Thursday, 8/11 – 7-9 pm: The Bird & Beckett Book Club discusses The Beekeeper’s Apprentice, by Laurie King. Come one, come all — call us at the shop to reserve a copy of the book. 10% off to book club participants. Oakland born Laurie King’s long-running series of mysteries centered on Sherlock Holmes associate Mary Russell has been embraced for years by Bird & Beckett patrons. This is the first book in the series which now runs to 13 books with her latest, The Murder of Mary Russell. No time like this August to get started on the books that have been widely hailed since this one was nominated for the Agatha Award. “King has stepped onto the sacred literary preserve of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, poached Holmes, and brilliantly brought him to life again,” said the Washington Post Book World. View a wonderful trailer for the book here.

King of the San Francisco saloon and salon pianists, Eric Shifrin sings too and rolls with the In Crowd through material from Cole Porter to Hoagy Carmichael to Gene Autry.  He’s been charming the swells, swindlers and stand-up guys in bars and bistros from the Barbary Coast to Nob Hill for decades and shows no signs of flagging. He’s joined tonight at Bird & Beckett by long-time associate Ari Munkres on bass and Randy Lee Odell on drums. Don’t deny yourself one of San Francisco’s singular pleasures!  

Poets read for the 3300! Thanks to the poets listed below, and the many folks who showed up to support the 3300, we raised $980 this afternoon! It’s not too late to channel more funds to the 3300 Club.  Drop off checks made out to the 3300 Club at the bookshop, and we’ll make sure the funds are delivered to owner Nancy Keane. These poets lent their voices to the cause, and made donations as well! Q. R. Hand Kim Shuck Avotcja Ed Mycue Marvin Hiemstra Gail Mitchell Lucy Lang Day Clara Hsu Bill Vartnaw It’s a benefit, so bring some serious dough! Give ’til you feel it! Make your checks out to “3300 Club.” Funds will go to Nancy Keane, who has operated the 3300 Club for lo these many years to distribute as she sees fit. Why support the 3300, besides the fact that it’s a human tragedy…

Tonight at Bird & Beckett: Smith Dobson V, vibes; Jack Tone Riordan, guitar; Justin Carney, bass; Evan Hughes, drums. The burnished sound of Milt Jackson & the MJQ finds its echo on the stage at Bird & Beckett when Smith Dobson rolls in the vibraphone.  Smith is heir to several generations of jazz talent — his father, Smith Dobson IV, was a hugely respected jazz pianist, and his mother, Gail Dobson, is a wonderful jazz singer while his sister Sasha is a vocalist based in NYC. And his grandmother? She’s a singer as well… And then, there was his grandfather, a jazz accordionist. When Smith was coming up, legendary jazz drummer Albert “Tootie” Heath, said of him, “He has the talent, determination and persistence as a musician, combined with the dedication necessary to succeed… improvisational skills totally advanced, excellent sensitivity, both solo and as an accompanist… my most talented student!” In…

Al Molina, trumpet Jerry Logas, sax and clarinet Don Prell, bass Vinnie Rodriguez, drums Jazz history right here! Bebop, lovely standards, fragments of old New Orleans… from “Ornithology” to “Doxy” — from “For All We Know” to “St. James Infirmary.” Bassist Don Prell just turned 87 on August 4th, and shows no sign of flagging. His roots are in the West Coast jazz realm of SoCal in the 1950s, and no one plays with more intensity, or joy. Trumpeter Al Molina has become a vital component of Seabop in its current incarnation– San Francisco-born (1935), Al grew up in a musical family and dove into jazz early and permanently. He’s got a beautiful style, lyrical and fiery at once. Jerry Logas, on sax, has more than fifty years of jazz performance under his belt, and plays sweet and soulful clarinet, tenor and baritone sax.  He’s nowhere happier than on a…

  Howard Alden is considered among the very best jazz guitarists in the nation, for good reason. We’ve been fortunate to host Howard twice in the past, and welcome him again this August — first on Thursday, August 4th joined in a trio by bassist Peter Barshay and drummer Vince Lateano, and again near the end of the month on Sunday, August 28th in a duo with guitarist Duncan James. This is the third time out for the trio with Howard, Peter and Vince — together they played two beautiful previous dates here at Bird & Beckett, first in January 2014 and again almost exactly a year ago in August 2015. Click here to see more from the trio’s August 23, 2015 date at Bird & Beckett. Cover charge $20.  No reservations, so please arrive early to be assured of a seat. Here, you can view a lovely performance that gives you a…

Nancy Keane grew up in San Francisco in the 1940s and ’50s in a big family, and several of the girls developed into wonderful writers, notably including the poet Geri Digiorno up in Petaluma. For years, Nancy has run the 3300 Club, a neighborhood bar par excellence at 29th & Mission. Somewhere along line she let the regulars know there would be poetry readings in their bar, and their grumbling was mostly just good natured resignation. We imagine that for the most part Nancy does what she wants, and garners huge respect along the way. Nancy will read today on a program with Jeanne Powell, a fantastically dedicated writer with a strong and instantly recognizable poetic voice. Jeanne has run various poetry series in San Francisco for decades (including most recently the series at the 3300 Club), publishes work by other poets, and has several collections of her own work…

Certified Country Music Star Misisipi Mike, singer/bassist Glen Earl Brown, Jr., slide guitarist Ian Taylor Sutton and drummer Kenny Owen deliver a truckload of classic country songs by Ray Price, Merle Haggard, Johnny Paycheck, Waylon Jennings and more.

The Bay Area’s premier young trumpet player leads his fine quintet through their paces… Erik Jekabson, trumpet Kasey Knudsen, saxophone Matt Clark, piano John Wiitala, bass Hamir Atwal, drums Here are a few minutes from the quintet’s last appearance at Bird & Beckett, in December 2015.  

Entwined is the remarkable story of “outsider” artist Judith Scott, who was institutionalized for more than thirty years before being reunited with her sister, Joyce Wallace Scott, who will be on hand today to present her book and engage in discussion with the audience. From birth, fraternal twins Judith and Joyce Scott lived as if they were one person in two bodies, understanding instinctively what the other wanted and felt, despite the fact that Judy had Down syndrome, profound deafness, and never learned to speak or sign. But this idyllic childhood of color, texture, and feeling ended abruptly when, at age seven, Judy was taken from their shared bed while Joyce slept, not knowing that the wholeness they had known was being shattered. For the next three decades, Joyce is left without her other half and must grieve unexpected loss while navigating her relationship with an emotionally distant mother—alone. Even…