$20 cover charge; sliding scale available Forged by six-string electric bassist Michael Wilcox, this trio with saxophonist Sheldon Brown and drummer Bryan Bowman continues in the tradition of Sonny Rollins’ early explorations of the tenor sax/bass/drums format. As a trio, they explore a wide variety of music that’s interested them over the years, from Brazilian…

Mourning the death of the poet… celebrating the life of the poet Friends read for street peddler, artist and poet Steve Dalachinsky, a legendary figure of the New York loft world who died of a brain hemorrhage September 15th, 2019, two weeks shy of his 73rd birthday, the day after his vibrant reading at an…

$20 suggested donation; any amount appreciated The Hard Bop Collective Daniel Casares, tenor sax; Jordan Samuels, guitar; Tomoko Funaki, bass; Austin Lee Harris, drums. Swingin’ and boppin’ since 2011 for San Francisco’s party set!

Amy Glynn is an award-winning poet and essayist whose work appears widely in journals and anthologies including The Best American Poetry. Her first poetry collection, A Modern Herbal, was published in 2013 by Measure Press; her second, Romance Language, is forthcoming in early 2020. She has received the Carolyn Kizer Award from Poetry Northwest, the SPUR…

Eveline Kanes is a poet and literary translator . Her poetry has appeared in numerous literary journals. Her book translations range from biography and fiction, to history, poetry and sociology. Her chap book, A Coin Worn Thin, appeared in 2015. Her current work is under submission. Susan Dambroff is a poet, performer, and teacher. Her…

$20 suggested donation/sliding scale available. Talk about your San Francisco jazz… On the fourth Friday of each month, our weekly jazz in the bookshop series features The 230 Jones Street, Local 6 Literary Jazz Band — in direct line of descent from the Chuck Peterson Trio, which started the whole “jazz in the bookshop” thing…

$20 cover charge; sliding scale available James Mahone Quartet James Mahone, saxophone Grant Levin, piano Aaron Cohn, bass Hamir Atwal, drums Two sets of jazz standards by four of the Bay Area’s very best!

From ancient times on, each generation spins its own visionary accountings out of threads of events only the universal psyche has ever fully embodied in memory. Whether in times of cultural evolution or devolution, fairy tales entertain, disturb, and edify, existing as offerings for us to contemplate, even as the ages roll on. Each fairy…

$20 suggested donation; pay what you can. Pianist Grant Levin has gained great acclaim on the San Francisco jazz scene since his move here in 2001; since that time, Bird & Beckett has been pleased and honored to present him hundreds of times — and we look forward with great anticipation to his last-Sunday-of-the-month bookings…

A rich gathering of poets celebrate the work of Bob Kaufman, collected in a new volume from City Lights Books, edited by Neeli Cherkovski, Raymond Foye and Tate Swindell, with a forward by devorah major. Lawrence Ferlinghetti said of Kaufman, “He was an original voice. No one else talked like him. No one else wrote…

Jun Jun Li’s Deep Sea in the Seed lavishly displays her abstract expressive oil paintings and poetry. Please join us at Bird & Beckett Tuesday evening, January 28th, to hear Jun Jun read a few of her poems and discuss the paintings these poems accompany in this stunning bilingual book of her work. About the Artist/Author:…

Please join us for an evening dubbed “Writers Painting Their Voices” as author John Curl reads from his latest novel, The Outlaws of Maroon, and poet Jack Foley in tandem with his partner Sangye Land perform some of Jack’s poems. These writers will use their voices to paint pictures, celebrate life, and remind us of…