Meridian Trio features Chicago based-musicians Nick Mazzarella on alto saxophone, Matt Ulery on bass, and Jeremy Cunningham on drums. Mazzarella, the group’s leader and composer, formed the ensemble in 2014 to play a steady monthly gig ​at a club in the south side neighborhood of Pilsen where he lives. That engagement lasted three years, during which time the trio developed a tight-knit musical rapport and a repertoire of original material. Through many hours of public performance, they gradually cultivated a unique and cohesive group sound–​one ​as energetic as it is nuanced. Mazzarella’s compositions for the trio draw upon the traditions of both avant-garde and modern jazz through a synthesis of free improvisation, interval-based improvisation, modalism, elements of the blues, swinging grooves and other cyclical rhythmic structures. The common thread unifying these components is a strong melodic sensibility shared by the players, formed and continuously refined by live performances.​ To date,…

Mike Olmos, trumpet Patrick Wolff, alto Lyle Link, tenor Adam Shulman, piano Owen Clapp, bass Evan Hughes, drums

Profound and hip poets, at that. Two remarkable intellects; two deep souls.  

The Jazz Philanthropists Union presents… This is some kind of a band! 7 pieces and a lot of stars. Total REX! Bang that gong! Till it makes a wreck of you.  

It’s time for the 2nd Annual Backyard Benefit Bash for Bird & Beckett at Jerry Ferraz’s place over on Mission Street near Highland. Call the store (415-586-3733) for the address. Saturday, May 13th – 1-5 pm! Live jazz by the Vince Lateano Trio! Music starts at 2 pm — jam session from 3 pm on. Musicians & poets welcome! Jerry’s famous chili, salad and garlic bread on the house. No host bar (proceeds to the bookshop) It’s a benefit, so bring your checkbook! Last year we called it a rent party, and we raised the rent almost to the penny! $5k give or take. Thank you for making sure we stay afloat, in business and on the cultural front! Bird & Beckett presents 300+ events every year, with YOUR monetary support. Thank you!  

Aaron Cohn, bass, leads the charge, with pianist Gaea Schell on the first set only, and guitarist Scott Foster, tenor saxophonist Danny Brown and drummer Omar Aran throughout!  Two sets of top flight jazz by first drawer San Franciscan jazz musicians! We present jazz in the bookshop every Friday evening, 5:30-8:00 – just like we’ve been doing for the past 15 years.  Never a missed Friday since October 2002.  $10 suggested donation per adult.  Kids free and welcome.

You heard them at the sun-drenched Glen Park Festival at the tail end of April… now dig them in the cool half-light of your favorite neighborhood bookshop. Steeped in genres ranging from rock, New Orleans funk and blues to bluegrass and jazz, Fog Swamp’s members have toured the world, having shared stages with The Meters, Wilco, Dave Brubeck, Yes, Phil Lesh, Ben Harper and others. Check out the tunes that No Depression called the 2013 “Discovery of the Year“!   Alex Wise – guitar, vocals Guitarist/singer/songwriter Alex Wise has produced twosolo albums, Blurred and Front Porch, and his funk band The Shreep‘s CD, Shreepwalkin’, was released by Gianormous Records. Wise has made numerous TV & radio appearances, has performed extensively all over the U.S. and Asia, and his songs have been used in feature films and video games. He’s shared the stage with Brian Stoltz, The Monophonics, members of The Radiators,…

Joe Goldmark , pedal steel guitar; Mitch Polzak, lead guitar and vocals; Hank Maninger, bass guitar and vocals; Kenny Owens, drums. The Seducers play Bird & Beckett on the first Sunday of each month! Classic songs by Waylon Jennings, Merle Haggard, Hank Williams, Bobby Bare, plus originals and a few from left field. It all makes for a lovely way to spend a Sunday evening before returning to the working grind. BYOB. Left to right: Joe Goldmark, Kenny Owen      

Eddie Jefferson Lives! And David Byrd channels the spirit! Eddie Jefferson was the founder of vocalese (putting great recorded solos to words, blazing to fame with the groundbreaking “Moody’s Mood for Love”). Chicago saxophonist David Byrd was at Jefferson’s last gig, at Joe Segal’s Jazz Showcase in the Windy City. and engaged Jefferson in conversation after the show. But Eddie Jefferson, at age 60, was shot and killed at his next gig on May 8, 1979 outside Baker’s Keyboard Lounge in Detroit. The performance Byrd witnessed at the Jazz Showcase left an indelible mark on Byrd as a musician, and he has been inspired to make his own fame in the fine art of vocalese. He’ll bring the spirit of Eddie Jefferson to Bird & Beckett Sunday afternoon, May 7th, with a fine band comprising himself on sax and vocals, Nick Tocco on guitar, Joe McKinley on bass and Dylan Garrison on drums.…

A reading from a new anthology, Truth to Power, with contributors Almaz Abinader, Connie Post, Dean Rader, William Pitt Root, Natasha Singh and Pam Uschuck. Cutthroat, A Journal of the Arts has assembled and published this collection of works, as powerful, compelling and incisive as they are timely. Individually and collectively, the pieces in this anthology trumpet a stirring call to action on today’s most crucial issues. Copies of Truth to Power will be available for sale, to be signed by authors. All proceeds beyond the cost of production go to the ACLU, Standing Rock Water Protectors, Southern Poverty Law Center, Planned Parenthood and Friends Of The Earth.

Jim Grantham, tenor saxophone Keith Saunders, piano Justin Carney, bass Jack Dorsey, drums Consummate pros share the bandstand tonight. Jim Grantham was on the scene at San Francisco’s famous jazz club Keystone Korner in that club’s late 1970s-1980s heyday, playing there and in other Bay Area jazz venues with key musicians including Bobby McFerrin, George Cables, Eddie Moore, Mark Isham, Ed Kelly, and Frank Tusa, among many others, and recording with trumpeter Eddie Henderson and pianist Jessica Williams. At Keystone Korner,  in 1977, Jim started a series of workshops and lessons in jazz theory and improvisation that formed the basis of a jazz method influencing a generation of professional musicians.  He was also on the Board of Directors for Bay Area Loft Jazz and The San Francisco Jazz Society. He studied music at the University of California at Santa Barbara and is a graduate, Cum Summa Laude, of Berklee College…

Trumpeter Al Molina and reed player Jerry Logas are at the core of bassist Don Prell’s Seabop Ensemble these days, with drummer Steve Nelson joining the group this Friday. Bassist Prell got his start in L.A. in the 1950s, traveling for several years as a member of the Bud Shank Quartet. He’s been a cornerstone of the Bird & Beckett Friday night jazz series since its inception in 2002, and leads a group here on the first Friday of each month.

At midnight, anything can happen. Twelve Chimes, It’s Midnight creates and podcasts original “radio” dramas of mystery, suspense, and horror! They’ll create one before your eyes and ears at Bird & Beckett tonight, with a live score performed by the Kurt Ribak Trio!

Tony Robles, born and raised in San Francisco, is co-editor and a revolutionary worker scholar of Poor magazine, and recently published Cool Don’t Live Here No More: A Letter to San Francisco. In 2010 he was nominated for the Pushcart Prize by Mythium Literary Journal for his short story, “In My Country.” Robles is also a housing rights advocate and board member of the Manilatown Heritage Foundation, and has written two children’s books, Lakas and the Manilatown Fish and Lakas and the Makibaka Hotel. Tommi Avicolli-Mecca, born and raised in the infamous South Philly, is a former member of Gay Liberation Front who has never stopped being an activist for queer and social justice causes. He is editor of Smash the Church, Smash the State: The Early Years of Gay Liberation (City Lights Books), and co-editor of Avanti Popolo: Italians Sail Past Columbus (Manic D Press). Avicolli-Mecca’s writings have appeared in…