Two Laureates on one stage… and you in the open mic… Mike Tuggle, Sonoma County Poet Laureate Emeritus (2008-9), is celebrating the upcoming publication of The Motioning In, New & Selected Poems by Petaluma River Press due this spring.  He is also the author of Absolute Elsewhere (2004, Philos Press) & The Singing Itself (2009, Running Wolf Press) & two chapbooks, Cazadero Poems (1994, Floating Island Press), and What Lures The Foxes (2011, Kelly’s Cove Press).  He was the recipient of a Sonoma Community Foundation Award in poetry, a Dickens Award in fiction, and the Oberon Poetry Prize. Bill Vartnaw, Sonoma County Poet Laureate Emeritus (2012-3), is a veteran of the San Francisco poetry open mic scene; he established Taurean Horn Press in 1974, which has published the works of several SF poets.  He is the author of two poetry books, In Concern: for Angels (1984, Taurean Horn Press) & Suburbs of my…

Eugene Pliner, piano Adam Gay, bass Omar Aran, drums A classic piano trio, led by one of the key players on the local scene for decades, often heard at Les Joulins Jazz Bistro. Eugene began his musical career at an early age in Riga, Latvia (formerly Russia). In his early twenties, he migrated to the U.S. where he continued to study piano at the new England Conservatory in Boston under the direction of Ron Blake. He also studied with Andy LaVerne and Richie Bierach in New York. Eugene’s first professional gigs were with the multi-instrumentalist, Ira Sullivan, and Gary Campbell (tenor sax), professor at the University of Miami in Florida. He has recorded in Paris with Stephen McCraven, the prominent drummer in the Archie Shepp band. Eugene’s most recent recording project was called “Memoire d’Antibes,” featuring a program of original compositions.

Smith Dobson, tenor sax     and vibraphone Luke Westbrook, guitar Noah Schenker, bass Hamir Atwal, drums Smith Dobson debuts a new quartet to explore some of his own writing and aspects of the jazz canon that inform his sensibility. Without doubt, Smith is one of the key players on the San Francisco jazz scene — holding forth at Bird & Beckett every first Saturday of the month.

Come on out to our 2nd Sunday Surf-a-billy Swing Time Dance Party! This month, it’s The Pleasure Palace, featuring the guitarero of North Beach, Ned Boynton; organ grinder Lorenzo Farrell and drummer/raconteur Rolf Wilkinson!  You’re going to love this little band and their swinging little repertoire. They’re beyond category, so we won’t assay to pigeonhole them here!  Come and out and enjoy yourself. We’ll ply you with Bloody Marys & Irish Coffees if that’s to your liking…  orange juice if that’s more your style..

Walker Talks!  A monthly series of ruminations by Walker Brents on diverse subjects — from individual writers and philosophers, to bits of mythology, epic tales and cultural turning points.   Today, Walker will plumb the subject of the Greek mystery religions- cults that persisted for centuries and even millennia, each with its own secret rituals, celebrations and belief systems, each centered variously on the likes of Dionysus, Orpheus, Demeter, Persephone, each open only to initiates… …religions that arose as the history of the gods became the history of the soul.

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.

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…