In the mid-1960s, the Gum Tree Girls and prior, Minnie Straub Baxter in 1958, saved Glen Canyon from sporting a freeway to the other side of Twin Peaks! Can you imagine?? Now, the Glen Park Neighborhoods History Project is Celebrating Moxie! by throwing the Glen Park Gum Tree Girls Festival, a festive, all-day picnic and…

New York comes to Bird & Beckett tonight! Richie Vitale, trumpet star, plays with local heroes Keith Saunders (piano) and Ron Marabuto (drums). Trust Keith and Ron…you want to hear this jazzman. Born in Rochester, New York, on September 23 (also John Coltrane’s birthday), Richard Vitale played with drummer Philly Joe Jones at the early…

On and on into the summer– Vibraphonist Dan Neville…trumpeter Richie Vitale…pianist Ray Skjelbred…pianist Larry Dunlap…saxophonist Kazemde George…books… Check our events calendar. We’re booked through to the end of the year! Get on our mailing list! Click on the “newsletters” link in the navigation bar above to subscribe. Bird & Beckett is a guaranteed fair wage…

In the face of five years of program cuts, course cuts, faculty and staff layoffs, all of which have accelerated substantially in the past past few months, activist faculty, staff and friends of CCSF are supporting a November 2022 ballot measure to obtain funds that would restore aspects of CCSF’s course offerings important to the…

Hungry to hear some of Bird & Beckett’s past live streams? On the home page you can scroll down to read the individual posts for the shows we’ve mounted in the past several months, a hint of what’s gone down since the pandemic lock-down began. In more amazing times, it would take you right back…

Bird & Beckett’s events open to the public have been back since mid-June 2021. Mask up and come in! (do please bring proof of full vaccination. Not vaxxed? Please get vaxxed and join us!) Jazz, poetry & more live in the shop and live streamed Come to 653 Chenery if you’re in town! Doors open…

Saxophonist and good friend Chuck Peterson passed this past Friday, February 18, 2022. Born February 8, 1931, he was 91 when he left us. Many of you have heard or lived some of Chuck’s story along the way. We know it imperfectly but we have a feel for it, for Chuck, for those who traveled…

Eric Shifrin brings a Latin touch to the bandstand tonight, in a long-standing trio with bassist Paul Smith and drummer Raul Ramirez. $20 cover (cash, please!); doors open at 7:20 for the 7:30 show.  Bring a mask and something to drink, if you like. You’re in for a delightful evening of music. Catch it in…

Drummer Tony Johnson brings in a quartet on the fourth Friday of each month. Tonight it’s the 230 Jones Street Band, with Charlie McCarthy, saxophone & flute; Glen Deardorff, guitar and Al Obidinski, bass. Four veteran jazz players, and long-time friends, swingin’. $20 cash cover charge; byob & a mask. Find the live stream on…

Guitarist Ed Cherry is in town briefly and brings a trio into Bird & Beckett with Adam Shulman on piano and Owen Clapp on bass. Call for reservations – 415-586-3733; limited seating. $20 cash cover charge. BYOB and a mask. Doors open at 7:20pm for the 7:30pm show. Ed Cherry moved to New York from…

None will dispute the notion that Dr. Legato, the multi-instrumentalist Noel Jewkes, has been in the top echelon of jazz players in the region for five decades. Noel is known for his swing and the cool elegance of his work on all manner of reeds, as well as piano and a few more instruments besides.…

Paul Combs, saxophone Ken Cook, piano Doug Miller, bass Alex Aspinall, drums A night of obscure Dameronia presented and performed by the Paul Combs Quartet. Tadd Dameron was a cornerstone of late 1940s jazz, contributing key compositions to the jazz canon including “Good Bait,” “Our Delight,” “Hot House,” “Lady Bird,” and “If You Could See…

Guitarist Scott Foster always cooks up a good show on the third Friday of each month. This month, he’s invited multi-instrumentalist Danny Bittker to help assemble a quintet and to call the tunes. Danny plays saxophones, clarinet and steel pan on this date, joined by Zach Pitt-Smith on sax and flute, Greg Nottage acoustic and…

The Glen Park merchants celebrate the neighborhood with a FREE BEER! party on the third Thursday of every third month, and this month, the guest of honor & delight is Tony from Critter Fritters. No live stream, no cover charge! Just come down to the shop & party with your neighbors! Tony is a neighborhood…

Kim Shuck, San Francisco Poet Laureate 2019-2021, hosts an online Bird & Beckett poetry reading twice a month – on the 2nd and 4th Mondays. Paul Corman Roberts and Youssef Alaoui are the featured poets for this session, with an open mic to follow. Bird and Beckett VirtualPoets, 6/13!! When Mon Jun 13, 2022 7pm…

Lucien Zell, passing through on his way to take part in the poetry workshops at the High Sierra Community of Writers in Olympic Valley at Lake Tahoe, will read some of his work alongside colleagues Kim Shuck, San Francisco Poet Laureate Emerita (2019-2021), and Lee Rossi. Can’t make it down to the shop for the…

San Francisco journalist Denise Sullivan conducts a monthly series of conversations (the second Sunday of each month from 10-11 a.m.) with The City’s activists, educators, arts and cultural leaders, as well as lesser-known workers, the everyday people who help make this place we call home, live streamed from Bird & Beckett Books. This month’s guest…

Michael Zilber, saxophone Matt Clark, piano Essiet Okon Essiet, bass Sylvia Cuenca, drums $20 cash cover charge at the door. Reservations: 415-586-3733 BYOB and a mask. Michael Zilber writes prolifically and plays a great tenor saxophone. Fine quartet on this date! Do come and enjoy a fine night of small combo jazz music in your…

Phillip Greenlief, tenor saxophone Dan Seamans, bass Tom Hassett, drums Always a pleasure to hear The Lost Trio! Decades of collaboration and a rich book of tunes by the likes of Thelonious Monk, Steve Lacy, Herbie Nichols and many, many more. $20 cash cover charge at the door. Reservations welcome: call 415-586-3733 BYOB and a…

The Pedro Pastrana Quartet is for sure a latin jazz ensemble, though it’s one like no other. On paper, the group might seem like your traditional jazz quartet — a wind instrument, bass, drums and a chordal instrument, in this case, the cuatro. But it’s the integration of the cuatro that defines the Ensemble’s unique…

Charlie Gurke, baritone saxophone Marcus Stephens, alto and tenor saxophones Josh Tower, bass Isaac Schwartz, drums Who doesn’t love the bari sax in jazz? One of San Francisco’s foremost bari practitioners will be in the house this Friday! Charlie Gurke is a keystone of the local jazz scene, leader of the famed Gurkestra — an…

Jeffrey Zable is a teacher, conga/bongo player, and a writer of poetry, flash fiction and non-fiction. His writing has appeared in hundreds of literary magazines and anthologies—more recently in Fiery Scribe, Third Wednesday and Fleas On The Dog. Ken Weichel has been writing and creating collages for the last fifty years. His latest book Azure,…

Francis Wong, saxophone William Roper, tuba Karl Evangelista, guitar Deszon X. Claiborne, drums Heavy cats, light on their feet. Memorializing the meaning of music by playing it. Feel the spirit $20 cover charge, byob and a mask capacity is 20, so call for a reservation (415) 586-3733

Jazz musicians, this one’s for you. Drummer Vince Lateano leads the session with Peter Barshay on bass and Ben Stolorow on piano. No fee to play. Audience, bring a $20 to help us pay the rhythm section. BYOB, and a mask for when you’re not playing, or if you’re not playing. Covid, you know…

  YAY! THE MOBY DICK SET The Literary Side of The Evangenitals Catch them at Bird & Beckett while they’re in town to play El Rio’s 25th Anniversary Shit Kicker Memorial Day Bash. $15-25 sliding scale, byob, and a mask Streamed on Bird & Beckett’s YouTube channel and Facebook page — or you MAY be…