Parlor Tricks is: Eddie Scher, National resonator guitar; Melina Selverston, sultry vocals; Jeff Bruner, contrabass and Fabio Reis, drums — a self-styled “industrial ragtime” band, doing for syncopation what Led Zepplin did for the theremin and what Lady Gaga did for bubbles! Parlor Tricks is the world’s first and foremost industrial ragtime band, scratching that hard to reach itch between Fats Waller and the Red Hot Chili Peppers– late-century covers and originals served with syncopation and stomp.

4-6 pm: Grant Levin, piano and Ricardo Diaz, bass weave a web of jazz at once delicate and indestructible. Really! You’ll like it. Feed that tip jar generously!!! 7:30-10 pm: Grant Levin leads a quartet, featuring Jonathan Bautista on tenor sax, Walter Savage on bass and Malachi Whitson on drums. This date will knock your socks off. Walter Savage was a key bass player on the Bay Area scene for decades before trying a self-imposed exile with his wife to Arkansas — that experiment was successful enough, but the Bay Area has drawn them back and now they’re established in Vallejo, with Walter driving into the city for any good gigs that come his way. He’s monstrously talented, and we’re lucky indeed to have him back. And then there’s Jonathan Bautista, with a true tenor tone and fluidity that’s a beautiful fit for this quartet. We’ve been beyond happy to…

jazz in the bookshop is our weekly Friday after work jazz party. Trumpeter Henry Hung brings in a quartet this week, with Jordan Samuels on guitar and Otto Huber on drums. Henry is a lyrical player whose grace is unmistakable, with charm and musical intelligence to spare. You’ll be pleased, we’re sure. He’s also the band director at the Ruth Asawa School of the Arts at the rim of Glen Canyon.

This Sunday night, Eric Shifrin and Ralph Carney lead the eclectic and rollicking quartet they call EaR Candy… with Joe Kyle, Jr. on bass and Randy Odell on drums. EaR Candy operates on the principle that to steal from one artist is plagiarism, but to steal from everyone is research!  Music from Duke Ellington to Gene Autry — obscure gems polished or just roughed up, it’s all the same to these guys! Grist for the mill. Eric & Ralph are both facing the realities of San Francisco economics– Ralph’s already shifted his base up to Portland or thereabouts, and Eric’s lingering uncomfortably while they Ellis Act him and his wife out of their abode.   The same economics are staring drummer Randy Odell in the face. Randy is scrambling to find a way to stay in the apartment he shares with his partner, the west coast blues guitarist GG Amos, over…

Avotcja, named 2015 Jazz Hero by the Bay Area Chapter of the Jazz Journalists Association last July, is a jazz musician with deep roots, a riveting poet, an imaginative and ruminative prose writer, a pioneer, an individualist, a fierce champion of her fellow musicians, poets and artists.  She leads the group named Best Jazz Group of the Year in 2005 and 2010 by the Bay Area Blues Hall of Fame, Modúpue (“graditude”) — a flexible ensemble with anywhere from four to fourteen musicians, a company that includes some of the Bay Area’s very best.  This Sunday afternoon at Bird & Beckett, Avotcja will be joined by pianist Jon Jang, reed player Francis Wong and bassist Heshima Mark Williams — stellar musicians all with major careers and reputations in the music. Read more about Avotcja and Modúpue on her site at http://www.avotcja.org/ BRING IN THE NEW YEAR RIGHT WITH THE ANNUAL HEALING EVENING OF…

Saturday, January 2nd at Bird & Beckett 7:30-10:00 pm THE SMITH DOBSON QUARTET originals and chestnuts Richard Sears, piano Doug Stuart, bass Tim Angulo, drums jazz club!  when lights are low $10 cover

Count on bassist Don Prell and his confreres to keep the jazz ball rolling at Bird & Beckett right into 2016!  We’ve never missed a Friday jazz date since the series began back in late 2002, so we’re well into our 14th year… nearly 700 consecutive Fridays and counting! Don got his start in LA in the early 1950s, and now leads the boppish unit he calls the SeaBop Ensemble.  They hold forth every Tuesday night down at the Bayview Boat Club on Terry Francoise Blvd. near the ballpark, and on the 1st Friday of each month they entertain the Bird & Beckett audience.  Tonight, he’s got stalwarts Jerry Logas on sax, Ray Scott on guitar and Vinnie Rodriguez on drums — Bird & Beckett favorites all.  Live jazz at Bird & Beckett every Friday from 5:30-8:00.  Pay what you can, but a ten-spot per adult is what it really…

It’s a lovely and low key thing, with two veteran jazz guitarists in solo and duo combination, passing a sweet Sunday afternoon at the end of the year, with you in their company.

Charles Thomas on bass and Omar Aran on drums join pianist Grant Levin for two sets of live jazz in San Francisco’s southernmost and foremost outpost of jazz and literary culture! Merry Christmas & Happy New Year!

Heshima Mark Williams presents The Jazzling Twintet at Bird & Beckett’s Saturday night jazz club… Vivian Warkentin, violin, is Assistant Concertmaster of Oakland Symphony, and an active freelancer. She’s studied jazz with David Balakrishnan.  Her credits include string section work withBurt Bacharach, Sammy Davis Jr., Tony Bennett, Sara Vaughn, Doc Severinsen, Chris Botti,Smokey Robinson, George Benson, Henry Mancini, and also film scoring at Skywalker Ranch and other local studios. Michael McCarthy, guitar, played bass with the proto-punk-country band Orgasm Spasm, and studied jazz guitar with Rich Parker, Jeffrey Burr, Alan Klein, Steve Erquiga, and Brian Pardo.  He’s played guitar with the Berkeley Jazz School Adult Big Band, and also leads a music group for the developmentally disabled called All Together Now. Wanda Warkentin, cello, is a member of the Berkeley and Santa Rosa Symphonies, and an active freelancer. She’s played Principal cello with Santa Rosa Symphony and Midsummer Mozart Festival, soloed with the tango orchestra SF Camerata, and…

Trumpeter Darren Johnston makes his Bird & Beckett debut, with Noah Schenker on bass and Omar Aran on drums.  Guitarist Scott Foster leads the date, as he does every third Friday of the month. Since settling in San Francisco in 1997, Canada-born trumpeter/composer/songwriter Darren Johnston has collaborated and recorded with an extremely diverse cross-section of artists. Johnston is a first-call instrumentalist with a gorgeous tone and sublime musicianship in a dizzying array of genres, from work with straight-ahead jazz luminaries such as bassist/composer Marcus Shelby, to experimental icons like ROVA, Fred Frith and Myra Melford, rising star singer/songwriter Meklit Hadero, or with traditional Balkan brass band giants Brass Menazeri. As a bandleader and composer he has made his mark with the award-winning Nice Guy Trio, The Darren Johnston Quintet, the category defying Broken Shadows Family Band, and more. His interests span composing instrumental music, writing songs, and performing all styles…