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!
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But nothing beats being in the room with the music & the musicians!
Peter Barshay is a fine bassist with a long and impressive track record, not to mention a beautiful tone & musical intelligence. With Grant Levin on piano and Bryan Bowman on drums, this will go down in your personal annals as one of the best trios you’ve laid ears on! Don’t miss out! On the jazz scene here for just a few years, Grant Levin has quickly become one of the most in-demand pianists on the Bay Area jazz scene, with a sophisticated harmonic and rhythmic approach that belies his youth. Bryan Bowman has been setting a high bar for Bay Area drummers in the avant garde and straight ahead traditions for over 20 years. As for Peter Barshay, he’s renowned in the Bay Area and nationally, and has shared the bandstand with such jazz luminaries as Kenny Barron, Freddie Hubbard, Sonny Stitt, Kenny Werner, Shirley Horn, Woody Shaw, Pharoah Sanders, Blue Mitchell, Tony…
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Editor/Illuminator Brian Lucas is joined by a cohort of contributors to his ongoing illuminated book project, about which one might find more here: http://poetbook.tumblr.com/ Readers will include Micah Ballard, Gillian Conoley, Patrick James Dunagan, Derek Fenner, Andrew Joron, Ava Koohbor, Sara Larsen, Todd Melicker, Joseph Noble, Julien Poirier and Cedar Sigo.
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Nancy Morejon is likely the best known and most widely translated woman poet of post-revolutionary Cuba. Born in 1944 in Havana to a militant dock worker and a trade-unionist seamstress, Morejón graduated from Havana University. She has received the Critic’s Prize (1986) and the National Prize for  Literature (2001). She declares, “I am, at once, Nancy Morejon, an individual, a unity, who cannot be subdivided into parts as one does when learning math…I am not more of a black person than a woman; I am not more of a woman than a Cuban; I am not more of a black person than a Cuban. I am a brief combustion of those factors.†Poet Jayne Cortez has called her poems “lyrical, compassionate, complex, and dazzling in their subtleties.†Please join us for an hour with Nancy Morejon in conversation with Tony Ryan.
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Don’t miss the rockin’ wonder from Down Under known as Pugsley Buzzard, playing his third solo show at Bird & Beckett.. Pugs is at once a rollicking stride piano master and a gravelly voiced singer, plumbing the extremes of dark fate and wry, whisky-soaked self-reflection. He plays barrelhouse blues & boogie woogie, growls his dark & titillating songs, and pumps out magnificent Harlem stride with a monstrous left hand and a dextrous right one.  A Sunday afternoon of good company, good music & a glass of decent wine… add a book to that mix, and, why, it’s magic! Read on for a rave review of a recent show by Pugsley in Perth and check Pugsley’s website at http://www.pugsleybuzzard.com/ for sound files and more. We’re proud that Bird & Beckett is his San Francisco home base…  He’s also at Pier 23 and Oakland’s Sound Room on this west coast swing before heading to New Orleans and back home. Last we heard,…
Read MoreRemember the halcyon days when Dave Parker’s jazzmen burned bright at the Red Rock Lounge down at the corner of Chenery & Diamond Street every Friday night! Jerry Logas, tenor sax; Charles Hamilton, trombone; Dave Parker bass; Greg German, drums.Â
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Christopher Gray and J. Raoul Brody join forces with a crew of like-minded friends to pay birthday tribute to — and sing the songs of — Harry Nilsson! A delightfully motley bunch will delve deep into Harry’s career, doing hits he wrote for other people (Three Dog Night’s “One (is the Loneliest Number)”, the Monkees’ “Cuddly Toy”), hits other people wrote for him (“Everybody’s Talkin’”, “(Can’t Live if Living is) Without You”), songs from movies (Popeye, The Point [“Me & My Arrow”? will they take requests?], Skidoo, The Life of Brian), and other oddities (“Good Old Desk”, “You’re Breakin’ My Heart”). Parentheses will abound. Solemn silliness too, we imagine!
Read Morewhich way west? Sunday concert series. All ages welcome! No cover charge, but your generous donations make it possible for us to pay the musicians. Sunday, June 9th – 4:30-6:30 pm: Terry Rodriguez Trio Ranging over jazz terrain from bop to Bill Evans – pianist Terry Rodriguez with bassist Ron Crotty and drummer Tom Hassett.
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On the second Friday of each month, jazz in the bookshop features The Jimmy Ryan Quintet. Drummer Ryan learned the trade in L.A. in the ’50s as well, and hit the San Francisco scene in 1960 — and never looked back. Jimmy has played with legendary musicians like Putter Smith, Vince Wallace, Kent Glenn and Bishop Norman Willliams, putting in significant time at legendary San Francisco clubs like Jimbo’s Bop City and the Gathering Cafe. For his Bird & Beckett dates, trumpeter Henry Hung and trombonist Danny Grewen, two active young players on the local scene, give a rich, fiery and romantic tone to the front line, while guitarist Scott Foster, a Bird & Beckett favorite since the beginning, handles the chordal duties and spins out beautiful lines with aplomb, and Bishu Chatterjee lays down a steady and creative foundation on the upright bass.
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which way west? Sunday concert series. All ages welcome! No cover charge, but your generous donations make it possible for us to pay the musicians. May 26th – 4:30-6:30 pm: Pacific Jazz Connection Jerry Logas, a multi-instrumentalist who covers all manner of saxes, clarinet and flute with equal parts lyricism and power, and Smith Dobson V, tenor player extraordinaire, heir to a multi-generational musical tradition and steeped from the cradle in jazz, bring us a fantastic quintet drawing from the deep well of “West Coast Jazz” that set listeners on their collective ear back in the late 1950s. Pacific Jazz Connection is co-led by Jerry Logas on baritone sax and Smith Dobson V on tenor sax, and a truly top-flight rhythm section comprising pianist Keith Saunders, bassist Michael Glynn and drummer Tony Johnson. Smith Dobson’s dad, also Smith, was a key pianist & vibes player on the regional (and national) scene for decades who played with…
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Sunday, May 19, 4:30-6:30 pm which way west? Sunday concert series never a cover charge, but your donations help us pay the musicians! Trumpet player Warren Gale has had a long and esteemed career, and is considered a key bebop player, particularly in West Coast small combo work, with significant time in Stan Kenton’s orchestra as well.  Drummer Jimmy Gallagher hales from Mendocino where he studied with pianist Kent Glenn– he’s been a vital force on the local jazz scene since moving down several years ago. Pianist Matt Clark needs little introduction to Bay Area, and indeed national, jazz audiences. He’s anchored groups with Bobby Hutcherson, Joshua Redman, Marcus Shelby and countless others. Bassist Michael Glynn studied with Basie & Armstrong associate Buddy Catlett, and has played with top-drawer jazz musicians including Bud Shank, Conte Condoli, Don Lanphere and Jon Hendricks! Join us for two sets of top flight jazz…
Read MoreA Bay Area native, active throughout the region in the early 1960s, with time served as house pianist at Jimbo’s Bop City from 19__ to 19__ in the company of Bishop Norman Williams, etc. Author of Diary of the Underdogs: San Francisco Jazz in the 1960s. Poet and novelist as well.
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We’ve got it all today, mother & daughter writers… New Orleans R&B… it’s all yours! Consider it our gift, in honor of the mothers we’ve got and the ones we sorely miss, and the mothers we are! First, Leslie Simon, mother, and Caya Schaan, daughter, join in a joint Mothers Day reading at 2 pm, and then Macy Blackman rocks it home at 4:30. New Orleans R&B, soulful mother of us all! Macy Blackman & the Mighty Fines might well be the best band in the Bay Area playing the music of Fats Domino, Professor Longhair, Lee Dorsey and Dr. John… originals too! Macy Blackman on piano, Richard Mayers on harmonica and percussion, Larry Vann on drums and Bing Nathan on bass. O Mother! Bring your mother… Bring your child! Single guy or gal out on your own? You’re just as welcome… Let us mention, by the way, that Leslie chairs the Women’s…
Read MoreWednesday, May 15, 2013 at 7:00 pm Poets Benjamin Hollander and George Albon read to celebrate the release of newly published prose works: Hollander’s In the House Un-American, and his Memoir American, and Albon’s Aspiration, all three of which will be hot off the presses from Clockroot/Interlink, Punctum, and Omnidawn, respectively. Benjamin Hollander was born in Haifa, Israel and as a boy immigrated to New York City. He presently lives on the west coast of North America. His books include: In the House Un-American (Clockroot Books/Interlink Publishing, Spring, 2013), Memoir American (Punctum Books, Spring 2013) Vigilance (Beyond Baroque Books, 2005), Rituals of Truce and the Other Israeli, (Parrhesia Press, 2004), The Book Of Who Are Was (Sun & Moon Press, 1997), How to Read, too (Leech Books, 1992), and, as editor, Translating Tradition: Paul Celan in France (ACTS, 1988). George Albon‘s books include Brief Capital of Disturbances (Omnidawn), Momentary Songs (Krupskaya),…
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Marc Dulman has gone into permanent exile now, and we miss him! He was a fine writer – of poetry, plays, prose fiction — and also a dedicated teacher with a long history at CCSF. A man who was constantly attuned to his own muse, who was confident that his writing was on par with the writers of the ages and who was likely quite correct in that assessment. We’re glad to have known him, and to have heard him read his own work — whether it was the poems collected in the volume called House Wine, the play called Ten Franc, or other work that he polished until it shone deep and bright. Marc’s colleagues and friends will gather May 5th, Sunday, at 2 pm to read some of his work — particularly the novel which was on the verge of publication when he passed away suddenly a few months ago. Soul on the…
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which way west? Sunday concert series. All ages welcome! No cover charge, but your generous donations make it possible for us to pay the musicians. Sunday, May 5 – 4:30-6:30 pm: Trio BZF. Pianist Ken French, bassist Ron Belcher and drummer Jim Zimmerman first found common musical ground a dozen years ago when they began traveling together with vocalist Clairdee, and their musical rapport is evidenced on the stunningly cohesive & joyful cd — called simply “Trio” — that they recorded as Trio BZF in a single afternoon in 2006. Their individual careers have kept them busy on divergent paths, but they’ve maintained this trio throughout, playing together whenever their schedule allows. Drummer Jim Zimmerman was on the road with Cleo Laine for decades as well as traveling regularly with Diane Schuur and playing in venues from Carnegie Hall to Tokyo’s Blue Note club with Peggy Lee, Michel Legrand, the…
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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.
We continue to present a full slate of programming of live music and poetry readings, and produce a literary journal and poetry chapbooks, and we seek and welcome your continued financial support by way of donations through our fiscal sponsor, Jazz in the Neighborhood.
Click on "donate" in the navigation bar above. Better yet, send or drop off a check made out to our fiscal sponsor, Jazz in the Neighborhood, with BBCLP in the memo line. Our mailing address is:
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
