653 Chenery Street
in San Francisco's Glen Park neighborhood
1-415-586-3733
[email protected]
Open to walk-in trade and browsing
Tuesday to Sunday
noon to six
Live Streams every weekend!
Refresh your browser to catch a show in progress!
Visit our Facebook page or YouTube channel!
But nothing beats being in the room with the music & the musicians!
Join us for a reading of “If San Francisco Collapses,” a new documentary theatre play by Megan Robertson. As we live in an age defined by technological advancements, this play examines technology’s impact on the region which birthed it. San Francisco has historically been a mecca for revolutionaries, artists, and activists. How does this truth coexist with the significance the city now holds for technology and tech workers? Through memories, figurative recollections, and calls to action, this play, begun at the University of San Francisco’s Performing Arts & Social Justice Department, examines the inner lives of San Franciscans, in their own words. What does this technological pull do to our personhood and the fabric of our city? Free event. RSVP encouraged here.
Read More
From Monday to Sunday, you can catch great jazz, hear from a Scottish war correspondent who left Moscow for Ukraine at the beginning of the war and is briefly on tour before returning there, attend the reading of a documentary theater piece in development… or just drop in during the day to buy a book… Definitely, jazz! The 230 Jones Street band Friday at 6; Joyce Todd McBride Trio Friday at 8:30; The Hal Richards Quintet Saturday at 7:30; and a jam session Sunday at 5! Bring cash for the musicians ($20-$25 for the Friday & Saturday shows) and byob! Call for reservations and details – 415-586-3733.
Read More
Jazz is our sweet spot. Make it yours. Support what we do in that regard! Make a donation to our 501(c)3 nonprofit and bring cash to the shows! Bird & Beckett is known internationally for what we’ve been doing. Live jazz and great books since 1999!
Read More
Joyce Todd McBride, piano & compositions. Stacy Starkweather, bass. David Rokeach, drums. $20 cover charge, cash please! $1.50 surcharge per seat for credit/debit cards. please pay at the door, and byob. for reservations, call 415-586-3733. Joyce Todd McBride, widely adored as the director of the massed vocal ensemble Conspiracy of Venus, is also much admired as a brilliant pianist and composer, in which guise she’s just released a playful, intricate and deep quintet album called “The Night-time Violets Bloom.” She’ll be celebrating at Bird & Beckett this Friday, April 25th, 8:30-10pm, with a piano trio date in the company of long-time collaborators Stacy Starkweather on upright bass and David Rokeach behind the drum kit.
Read More
Hal Richards, winds, reeds & arrangements. Henry Hung, trumpet. Rumi Abe, piano. Ron Belcher, bass. Akira Tana, drums. $25 cover charge, cash please! $1.50 surcharge on credit/debit. Please pay at the door, and byob. For a reservation, call the shop at 415-586-3733. Hal Richards is a musician of many horns. When he first strolled into Bird & Beckett in the early aughts for a gig with our Friday happy hour band, the one that started all this jazz for us back in 2002, he made it a point of pride that he carried in all his horns — numbering seven, if we remember correctly — in a single entrance. These days, he still makes it a single entrance for the most part, but he picks and chooses which horns and how many of them to lug. Sometimes as few as five or six! Still, it’s not the number of horns…
Read More
Thursday, April 30th at 7:30pm, we’re pleased to present a book release party for short story writer & cartoonist Janice Shapiro with her debut graphic novel fresh out from Fantagraphics, Honoria: A Fortuitous Friendship. That’s young Honoria at the far right, with her siblings and her mother, Sara Murphy, who, together which her husband Gerald Murphy, were at the center of a constellation of gadflies flitting about them and their guests at the Murphys’ Cap d’Antibes villa — guests that included their good friends Scott & Zelda Fitzgerald, not to mention the likes of Ernest Hemingway, Dorothy Parker, Cole Porter and Pablo Picasso, reveling through the nights and languishing in the sun on the beach by day. It’s the summer of 1929, when Ida, a young, sheltered and unsophisticated girl from New York, is sent by her father to stay with Honoria and her parents, the Murphys, at their villa…
Read More
Here at Bird & Beckett Books, we’ve always relied on the kindness of neighbors and strangers to make it all work; and we’ve always found that strangers don’t stay strangers long! Your tax-deductible donations to our 501(c)3 nonprofit, the Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project, FEIN 261906810, are the secret sauce. Book sales and cover charges at the shows are crucial, but only go so far to fill the cornucopia of culture that you’ll find here at Bird & Beckett! You can donate through our website using PayPal. Or if you prefer, you can drop off or mail us a check made out to the “Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project” — write “tax-deductible donation” in the memo line. Cash is fine if you prefer. You can also donate on a recurring, monthly basis through PayPal — which is quite a wonderful way to support us. Bright moments ahead, thanks…
Read More
The posts that follow show you what’s come and gone. Search the videos on our youtube channel or facebook page to find evidence of what you remember, or what you missed! Then, make sure you catch the next thing that catches your fancy. The live streams are great, but live music in a room with folks you know or ought to get to know, that’s irreplaceable…
Read More
Night Train to Odesa just won a major award in the UK, and was abridged for BBC Radio 4. It sits between memoir, reportage, and literary journalism, and has been praised for its pacy narrative style – definitely not a dry tome on the war in Ukraine, but on-the-ground reportage, starting in Russia just before the invasion, moving to Odesa, Kyiv, and then eastern Ukraine, as the journalist moved into frontline reporting. It was called a “powerful insight into what it’s like to go it alone in a conflict zone.” The book was released in paperback April 5th of this year, and Stout is touring in support of its release starting at the Ukrainian Institute of America in New York City, with talks at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA) in Washington, DC and the Atlantic Council, also in Washington, among others. The Observer review: “… a luminous love letter to an embattled nation, as…
Read More
The Oakland School for the Arts Alumni Quintet brings together musicians whose roots trace back to the halls of OSA, where they studied under the mentorship of the legendary Dave Ellis—a guiding force who continues to shape their musical paths today. Though they’ve since scattered across the country, from San Francisco to Baltimore, Stockton to New York, their shared foundation and deep musical connection keep pulling them back together. Featuring Gus Hurteau on vibraphone, Max Ehrhardt on trumpet, Hannah Mayer on piano, Ale Sanchez on bass, and Miles Turk on drums, the quintet has been playing with one another in different combinations for years. In high school, their talents brought them to stages like Yoshi’s, and just recently, they returned from a cultural exchange tour in Shijiazhuang, China, where they represented their musical roots abroad. This concert is a rare and special reunion—a one-time event that brings these far-flung friends back home. Expect a dynamic set blending modern jazz with touches of experimental R&B, rooted…
Read More
From gospel to Brazilian choro, poetry to literary investigation and celebration, and all that jazz, Bird & Beckett has offered you a lot this week and caps it off with Bentley High scholars investigating F Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby Sunday at 3pm and the Vince Lateano Trio Sunday at 5pm Get your culture this weekend and get your books now, before the General Strike! Get your strike card here. Call the shop for information or to reserve seats – (415) 586-3733
Read More
In troubled times music is a salve for the soul. This ‘Jazz plays Spirituals’ concert features Neil Adler (piano/bass), Michael Turner (voice/piano), David Adler (bass) and John Anning (drums). Neil Adler is a local bandleader/pianist and chromatic harmonica player whose has ‘Emi’s Song’ album, featuring a variety of jazz genres, was released with great success last year. Neil’s other side is playing gospel piano in a Pentecostal church with multi-instrumentalist Michael Turner. This powerhouse aggregation will bring jazz spirituals to celebrate Emancipation Day, in a concert that promises to be inspirational and uplifting. $20 cover charge
Read More
Fatemeh Shams is the author of When They Broke Down the Door (Mage 2016), which won Latifeh Yarshater’s Annual Book Award, and Hopscotch (Ugly Duckling Presse, 2024) which won the 2023 Poetry International Chapbook Award. She teaches Persian literature at the University of Pennsylvania. Kim Shuck hosts featured poets with an open mic on the 2nd Monday of each month. On the 4th Monday of the month, the reading is all open mic. Join Zoom Meeting https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84350265713?pwd=eE84V3BYdWxiSFBHNHhmdUt1WTUzdz09 Meeting ID: 843 5026 5713 Passcode: 244211
Read More
Saturday (4/12) from 7:30-9:30pm, the Levit-Behrman Quintet, with Joel Behrman, trumpet; Jesse Levit, alto sax; Matt Clark, piano; Josh Thurston-Milgrom, bass; Jeff Marrs, drums. There’s a lot to be said about this quintet and its fine, well-traveled personnel. Suffice to say, they’re coming in tight and rehearsed. Read a whole lot more on the calendar linked from the Events button up above on this website! $25 cover charge, byob.___________ Sunday (4/13) from 7:00-9:00 pm, the Jim Nichols / Charlie Keagle Duo. This is going to be a lovely date, as guitarist Nichols and reed player Keagle engage as a duo with exquisite music guaranteed. $20 cover charge, byob. ___________ Already in town? Muni will get you here quick. Out in the Far East Bay or South Bay? There’s BART. Up in the North Country? We got bridges and surface streets! Languishing in Cap d’Antibe or Paris? Rome, Kolkata or Cuzco?…
Read More
Friday (4/11) from 6-8pm, Eric & the In Crowd, tonight with Eric Shifrin, piano/vocal; Heath Proskin, bass; and Jimmy Duchowny, drums, plus a surprise guest. Jimmy, who’s just flown in from Brazil, is an old friend from Eric’s teenage jazz beginnings. Back then, in Malibu, Eric was playing sax and heard that a younger kid who lived around the corner was playing the drums. Jimmy also had a piano and his dad put it in a small nook at the back of the house where Eric and Jimmy began playing all the time. Just the two of them Eric on piano and sax, Jimmy on drums. Once, when they heard that Ronnie Laws had moved in across the street, they set up in Jimmy’s front yard and tried to attract the famous jazz flutist’s attention playing Eric’s fiercely modern tune RED SHIFT. The rest is history! $20/byob._________ Friday (4/11) from…
Read More
Sign Up for Our Weekly Emails!
SUPPORT BIRD & BECKETT - DONATE TODAY!
Your donation to the Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project helps us pay for a multitude of operating expenses necessary to present, promote and preserve local music, poetry, and more.
Help us keep the arts alive and thriving!
The Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project was created in 2007 "to present, document and archive the creative work of significant living writers and musicians in the San Francisco Bay Area, for a neighborhood audience and future generations," continuing the work we began when the store was established in 1999.
We continue to present a full slate of programming of live music and poetry readings, and produce a literary journal and poetry chapbooks, and we seek and welcome your continued financial support by way of donations.
Click on "donate" in the navigation bar above. Better yet, make a check out to the “Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project” and drop it off or mail it to:
Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project
653 Chenery Street
San Francisco, CA 94131
Call us at (415) 586-3733 to find out how else you might lend your support.
____________
We're immensely appreciative of Jazz in the Neighborhood for having stepped in as our temporary fiscal sponsor for a few months, while we straightened out some paperwork to get nonprofit status restored to the BBCLP. We're happy to say that's been done, and all past, present, and future donations made directly to the BBCLP are fully tax-deductible!
TAKE OUR SURVEY
To take our SURVEY, click here, and help the BBCLP get to know you better! As Duke Ellington always said, we love you madly...
The Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project
Our events are put on under the umbrella of the Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project (the "BBCLP"). That's how we fund our ambitious schedule of 300 or so concerts and literary events every year.
The BBCLP is a [Read More ]
The Independent Musicians Alliance
Gigging musicians! You have nothing to lose but your lack of a collective voice to achieve fair wages for your work!
The IMA can be a conduit for you, if you join in to make it work.
https://www.independentmusiciansalliance.org/
Read more here - Andy Gilbert's Feb 25 article about the IMA from KQED's site
