A year and a day since its theatrical debut, Emily Keeler’s Dark Days and a Black Dog returns to Bird & Beckett tonight, with live music. A solo turn by actor Andrea Snow, directed by Jael Weisman, Emily’s piece unspools seven heart-wrenching years in an intensely personal, darkly comic and breathtakingly recognizable theatrical experience. This time around, Andrea delivers Emily’s words with the expansive dimension of Randy Craig’s piano accompaniment. https://www.darkdaysandablackdog.com/fromthepiece Emily Keeler has been a dancer in San Francisco since 1974. She was a principal dancer for The Moving Company, Cliff Kuter’s New Dance Company, and Joe Goode Performance Group. She choreographed for numerous dance companies both ballet and contemporary including SF Dance Theater, Chrysalis, The Moving Company, DanceArt, Oakland Ballet, and Joffrey Dancers, and was a four time recipient of a National Endowment for the Arts Choreographic Fellowship. She and has been an educator and artist in residence…

Macy Blackman & the Mighty Fines come to Bird & Beckett tonight to deliver a rockin’ excursion through a couple dozen gems, known and obscure, from the musical minds of New Orleans greats like Professor Longhair, Dr. John, Irma Thomas, Allen Toussaint and Fats Domino. The Mighty Fines have been playing New Orleans R&B in San Francisco since 2003, with Ken “Snakebite” Jacobs arriving from the Crescent City in 2005 in the wake of Hurricane Katrina and taking on the bari sax and clarinet role in the band. With tenor player Nancy Wright out tonight, he’ll handle that aspect with alacrity. Mighty Fines stalwart bassist Bing Nathan and Macy are practically joined at the hip, and Mark Lee is a natural behind the drum kit. A good time, guaranteed. $20 cover charge (cash/venmo at the door) byob  

Friday, January 12, 6-8pm – $20 cover,  byob ERIC & THE IN CROWD Every Second Sunday! Piano Professor Eric Shifrin’s Residency Continues in 2024! January 12th, introducing “THE COMPOSERS SERIES” Another great show each month featuring composers whose gem-like tunes have become jazz standards. This month’s spotlight falls on VINCENT YOUMANS & VICTOR YOUNG Think “More Than You Know” & “Tea for Two” and “Stella By Starlight” & “Beautiful Love”   Friday late show! 8:30-10pm, $20 cover, byob Macy Blackman & the Mighty Fines featuring Snakebite on saxophone Macy Blackman, piano Bing Nathan, bass Mark Lee, drums New Orleans R&B at it’s rollicking best! Let the good times roll!   Saturday, 7:30pm, $20 cover,  byob Actor Andrea Snow performs in monologue Emily Keeler’s “Dark Days & a Black Dog” with live music by Randy Craig directed by Jael Weisman   Sunday, 5-7pm, $20 cover, byob The Seducers! Honky Tonk! Mitch…

Avotcja, poetry and small percussion Sandi Poindexter, violin Francis Wong, saxophones Heshima Mark Williams, bass Raul Ramirez, drums $20 cover charge reservations: call 415-586-3733 Avotcja & Modúpue kick off another great year of live music at Bird & Beckett! For more years than we can count, Avotcja, a formidably great poet/musician/composer/musicologist, has brought her ensemble of musical geniuses, Modúpue to Bird & Beckett on the first Sunday of the year to perform for you. 2024 continues the tradition! Performances by Modúpue are always a joy to experience. Modúpue was named best jazz group of the year twice, in 2005 and again in 2010, by the Bay Area Blues Hall of Fame. Avotcja herself was named a “Jazz Hero” by the Jazz Journalists Association in 2015. Her radio shows on KPFA (“Bebop, Cubop & the Musical Truth”) and KPFA (“La Verdad Musical”) have been soul satisfying for decades, expressing the boundless…

Jesse Levit, sax and EWI. Colin Hogan, piano. Dexter Williams, bass. Elé Howell, drum set. A fantastic band, top to bottom. You only regret the shows you miss! Join us! $20 cover charge at the door cash or venmo. byob. For a reservation, call the shop at 415-586-3733.

Annie Orzen, piano Maddox Rochman-Romdalvik, bass Will Davies, drums Lily Bogas, vocals Annie Orzen, born & raised in Glen Park, is studying jazz and contemporary media at the Eastman School of Music in Rochester, NY. She’s been home for the holidays and returns to school shortly, but first a stop at Bird & Beckett! The Annie Orzen Trio pushes the envelope of jazz, bringing a unique repertoire of original compositions and freshly interpreted standards to the Bird & Beckett stage. Heavily inspired by their training in jazz and their collective love for modern genres of music, the group combines jazz, r&b, gospel and funk into a contagiously exciting night of music. It’s the late show Friday the 5th, so enjoy a meal at Manzoni or Tekka House and walk up to the shop for an 8:30 start. $20 cover charge (cash or venmo at the door) $10 for teens and…

Welcoming back to Bird & Beckett, for our first jazz show of 2024, Danny Brown, tenor man extraordinaire, in superb company — with Smith Dobson drums, Eric Markowitz on bass and young Graham Messer on piano. Brilliant players, all! Don’t miss it! $20 cover charge; byob. Reservations, call 415-586-3733.

January 18th, Walker Brents III, gives one of his monthly live-streamed talks, this one on Marie Louise Von Franz, student of Carl Jung, who made great contributions in Jung’s footsteps as both thinker and therapist. Find it on our youtube channel or facebook page at 7:30pm Thursday. Want to come down and sit enthralled, listening in the dark? Call us, and we’ll let  you in and find you a seat. byob. /// Then, starting Friday in the gloaming, it’s jazzz ’til the sun’s gone down on Sunday. Friday, 6pm: Guitarist Scott Foster, having just made a trip out to New Orleans, brings Mike Rinta on trombone, Ollie Dudek on bass and Larry Vann on drums, comprising a deep & wondrous quartet, to play some tunes that have been on his mind in anticipation of the trip, on the hallowed ground there and since his return. Scott’s 3rd Fridays residency has…

Beau Beausoleil reads from his collection War News, a digital book published by AGITATE! War News is a collection of 90 poems, written one a day since October 8, 2023. The poems in the collection reflect on what it means to bear witness to war, killing and destruction in Gaza, Palestine. It asks, ‘what does it means to be alive at a time when even the death and suffering of children fails to elicit a response strong enough to end the war.’ This collection of 90 poems is a witness testimony from afar. It is an archive of grief, mourning and solidarity. It is an accounting of the cost of war. Through these powerful and devastating poems Beau reminds us that we cannot turn away. In the poet’s own words, “[O]ur humanity, our collective morality, requires that we bear witness and then take some kind of action.” Beau’s reading will…

Gaea Schell on flute leads a fabulous aggregation of musicians in two sets of Latin jazz tonight! Conguero Carlos Caro is driving in from the Central Valley to join Gaea, bassist Saúl Sierra and vibraphonist Dan Neville for two sets of dynamic music. $20 cover charge (cash or venmo at the door). BYOB. Reservations: 415-586-3733 Every Saturday at 7:30pm, you’ll find San Francisco’s best jazz players plying their trade in Glen Park, San Francisco’s secret gem of a neighborhood–a stop on the Crosstown Trail with its own bookshop/jazz joint, BART station, Muni stops for the 23, 35, 36, 44, 52 and J-Church lines, off ramps from I-280 and the San Jose Boulevard expressway whisking traffic through the Bernal Cut, coffee shops, taqueria, bar, Chinese, Thai, Japanese and Italian restaurants… all in a couple blocks of businesses, with beautiful Glen Canyon Park just up the street. Come early to grab a…

Jazz – the late show! 8:30-10pm $20 cover; byob The Isaiah Javier Quartet Isaiah Javier, tenor sax Simon Aks, guitar Giulio Cetto, bass Louis Sweatt, drums Isaiah Javier, Simon Aks, Giulio Cetto and Louis Sweatt meet on the Bird and Beckett stage for the first time as a unit, playing original music and their favorite tunes. Isaiah and Louis are visiting from the east coast for the winter season with Simon coming up from LA to form a great group with Bay Area bassist Giulio Cetto. Says guitarist Simon Aks, “Super excited to be playing a show at @bird.beckett in Glen Park this Friday from 8:30-10! Looking forward to playing some great music and originals so come see what’s goin on. Such a great listening space for some of the most demanding and fun music I’ve been a part of in awhile. Tickets at the door or call to reserve.”…

Duncan James, guitar Larry Chinn, piano Joe McKinley, bass Bob Blankenship, drums $20 requested donation; pay what you can. byob.  reservations, 415-586-3733 Four long-time bandstand colleagues play jazz as if it’s second nature to them, which it is, actually… byob and settle in for a set or two amidst friends and neighbors at Bird & Beckett’s long-running Friday after work jazz happy hour. Provision yourselves! Duncan traditionally helps us close out the year each year with a gathering of friends and fellow musicians. The Duncan James Quartet date this evening is supported by Jazz in the Neighborhood’s Guaranteed Fair Wage Fund. Visit JitN’s website to find out how you can help them in their mission to raise the wage and working conditions standards for the Bay Area’s pool of fine professional jazz musicians. Jazz in the Neighborhood is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization dedicated to improving the economics of jazz performance…

Friday, 12/29 – 6-8pm: The Duncan James Quartet with Duncan on guitar, Larry Chinn on piano, Joe McKinley on bass and Bob Blankenship on drums, $20 suggested, pay what you can. Friday, 12/29 – 8:30-10pm: The Isaiah Javier Quartet with Isaiah on saxophone, Simon Aks on guitar, Giulio Cetto on bass and Lewis Sweatt on drums, $20 cover charge (cash or venmo). Saturday, 12/30 – 7:30-9:30pm: Cuarteto de la Luna Nueva with Gaea Schell on piano, Dan Neville on vibes, Saul Sierra on bass and Carlos Caro on percussion, $20 cover charge (cash or venmo). In general at B&B, you’ll be good if  you byob and a twenty to help pay the musicians! Kids under twelve are free and welcome, and teens & music students can take in a show for five or ten bucks. We’re open regular store hours this week and next — selling books noon to six…

Long-time collaborators Beth Custer and Will Bernard have a new recording — “SKY” — to present. Beth is an incredible artist. Read just a few posts on her website www.bethcuster.com and you’ll be floored by her energy, commitment and engagement in the creative life. Hear her music and you’ll be floored by her talent. Hear her live tonight at Bird & Beckett with the great Will Bernard — her long-time collaborator ever since the early 1980s days of the Club Foot Orchestra — together with the Oakland Symphony’s Ellen Gronningen, and carry that spirit through the holidays. World peace now! The trio performs music from SKY and a few deftly sculpted winter baubles. Gorgeous melodies, a little raunchy blues, some delicate otherworldly timbres, this lush trio will delight you with their genre-bending music. Beth Custer, clarinet Will Bernard, guitar Ellen Gronningen, violin $25 cover charge at the door. Reservations: 415-586-3733…

The legacy band continues! 21 years and counting we’ve had Friday jazz after work in the bookshop. It’s too late to stop now! Charlie McCarthy, saxophones and flute Max Perkoff, piano Chuck Metcalf, bass Tony Johnson, drums From swing to bop, jazz is the thing! Byob and a twenty for the band! Kids under 12 free Teens and music students, $5-10 will do it.

December 17th is the night that dervishes around the world whirl, each in their own place, celebrating the passage of the great wise man Rumi into the unseen realms. They celebrate the gift of his life and thought, which still inspires now, even after seven hundred and fifty years. Rumi’s rapturous turns of phrase, carried across into so many languages, are only one facet of his gem-like mind. His literary works are full of themes and settings which reveal a much more common world than we might otherwise presume, given such a mystifying reputation. The enraptured one could actually be any one of us, but we might not know it, having become habituated to not seeing it. Rumi’s thoughts challenge us every bit as much as they succor us. You might even say that their challenge is simply a facet of the inspirational jewel which is Rumi’s live-giving gift. Tonight,…

The Vince Lateano Trio has a long-standing monthly residency on the third Sunday of each month, from 5-7pm. Vince has been a mainstay of the San Francisco jazz scene since the mid-1960s. No better way to spend a late Sunday afternoon! Do come, byob and a twenty for the band, or whatever you can afford. Bring kids, neighbors, friends, and introduce them to the joys of jazz at Bird & Beckett! Can’t make this one in the flurry of holiday excitement? Come the day after Christmas at 3pm for a relaxed reprise of the trio! Ben Stolorow, piano Peter Barshay, bass Vince Lateano, drums

BYOB and a twenty for the band– and a penchant for a good time. Bring friends, neighbors, kids, parents, parrots, whatever ya got. Unwind at the end of the thing we used to call the “work week” by settling into the cozy confines of your neighborhood bookshop, and enjoy jazz & good company with a bunch of fine San Francisco jazz players. It’s a twenty-one year tradition at Bird & Beckett! The 2nd Friday of every month, we have the pleasure of presenting the potentate of piano, the sultan of swing, the duke of ten digits, Mr. Easifingers himself, Eric Shifrin at the piano in the company of one batch or another of his closest friends and colleagues. Tonight, that means guitarist Gino Raugi and bassist Michael Leal Price. It’s a happy two-hour happy hour in store for you. Snag someone you love and drag ’em in here for a…

Book release reading & celebration!   Lisa B (Lisa Bernstein)’s new volume of poems God in Her Ruffled Dress (What Books Press, 10/23) appears 34 years after publication of her debut full-length poetry book The Transparent Body (Wesleyan University Press).  Her poems have appeared in more than 60 anthologies and periodicals, including City Lights Review, Field, Kenyon Review, Lilith, Ploughshares, Poetry International, Tikkun, and Zyzzyva. She has won creative writing fellowships from the National Endowment for the Arts, Headlands Center for the Arts, Ucross Foundation, and others. Lisa B is also a jazz and groove singer interweaving spoken and sung verse in her original songs and re-envisioned standards. She has released seven albums and various singles (available on all music platforms) to critical acclaim and international radio play, and she performs with her band throughout the country. She also works as a professional psychic reader.  Thoreau Lovell is a poet…

Poets Sarah Menefee and Patrick Dunagan read tonight to celebrate the release of “There You Are,” Sarah’s chapbook just published by Bird & Beckett. An accomplished poet with deep roots in the San Francisco tradition of political activism, Sarah is a homeless rights activist, a founding member of Homes Not Jails and First they came for the homeless, a tent-community based, homeless-led homeless rights organization which organizes street actions to demand housing and defy criminalization. She is also a founding member of the League of Revolutionaries for a New America and the Revolutionary Poets Brigade, and serves on the Editorial Board of the People’s Tribune, where she edits the homeless movement pages. Patrick James Dunagan is a poet and essayist, raised a skateboarder in Southern California who became interested in poetry as a transplanted teenager living in New Hampshire, refining his reading skills in the course of earning a BA…

We’re always pleased when we can  host the talented youth who are enrolled in the Roots, Jazz and American Music undergraduate degree program at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music. Tonight, it’s their end of the semester holiday party. Food, drink and music!

John Calloway has been very busy with his project delving into the intersection between his Filipino and African American roots, particularly the juncture when his grandfather as one of the Buffalo Soldiers deployed to the Philippines.  Tonight, he’ll range freely over the musical territory that he’s built a career on. $20 cover charge. BYOB. Reservations, call 415-586-3733.

REOTREO PLUS ONE Donald Robinson, drums Karl Evangelista, guitar Larry Ochs, reeds plus Kazuto Sato, bass Robinson, Evangelista and Ochs tonight invite the inspiring bassist and long-time Jazzman Kazuto Sato to join their free-jazz band. REOTREO has its roots in the three and a half decades-long association of percussionist Robinson and reed player Ochs, who have collaborated in free and structured improvisation in a duo format privately and publicly since the early 1990s, when they first began working together in saxophonist Glenn Spearman’s Double Trio. The Double Trio released three lps between 1993 and 1996. In 1994, the two colleagues joined with bassist Lisle Ellis in the trio What We Live, which released seven lps between 1994 and 2002. In 1997, Robinson joined with Ochs’ long-standing (since 1977) band, ROVA Saxophone Quartet to record their revivication of John Coltrane’s Ascension. From 2000 to 2010, Ochs and Robinson joined with Scott Amendola…

The trio returns! Luis Peralta, piano David Ewell, bass Ben Esposito, drums Danielle Perez, vocals $20 cover charge (cash or venmo at the door) byob Supported by Jazz in the Neighborhood’s Guaranteed Fair Wage Fund, and you!

Celebrating Scott’s nine-month tenure with saxophonist David Boyce and percussionist Zori Marinova at Etcetera wine bar on Valencia Street, the trio will entertain you at Bird & Beckett as this month’s installment in Scott’s regular third-Fridays residency at Bird & Beckett. Bringing musical wine & roses to you, his adoring fans. Bring your own actual wine, or a beverage of your choosing, and raise a glass to San Francisco’s wealth of fine jazz players. $20 suggested donation; kids under 12 free, teens and music students pay a $5-10 sliding scale.

  Jesse Levit, saxophone Kai Lyons, guitar Billy Edwards, bass Elé Howell, drums $20 cash cover charge or Venmo: @birdandbeckett byob   Elé Howell, a prodigy from a young age born and raised in the Bay Area, names a set of early influences that include his father, the saxophonist Richard Howell, as well as teachers and mentors from the Oaktown Jazz Workshops and Bay Area jazz and African music communities, including Art Khu, Babatunde Lea, E.W. Wainwright, Khalil Shaheed, Larry Vann, James Henry, Jack Dorsey, Sly Randolph and Angela Wellman. Still in his mid-twenties and now based in New York, he’s forged a vital career, touring internationally with Ravi Coltrane and Chief Christian Scott aTunde Adjuah, and working along the way with Stanley Clarke, John Scofield, Gill Goldstein, Brandee Younger, Reggie Workman, John Santos, David Gilmore, Weedie Braimah, Mike Rodriguez, Jeff Chambers, Alex Sipiagan and countless other fantastic musicians. “He’s…

Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84350265713?pwd=eE84V3BYdWxiSFBHNHhmdUt1WTUzdz09 Meeting ID: 843 5026 5713 Passcode: 244211 Kim Shuck hosts a monthly (Second Mondays) poetry reading on Zoom with a featured poet or two followed by an open mic. On December 11th, the reading will feature Qwo-li Driskill reading some of their own work, together with guests reading some of Qwo-li’s poems as well. Qwo-li Driskill has long been regarded as an important Two-Spirit poet and academic. Their work has been featured in many anthologies and journals, they have co-edited the award winning Sovereign Erotics; their Walking with Ghosts has been both celebrated and taught widely. We will be hearing Qwo-li’s work read in different voices in celebration of their writing and their tireless commitment to social justice and inclusivity. The work will be read by regular attendees of our zoom and special invited guests.

Denver awardee as The Jazz Journalists Association’s 2023 Jazz Hero! Here in the Bay for jazz business, with a trio date at Bird & Beckett as a bonus! Tenia Nelson on piano Heshima Mark Williams on bass Brother Khalil Abdullah on guitar Here’s her recent Bird & Beckett engagement with her Denver trio! TNT at B&B 8/9/22

A singer songwriter of prodigious talent, with a wry, dark observational streak, delivers two sets of narrative gems, modern myths and fables, in the company of his long-time associate Mike Anderson on bass, and the great bassist Pam Brandon leaving that chore to Mike while she sings like nobody’s business alongside the pewter-throated Mr. Tani! To clarify: Maurice Tani, vocals and guitar Pam Brandon, vocals Mike Anderson, bass Country noir! $20 cover charge; byob Reservations: 415-586-3733