Happy Birthday, Sam!

April 13 is Samuel Beckett’s putative birthday– so this Friday, let’s toast the great man and his good works! 

Scott Baker & Val Fachman, fond thespian interpreters of his words and fresh back from Paris, will hold forth at the break between jazz sets this evening to share a few of Sam’s poems in his original French and his own English translations of same!  Guinness & Jamesons the drinks of choice!

Friday, April 13, 5:30 pm to 8:00 pm

Jimmy Ryan Quintet

Jazz in the Bookshop Every Friday!

Henry Hung (trumpet), Danny Grewen (trombone), Scott Foster (guitar), Bishu Chatterjee (bass) & Jimmy Ryan (drums).  Jimmy Ryan got his start in L.A. in the ’50s, got to San Francisco in the early ’60s, and has been a key member of the Bird & Beckett Friday night jazz series since the beginning, as has guitarist Scott Foster.

This fine quintet features bassist Bishu Chatterjee alternating month-to-month with Charles Thomas, plus, with Henry and Danny, two terrific young front-line players on the local scene.

 Aprés le jazz…  Friday, April 13, 8:30 pm

The Little Book
of Terror

Author Daisy Rockwell in Person

WEST COAST RELEASE – Daisy Rockwell paints under the takhallus, or alias, Lapata (pronounced ‘laapataa’), which is Urdu for “missing,” or “absconded,” as in “my luggage is missing,” or “the bandits have absconded.” She posts her paintings regularly to Flickr, and writes for the blog Chapati Mystery. She has shown her work in San Francisco, Los Angeles, Philadelphia, Washington, DC, Waterloo, Ontario, and Lenox and North Adams, Massachusetts. Her essays on literature and art have appeared in Bookslut, Caravan and The Sunday Guardian (New Delhi).

Rockwell grew up in a family of artists in western Massachusetts, some whose work adorns the surfaces of chinaware and brightens up the waiting rooms of dentists’ offices (think Norman), and others whose artistic output has found more select audiences (think Rockwells you don’t know). From 1992-2006, Lapata made a detour into Academia, from which she emerged with a PhD in South Asian literature, a book on Upendranath Ashk and a mild case of depression. Nonetheless, she sometimes still teaches Hindi.

Rockwell’s new book of paintings and essays on the Global War on Terror, The Little Book of Terror, debuted in February 2012 from Foxhead Books.

 

Sunday, April 15

Two Coltrane events

2:30-4:00 pm:
Panel Discussion

4:30-6:30 pm
Which Way West? Concert

When Bar Walkers Preach:
Considering Coltrane

2:30 pm – Drs. Anthony Brown, Tommy Lee Lott, Herman Gray

Presentations and a discussion by contributors to the book John Coltrane and Black America’s Quest for Freedom (Leonard Brown, ed.; Oxford University Press 2010).  Coltrane, the man; Coltrane, the icon; and Coltrane, the musician have been endlessly considered by experts and laypersons alike — but this collection of essays is notable as it takes an intent look at Coltrane from the perspectives of a dozen African American scholars and musicians. 

Tommy Lee Lott (SJSU professor in Philosophy, author of The Invention of Race: Black Culture and the Politics of Representation and a Glen Park denizen) will discuss his essay, “When Bar Walkers Preach: John Coltrane and the Crisis of the Black Intellectual;” Herman Gray (UCSC professor in Sociology) presents his essay “John Coltrane and the Practice of Freedom;” and Anthony Brown (percussionist, composer and arranger; leader of the Asian American Orchestra; musicologist) discusses Coltrane’s music.  Dr. Brown will continue his explication during the trio performance following (starting at 4:30).

4:30 pm – Anthony Brown Trio
with poets Genny Lim
& devorah major

feat. Masaru Koga on saxes & shakuhachi

Anthony Brown and Mas Koga roam freely but with purpose through the titanic catalog of John Coltrane’s music.  Along the way, they’ll illustrate some of the great saxophonist’s myriad aspects, and will give a sense of Coltrane’s unequaled contributions to music and to the African American spiritual quest — whether as a consequence of an intuitive thirst for expression or stemming from a rigorous search for freedom and spiritual truth.  Former San Francisco Poet Laureate devorah major and poet Genny Lim will join the trio to read poems about and inspired by Coltrane.