“We were still in the boundless void, striped here and there by a streak or two of hydrogen around the vortexes of the first constellations. I admit it required very complicated deductions to foresee the Mesopotamian plains black with men and horses and arrows and trumpets, but, since I had nothing else to do, I…

M + M + M + M 4 Poets at Bird & Beckett A mellifluous evening of poetry by Miriam Bird Greenberg, Margaret Stawowy, Melissa Stein & Maw Shein Win Macaroons, meringue & merlot will be served Miriam Bird Greenberg is the author of In the Volcano’s Mouth, which won the 2015 Agnes Lynch Starrett…

With the commencement of their second year, the sophomore class of students in the San Francisco Conservatory of Music’s new “Roots, Jazz & American Music” Bachelor’s degree program hosts the incoming SFCM RJAM freshman class and peers from colleges and high schools throughout the Bay Area in a monthly jam session! This is an exciting opportunity to watch and…

$10-20 suggested donation; $5-10 for students / musicians / low income. Joe Goldmark, pedal steel guitar; Mitch Polzak, lead guitar and vocals; Hank Maninger, bass guitar and vocals; Kenny Owen, drums. The Seducers have had a monthly gig at Bird & Beckett for nearly three years, playing classic, outlaw and honky tonk songs by the likes of…

$10-20 suggested donation; $5-10 for students/musicians/low income. David Byrd, saxophone and vocals; Grant Levin, piano; Joe McKinley, bass; Dylan Garrison, drums. David Byrd is unique in his penchant for infusing a heavy reggae vibe into his bebop and modal jazz, though just as often he stays right there in solid jazz territory, always with massive…

Writer-contributors including Margaret Cooley, Keith Cooley, Nellie Wong, Jerry Path, and Alice Rogoff gather to read their work as well as the work of co-contributors Phyllis Holiday and Adele Kearney, and to celebrate the publication of the new LaborFest Writers Anthology! It’s hot off the press. Live music by the Union Bugs! Giving Voice: LaborFest…

$20 cover charge; $10 for students/musicians/low income. Matthew Charles Heulitt – guitar Matt Renzi – clarinet/sax Tim Bulkley – drums Dan Feiszli – acoustic bass Matthew Charles Heulitt, in his guitar work and compositions, seeks the “intangible beauty that only music can communicate.” With three highly skilled and sympatico jazz colleagues well-suited to pursue the…

$20 cover charge; $10 for students/musicians/low income. Elena Welch is a jazz and blues vocalist greatly influenced by her ten formative and very fun years living in the music city of Chicago, Illinois. She resided on the Big Island of Hawaii for over eight years, where she performed regularly with her quintet as well as with Island…

$10-20 suggested donation; $5-10 for students/musicians/low income. Lots of fun and great music with this band, from swing to bop and straight ahead to the now! Youngster Jeffrey Burr plays guitar in the company of four jazz vets — drummer Vince Lateano, trumpeter Al Molina, saxophonist Jerry Logas and bassist Dean Reilly. Dean’s the grand old…

    The story of the “hippie trail” through the eyes of a traveler. North Beach writer Terry Tarnoff tells tales of the trail and of some of its more notorious characters. He’ll read passages from his paired memoirs, or are they novels, The Bone Man of Benares and The Reflectionist, and he’ll display artifacts and unspool videos…