653 Chenery Street
in San Francisco's Glen Park neighborhood
1-415-586-3733
[email protected]
Open to walk-in trade and browsing
Tuesday to Sunday
noon to six
Live Streams every weekend!
Refresh your browser to catch a show in progress!
Visit our Facebook page or YouTube channel!
But nothing beats being in the room with the music & the musicians!
Part elegy, part memoir, part early-stage movie script, Naked takes the reader into a specific time and place from Donnelle McGee’s life and connects us to his origins. McGee is a confessional poet for today, unflinching but not distant, self-aware but not self-absorbed. He doesn’t shy away from hard terrain; instead, he forces the reader to see what he’s seen, feel what he’s felt, and mourn what he’s lost. Along the way, we all experience the singular exhilaration that stems from beating the odds. McGee’s voice is distinctive, his poems are engaging, his story is riveting. Donnelle McGee’s previous work includes the novel, Shine.  He earned his MFA at Goddard College and is now on faculty at Mission College in Santa Clara.  This is his second Bird & Beckett reading.
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Jinx Jones is among the top guitar wizards in the Bay Area, known far and wide for his killer rockabilly virtuosity, but no stranger to the jazz tradition.  His Jazzabilly All-Stars set the standard for cool and straight ahead jazz with an Americana inflection. You can count on hearing Jinx with his rockabilly aggregation, the Kingtones, at the Glen Park Festival each year (coming up on the last Sunday in April) — and with close to the same regularity, Bird & Beckett invites him in with his Jazzabilly All-Stars. Don’t miss a Bay Area musical treasure… “There are very few guitarists on the scene today who have a resume like San Francisco picker Jinx Jones. After having played with both Chuck Berry and Roy Buchanan, Jones has established himself as one of the top rockabilly guitarists on the scene today.†– Dr. Matt Warnock; Guitar International Magazine “Jinx Jones and his…
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Guitarist Calvin Keys has been featured on many acclaimed recordings since the early 1970s, both as a leader and a sideman, with such artists as Ahmad Jamal, Ray Charles, and Bobby Hutcherson.  He’s also long been a mainstay of the Oakland jazz scene.  We are more than pleased to welcome him for his second appearance on the Bird & Beckett stage, hot on the heels of a booking earlier this month by New York City’s Jazz at Lincoln Center in a celebration of Wes Montgomery’s groundbreaking guitar work.  Like Wes Montgomery, Calvin possesses an unmistakable personal style that sets him apart from his peers. Bassist Heshima Mark Williams is a world-traveled musician who holds down our third-Saturday-of-the-month date, playing when he’s free and booking the date whenever he can’t be on hand.  For this date, he’ll be here to lead a superlative trio with Calvin Keys at its heart.  We’re proud and…
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Three poets out to make you laugh, or at least be awed by… we do  believe! Open mic follows. Jerry Ferraz has been hosting this shindig for as long as we can remember. Do come! Per Kopel & Always:  “you’ll find poetic adventures (mysterious, joyous, even wondrous)featuring zesty language, robust verse and a moustache!”
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Devreaux Baker and Doren Robbins will converge on Bird & Beckett for what promises to be a rich and rewarding reading, she from Mendocino and he from Santa Cruz.  Though they haven’t met, they’ve known and admired each other’s poetry and are anxious for this chance to share the stage. “One enters Devreaux Baker’s [work] as one would sacred terrain. These poems are spare, tactile and textured, but they hover between worlds.” — Cynthia Hogue Doren Robbins came to poetry and literature in the late 1960s as a result of a cascading chain of influential encounters with writers through their books, from Henry Miller to Kenneth Rexroth to Arthur Rimbaud and far beyond.  His lifelong activism was similarly spurred by the ferment he found around himself in those days. open mic follows, Jerry Ferraz, mc
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Jim Grantham – reeds & flute Eric Swinderman – guitar Jeff Neighbor – bass Jack Dorsey – drums Veteran jazz players unite under the leadership of Jim Grantham, who plays from deep within the tradition of melodic lyricism—Lester Young, Dexter Gordon, Stan Getz, Miles Davis, Wayne Shorter. Jim has performed with the likes of Bobby McFerrin, George Cables, Eddie Moore, Mark Isham, Ed Kelly, Gaylord Birch, Frank Tusa and Calvin Keys, and has recorded with Jessica Williams and Eddie Henderson. He is also a well-known jazz educator (including a series of workshops in jazz theory and improvisation that he started at San Francisco’s legendary Keystone Korner in the late 1970s).  Jim is also the author of a much used, in-depth text on jazz improvisation.
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David Schooley has been minding the mountain for 25 years or more, working hard to keep it in the minds of those who might help him protect it from encroaching development. Â He regularly leads hikes over its rolling terrain, and spends many hundreds of times as many hours exploring and nurturing it on his own. Ravines of the Heart is a new book that holds some of his writings and art spawned by his dedication to the open spaces on its flanks and in its folds. Â David will read a few pieces and talk about the mountain to the assembled audience at Bird & Beckett, sharing his conviction that the mountain and its flora and fauna are precious, irreplaceable and simply good to know for the benefit of your soul and peace of mind. http://www.mountainwatch.org/schooleys-history-story/Â bears an essay by David that will give you a pretty good grasp of what’s been…
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Jonathan Bautista, sax Grant Levin, piano Joe McKinley, bass Jon Arkin, drums More fantastic jazz from Grant Levin and a hardy band of co-conspirators. Jazz club at Bird & Beckett is the thing for sure! Â Come and dig it.
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Guitarist Scott Foster leads a quartet through tunes associated with the great tenor saxophonist Dexter Gordon. We’re talkin’ the great David Boyce on sax (think Broun Fellinis, but then think Dexter!), plus Noah Schenker on bass and Omar Aran on drums. Â Oh, and Scott, of course, on guitar! Â This will be be a blast!
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Pam Brandon has her hand in a lot of bands in a lot of genres around these parts — from the Luxomatics to Belle Monroe & Her Brewglass Boys… from 77 El Deora to the Chazz Cats — but the hottest of them all might just be her tight little jazz group, The Monroe Trio. Whether you flock to Bird & Beckett to cock an ear and snap your fingers or to satisfy that itch to dance, The Monroe Trio — with Pam on vocals and stand-up bass, Mark Holzinger on guitar and Noam Eisen on piano — effortlessly delivers the goods. Don’t miss one of the Bay Area’s most stunning musical treasures! Â You’ll be smitten but good!
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Two writers with recent books out from Coffee House Press will share the Bird & Beckett stage:  Dale Herd reading stories from Empty Pockets and Bill Berkson reading poems from Expect Delays. Bill Berkson came of age as a writer during the era of the “New York School” painters and poets in the late 1950s/early 1960s, significantly influenced by Kenneth Koch and other key figures.  He has been a major figure on the west coast literary scene since at least the early ’70s, and taught literature and writing at the San Francisco Art Institute for decades.  He has well over a dozen books published by a range of interesting small presses and larger publishers. Dale Herd writes stories described as “gritty, unsparing snapshots of just getting by in barrooms and diners on the margins of America.”  His first book was published by Donald Allen’s Four Seasons Foundation in the storied days of…
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Jazz pianist Joe Warner is one of the Bay Area’s brightest young talents, regularly sharing the bandstand with some of the region’s best and most experienced singers and instrumentalists, from bassists Marcus Shelby and Ron Belcher to drummer Howard Wiley to singers Denise Perrier and Faye Carroll.
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Smith Dobson, vibes Jeffrey Burr, guitar Adam Gay, bass James Gallagher, drums Smith Dobson is a triple threat — a supremely talented musician on tenor sax, vibes and drums. Â He’s also one of the key motivators of the San Francisco jazz scene, and we’re fortunate to present him with a hand picked group of musicians on the first Saturday of each month in our “jazz club” series. We’ve been eagerly waiting for him to bust out the vibes on one of these dates, and now’s the time. And we’re doubly pleased that Smth has booked Jeffrey Burr on the date — one of the Bay Area’s very best jazz guitarists — along with rock solid rhythm section journeymen Adam Gay and James Gallagher. Don’t miss the fantastic music and the sweet splendor that is jazz club! Â $10 cover — and the best $10 you’ll have spent all week, trust us…
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Osha Neumann, muralist, sculptor, and civil rights lawyer, will doodle and draw and read from just published Doodling on the Titanic: The Making of Art in a World on the Brink.
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Come Tuesday evening! Â Jack’s mounting his photos, and hard on the heels of the opening, we’re sending his sister Rebecca off to India along with Rebecca’s husband Abhijeet and the baby Kuheli. Â Double celebration! Gallery Ex Libris is now putting up its second exhibition. Make the Gallery Ex Libris a part of your arts landscape!
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SUPPORT BIRD & BECKETT - DONATE TODAY!
Your donation to the Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project helps us pay for a multitude of operating expenses necessary to present, promote and preserve local music, poetry, and more.
Help us keep the arts alive and thriving!
The Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project was created in 2007 "to present, document and archive the creative work of significant living writers and musicians in the San Francisco Bay Area, for a neighborhood audience and future generations." We've been doing that very thing for more than a decade and a half, continuing the work we began when the store was established in 1999.
Due to lapses in tax filings during and post-pandemic, the BBCLP's status as a registered nonprofit was suspended at the beginning of April 2024 while we reapply, which is expected to take about six months. Donations made after April 1st will not be tax-deductible until nonprofit status is restored.
However, we continue to present a full slate of programming live music and poetry, and producing literary chapbooks, and we seek and welcome your continued financial support in the interim. If a tax-deduction is not a major reason for your support to date, we hope you'll continue to ride with us while we navigate these next several months.
Click on "donate" in the navigation bar above, drop off a check at the bookshop, or drop one in the mail to:
Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project
653 Chenery Street
San Francisco, CA 94131
Call us at (415) 586-3733 to find out how else you might lend your support.
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The Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project
Our events are put on under the umbrella of the Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project (the "BBCLP"). That's how we fund our ambitious schedule of 300 or so concerts and literary events every year.
The BBCLP is a [Read More ]
The Independent Musicians Alliance
Gigging musicians! You have nothing to lose but your lack of a collective voice to achieve fair wages for your work!
The IMA can be a conduit for you, if you join in to make it work.
https://www.independentmusiciansalliance.org/
Read more here - Andy Gilbert's Feb 25 article about the IMA from KQED's site
