Ray Skjelbred, piano and vocals; Clint Baker, bass and vocals; Riley Baker, drums. Ray’s roots are in the blues and pianists like Joe Sullivan, Earl Hines and Art Hodes, and he plays like an angel. He’s a legend in the world of traditional jazz, traveling the circuit from his base in Seattle. Catch the documentary about him that’s screening in the upcoming New York Jazz Film Festival, “Piano Jazz: Chicago Style!” We think the fest runs in August at Raw Space in NYC. Look for it! Here’s a recent solo performance by Ray. And here’s one with Clint, among other colleagues. Based in the Bay Area, Clint’s reputation as a player in the trad world, on cornet, clarinet, bass and any number of other instruments, is unrivaled. He’s also a musicologist of great repute. Riley is Clint’s young son, and is a helluva drummer, most widely known for his boundless prowess…

In association with Bird & Beckett, Fanny Renoir presents The Kentucky Twisters   The Kentucky Twisters is a six-piece bluegrass band. All six musicians are members of the California Bluegrass Association  and have been playing together for some ten years entertaining folks here in the Bay Area. They say they’re “what you would call a Strictly Bluegrass Band.” Their material covers the best of bluegrass released in the 1940s and 1950s. You might say they draw the line at the Korean War.   Frank Holmes on guitar and vocals — from Louisville, KY & San Francisco Lou Felthouse on guitar and vocals — from San Francisco Steve Breen on banjo and vocals — from San Francisco Tom Cline on dobro — from El Cerrito Bruno Brandly on mandolin and vocals — from Oakland Emil Nishi on bass — from Oakland Here’s a little video of  the Kentucky Twisters… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GDbR4ICPMTY  And Elvis will be…

Two sets of high octane honky tonk from a supergroup that calls Bird & Beckett home every second Sunday. Joe Goldmark, pedal steel guitar Mitch Polzak, lead guitar and vocals Hank Maninger, bass guitar and vocals Kenny Owen, drums

Noah Frank, trumpet Eli Maliwan, tenor sax Greg Jacobs, piano Curtis Aikens, bass Joe Kelner, drums With a sound and approach flexibly fitted to the space and the time, Sueños fuses hip-hop & R&B rhythms, blending modal with gospel harmonies, flowing with bebop-tinged horns over the top of a tight rhythm section that knows no boundaries. Original music and tunes by Roy Hargrove, Christian Scott, Kanye West, and J Dilla, alongside classic jazz standards, ballads and burners. Sueños has performed at the Fillmore Street Jazz Festival in SF and the PDX Jazz Festival in Portland, as well as at secret shows curated by SOFAR Sounds SF, SOFAR Sounds Portland, and SOFAR Sounds New York.

Dan Neville vibes Destiny Muhammad harp Rebecca Kleinmann alto flute Gaea Schell piano Sam Bevan bass Pepe Jacobo drums The Golden Circle Sextet, led by the acclaimed young vibraphonist Dan Neville, features the unique timbre of the concert harp with vibraphone and alto flute. This sextet combines elements of Jazz, Afro Cuban, Spanish and Norwegian street music, with textures of lush strings and woodwinds, driving rhythms and highly melodic phrases. Their cd “Tenerife” was released in 2016, a debut album steeped in West Coast jazz with elements of Afro-Cuban music. It’s reminiscent of Ahmad Jamal, Wes Montgomery, Alice Coltrane and Milt Jackson. Dan Neville is a multi-instrumentalist, a double-time student at both CJC and CCSF, a jazz performer, composer, and arranger. His credentials include 7 seasons of playing vibes for SFJAZZ Center’s Monday Night Big Band; arranging for Adam Theis’ Treat Social Club; and winning 1st place in the 2017 Jazz Search…

Bliss Rodriguez, piano Erik von Buchau, vibes Myron Cohen, drums Pianist Bliss Rodriguez was born in NYC on April 2, 1945 to Dominican immigrant parents. He grew up in Hamilton Heights, between Harlem and Washington Heights, on the west side. Bliss was born visually impaired, having no vision in his right eye and partial sight in his left, becoming completely blind at the age of 17. As a child, Bliss attended the only school in NY at the time for the visually impaired, a Catholic grammar school run by nuns. The sisters wanted their charges to be well rounded, so as a child Bliss received ballroom, tap dance, music and drama lessons in addition to a standard primary education. His parents bought him a piano at age nine, and he began playing it by ear. By high school he met fellow musician José Feliciano, and together they formed an instrumental trio…

Lyle Link, saxophone Adam Shulman, piano John Wiitala, bass James Gallagher, drums Adam Shulman has been a staple of the San Francisco jazz scene since he moved to the city in 2002. Before the move, Adam was a student at UC Santa Cruz where he studied with the great pianist Smith Dobson and the trumpeter/arranger Ray Brown. Adam has played as a sideman with internationally renowned artists Stefon Harris, Willie Jones III, Miguel Zenon, Mark Murphy, Alan Harris, Luciana Souza, Paula West, Ratzo Harris, Larry Coryell, Sean Jones, Grant Stewart, John Clayton, Bobby Hutcherson and with the Glen Miller Orchestra.

The spot where the moon was lowest, as she went by, was off the Zinc Cliffs. We used to go out with those little rowing boats they had in those days, round and flat, made of cork. They held quite a few of us: me, Captain Vhd Vhd, his wife, my deaf cousin, and sometimes little Xlthlx – she was twelve or so at that time. On those nights the water was very calm, so silvery it looked like mercury, and the fish in it, violet-colored, unable to resist the Moon’s attraction, rose to the surface, all of them, and so did the octopuses and the saffron medusas. There was always a flight of tiny treasures – little crabs, squid, and even some weeds, light and filmy, and coral plants – that broke from the sea and ended up on the Moon, hanging down from that lime-white ceiling, or else…

[arve url=”https://vimeo.com/240973062″ align=”right” /] Lincoln Adler, sax Lee Bloom, piano Brandon Essex, bass Carrie Jahde, drums With the experience of many years of collaboration as a unit, NoCoasters takes on original compositions, jazz, Latin, New Orleans, pop and even country standards and reinvent them in ever-changing ways. Their approach is highly improvisational, playful, and communicative. NoCoasters performs for the swells at spots like Cafe Claude, the Cigar Bar–all manner of swanky establishments. Here, you get to hear them without the chatter of fellow diners and the clatter of dishes. Presented by Bird & Beckett with support from Jazz in the Neighborhood’s Guaranteed Fair Wage Fund.    

Smith Dobson, soprano sax Charlie Gurke, baritone sax John Wiitala, bass Evan Hughes, drums Each of these four musicians is hugely respected on the local professional jazz scene; together, they’ll dig deep into some wonderful music. Smith Dobson, the very great San Francisco multi-instrumentalist, has recently been working on a notoriously difficult horn, the soprano sax, and has been nursing the burning idea of digging into some originals and tunes by the likes of Thelonious Monk with a group built around the soprano sax/baritone sax pairing, along the lines of the music made in the late ’50s and early ’60s by soprano sax master Steve Lacy. Lacy’s album “The Straight Horn of Steve Lacy,” which featured Charles Davis on bari, John Ore on bass and Roy Haynes on drums, showcases this approach applied to tunes by Monk, Miles Davis and Cecil Taylor. Monk’s album “San Francisco Holiday” provided the band name. Smith, Charlie, John…

Lyle Link, alto sax Bob Kenmotsu, tenor sax Keith Saunders, piano Adam Gay, bass Omar Aran, drums Bassist Adam Gay has assembled a quintet of fine players, including two reed players who have soul and technique to spare. The Friday-after-work slot is always “pay what you want” or “pay what you can” and our basic line these days is that $10 per solvent adult is the way to go. We want your help in keeping money flowing into the scant pockets or our fine San Francisco cultural workers! Keep in mind, that it’s up to you! More is fine, and less is fine too. We want you to enjoy the music, the musicians, the company of friends, neighbors, live music aficionados and the other good people that are keeping the soul of San Francisco alive for us! Giving us the strength to keep fighting the good fight against the deep…

Patrick Wolff, sax Randy Porter, piano Eric Markowitz, bass Evan Hughes, drums Saxophonist Wolff joins forces with highly acclaimed Grammy-nominated pianist Porter for a couple of sets of creative, swinging jazz. Long associated through their yearly involvement with the Stanford Jazz Workshop, these two musicians share the core musical values of the bebop era and the music that grew out of it. Backed by the irrepressible swing of Eric Markowitz and Evan Hughes, one of the Bay Area’s great rhythm section pairings, the band will jump head first into the wittiest tunes of the canon, from composers like Cole Porter and Thelonious Monk.