network of ballrooms and clubs that served as its primary stages. The early band venues, while the new SF scene was emerging from folk and folk-rock beginnings, were often places like The Matrix nightclub. As audiences grew, and audience dancing became customary, performances moved into venues with more floor space, such as the Longshoreman's Hall, the Fillmore Auditorium, the Avalon Ballroom, Winterland, and the Carousel Ballroom — later renamed the Fillmore West. 

From April 1966 to November 1968, the Avalon Ballroom came alive nightly with psychedelic light projections and an ever-growing rotation of San Francisco rock bands. From the stage up to the balcony, the old ballroom proved to have exceptional acoustics. 

Music critic Ralph Gleason captured the scale of the scene in the ''San Francisco Chronicle'' in March 1967: "Nowhere else in the country has a whole community of rock music developed to the degree it has here. At dances at the Fillmore and the Avalon…thousands upon thousands of people support several dozen rock 'n' roll bands that play all over the area for dancing each week." 

With support from deejays like Tom Donahue — first on the Top 40 station KYA and later on the new album-oriented FM stations KMPX and KSAN — and from San Francisco-based ''Rolling Stone'' magazine, founded in late 1967, the city became a centre of the world's popular music, with the Fillmore West emerging as an internationally renowned venue.