Three years after a brush with death, Niesen’s still the boss at Front Porch Music

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Artie Niesen, the founder and longtime proprietor of Front Porch Music in downtown Bakersfield, is still the boss.

On Tuesday afternoon, Niesen and his pistol of a wife and angel of a caregiver, Tasha Lepo, visited the store on 19th Street to check in with his crew, do some business and say hello to any friends that happened to stop by.

Lepo was with Niesen on that day in March 2020 when he nearly left her for good. Yet, even in the midst of that life-and-death emergency, Lepo remembers Niesen being adamant that the store would not be abandoned.

“The first thing he said the moment he was in the hospital ... he remembered the cash register needed fives and ones, or something,” Lepo recalled.

“You want me to go to the store and keep it going?” she asked him. “Yes,” came his answer. Front Porch Music has been a downtown Bakersfield icon, a rough-aroundthe-edges hometown music store, for as long as many local musicians can remember.

As the name suggests, the business actually began on Niesen’s front porch when he lived in Rosedale in 1978. Front Porch moved to its 19th Street location in the early ‘80s, where it has attracted Bakersfield’s own Buck Owens and Korn, as well as far-flung rockers like Aerosmith, Sheryl Crow and Green Day.

It’s often a must-stop for musicians passing through Bakersfield.

But after his brush with death in 2020 , many wondered whether Niesen would ever be able to return to his beloved Front Porch.

But there he was, front and center in the store, talking with store manager Luke Puneda about the price of guitar strings going up.

“We’ve been doing pretty good since we picked up the Fender line,” he said of the classic guitar line.

Although he was always a drummer, he had to know guitars, inside and out.

“I’ve been building and working on guitars since the early-’70s,” Niesen said. “So I know a little bit about ‘em.”

Asked what it’s like running the store without the boss being there every day, Puneda said they talk regularly.

“It’s almost like he’s still here,” he said of Niesen.

“When I was here, he just ignored me any way,” Niesen quipped.

Then he paused. “No,

Luke has been invaluable.”

Puneda and longtime employee and local drummer Joe “City” Feldt have been doing the physical work of “running the place,” Niesen said. “I can’t complain about that.”

Many predicted the store would close its doors for good after Niesen got sick. But everyone involved proved them wrong, Lepo said.

“This is his life’s work, you know,” she said, looking around at the music store her husband built.

“It’s all him. I didn’t do it. I’m just a groupie.”

But since Niesen’s injury, it’s been nearly all her, taking on a role she never imagined for herself, yet facing it with courage and determination.

“Strong women were helping me stay strong in a real dire situation,” she remembered of women friends who had her back through the worst of it.

“Having strong women say, ‘You can do this,’” meant a lot, she said.

“I’m also the daughter of a Marine,” Lepo said.

“And we don’t fail.”