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!
1964 saw the release of A Love Supreme, a jazz record that changed the world’s thinking on jazz, even as John Coltrane had already set the path… This Sunday, percussionist Anthony Brown will celebrate the milestone of the album’s 50th anniversary, with a trio and the eminent poet Genny Lim, a crucial voice on the San Francisco scene since the 1970s,
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It’s jazz club at Bird & Beckett… when lights are low. Special performances, and a sweet vibe to make your Saturday night. Don’t look back!  Tonight, trumpeter, flugelhornist & singer Dave Bendigkeit brings in a marvelous, tight quartet with David Udolf on piano, Peter Barshay on bass and Akira Tana on drums. All of these musicians were deeply involved in creating the jazz that evolved post-1968.  By the time a lot of us thought it was just disco, these guys were driving through the changes into a dizzy atmosphere of their own making.  Says Dave, “No musical ‘rear-view mirrors’ for us…”  They’re artists.  They don’t look back. Yes, they mine some classic material, but they’re also busy creating original music “from the great river of American music where the groove and self-expression are paramount.” Dave began working on the San Francisco jazz scene in the early 1970s, performing with dozens and…
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David Meltzer’s a brilliant poet and he could use a hand!  So come give him a hand, and let’s put together some funds to meet medical expenses.  A $20 donation at the door is requested, though we’ll not turn anyone away as long as space allows!  And much larger donations are definitely encouraged and appreciated.  We’ll also sell a signed letterpress broadside that David’s working up with Nick Whittington as we speak! Colleagues Clark Coolidge, Sunnylyn Thibodeaux, Andrew Joron, Les Gottesman and Julie Rogers will read poems.  Cloud Shepherd and The Rabbles will play music.  Wine, beer and abundant high spirits guaranteed! Can’t make it on November 9th?  No worries!  Visit Meltzerville at this link and it will take you to a place where you can donate to the fund!
Read MoreGuitarist Tom Lander brings in a quartet including saxophonist Charlie McCarthy, bassist Chuck Bennett and drummer Tony Johnson for two sets of jazz standards and originals. All this other stuff this weekend? Â Wonderful indeed. Â Way beautiful! Â But this Tom Lander date is as good as it gets! Â If you’re seriously appreciative of small combo jazz, you should make this date. Â You know the way you spend ridiculous amounts of time at the International Film Festival? Â That should be how you regard the offerings here at B&B, it we do say so ourselves!. Tom was playing blues and rock in Madison, Wisconsin during college in those heady mid -60s before coming out to San Francisco in 1969. Â He continued in that vein here until digging into music he couldn’t just pick up off records, starting a development in jazz advanced significantly by studies with influential guitar teachers like Davis Ramey and…
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Hey y’all! It’s the new thing at Bird & Beckett! Second Sunday of Every Month Surf-a-billy Swing Time Dance Party! First date: November 9th! Lavay Smith’s Swingin’ Trio Featuring Jules Broussard The band starts early & ends promptly so get out of bed and prepare to swing! Read all about Lavay at lavaysmith.com! Read up on Jules at broussard.com
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Noel Jewkes, reeds. Grant Levin, piano. Joe McKinley, bass. Myron Cohen, drums. Always a new twist when Grant Levin brings in some of San Francisco’s finest and most interesting players. “jazz club” every Saturday night, from 8-11. Â When lights are low… Â It’s not like anything you’ve experienced yet at B&B.
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Randy Craig, piano; Robbie MacGregor, guitar; Alex Baum, bass; and Ken Owen, drums play an eclectic mix of jazz, blues and originals.  Craig and MacGregor have been playing regularly on Wednesday nights at the Marsh Berkeley, with a revolving cast of friends, including today’s bassist and drummer, Alex Baum and Ken Owen.  Visit craigandmacgregor.com for more tantalizing detail on that particular little soiree….  A fine time guaranteed with these guys… Randy has written more than 40 scores for the stage and a slew of film scores. He’s been part of two Obie Award-winning plays and scored an Academy Award-nominated ï¬lm. His work has been seen and heard at the Mill Valley Film Festival and the San Francisco Jewish Film Festival among others around the world. A recipient of the Bay Area Theatre Critics’ Circle Award for Best Musical Score, Randy has worked with the San Francisco Mime Troupe, was a founding…
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Tenorman Smith brings in a crack quartet– with Ben Goldberg on clarinet, Adam Gay on bass and Omar Aran on drums. Â Smith has a brand new cd in hand! Â Come celebrate!
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Special 5th Friday booking: Â John Calloway, flute and percussion, brings in a quartet featuring Andrew Hall on piano; Mike Arnold on bass; and Brian Andres on drums. Recently, John spent time in Cuban recording studios with top local talent there to lay down tracks for a forthcoming cd. Â He’s long been a key player locally, especially on the latin jazz side, as well as an influential teacher at SFSU and other institutions and recently served a long stint on the SF Arts Commission. The quartet will deliver two sets of top quality straight-ahead and latin jazz and bebop! Â Happy Halloween! Come celebrate the end of the baseball season as we kick off another three-day run of great jazz dates, starting tonight at 5:30, Saturday at 8Â (Smith Dobson Quartet)Â and Sunday at 4:30 (Randy Craig Quartet).
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Walker Brents III gives monthly talks at Bird & Beckett on the last Sunday of each month. Oct. 26th at 2:30 pm, he’ll address the vastness of Rumi’s contribution to human insight, beyond the poetry that has become so familiar. Walker has been delivering talks on bits of mythology, various poets and philosophers, and more for many years at Bird & Beckett — on the last Sunday of the month except December, July and August.
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Saturday night, you’ll want to unwind from Giants mania with the Terrance Tony Quartet – Eugene Pliner, piano; Aaron Cohn, bass and Vinnie Rodriguez, drums. Alto player Tony was Houston based until just a couple of years ago.  He was influenced by–and played alongside–legendary Houston tenor players Illinois Jacquet, Arnett Cobb, Don Wilkerson and Eddie “Cleanhead” Vinson and Dallas titans James Clay and Marchel Ivery.  In 1989 he toured with Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers in the band that included Benny Green, Frank Lacy, Javon Jackson and Donald Harrison.
Read MoreSure, Pugsley Buzzard has flat out delighted Bird & Beckett audiences several  years running, as he’s made the store’s stage a regular stop on his mostly annual U.S. tours since 2011.  As we noted then, “he boasts an unlikely name and a voice like gravel on a treacherous road…and he plays a mean piano!” But right now, Pugs is going to have to build up a few more dates to make a U.S. tour practical for his new CD, CHASIN` ACES  (available now at Bird & Beckett!), recorded in New Orleans, Melbourne and the Blue Mountains — with ten new originals and featuring some of New Orleans’ top jazz, blues and funk players including Jimmy Carpenter, Antonio Gambrell, Craig Klein, Charles Brewer, Nathan Lambert, John Fohl and Irene Sage who have performed with artists Dr John, Allen Toussaint, Bonerama, Walter Wolfman Washington, Eric Lindell and the Mardi Gras Indian Funk Ensemble…
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Ben Goldberg, clarinet. Michael Coleman, piano. Rob Adkins, bass. Hamir Atwal, drums. These musicians have been playing together for years in a bunch of incredible groups. As a quartet they are in strict pursuit of beautiful melody. Hamir Atwal says: “I think for each of us, melody comes first. Then there is the importance of breath, and personal expression.†The quartet will be focusing on the music of Annette Peacock. Joining the group from New York is special guest Rob Adkins on bass. Hamir Atwal, a Bay Area native, began playing the drums at the age of 10 and started playing professionally at the age of 18. He studied at the Berklee College of Music on scholarship studying improvisation with saxophone great Joe Lovano and trombonist/composer Hal Crook.  “Studying with composers and people who don’t play your instrument really opened the way I approached music and improvising.” After graduating from Berklee, Hamir moved back to the…
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Diane di Prima, San Francisco Poet Laureate Emeritus, launches her new collection The Poetry Deal (San Francisco Poet Laureate Series No. 5, City Lights Publishers, 2014) in the company of the legendary QR Hand. Both are treasured, original voices with decades of influential work to their credit including four or five decades here in the Bay Area. Joining Diane and QR is the very wonderful piano improviser and composer Walter Earl.
Read MoreJoin us for a community forum on two controversial propositions on the November ballot with State Assembly Candidate and SF Supervisor David Campos and experts from both sides of the Prop G (real estate speculation tax) and Prop E (soda tax) issues.
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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.
TAKE OUR SURVEY
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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
