Michael Zilber, saxophone Matt Clark, piano Essiet Okon Essiet, bass Mike Clark, drums $20 cash cover – byob – reservations, call 415-586-3733 Doors open ten minutes before the 7:30 show time. Not able to come to the shop? Donate any amount that seems fair to you, and watch it in the live stream on our YouTube channel or Facebook page. Your donations help us pay a fair guaranteed wage to the fine musicians that cross our stage. Inextricably tied to the Headhunters, drummer Mike Clark is a funk legend whose beats for Herbie Hancock’s hugely influential mid-70s band have been endlessly sampled. But long before he brought East Bay grease into the keyboardist’s pioneering combo, Clark was a Philly Joe Jones-idolizing jazz cat who came up on the 1960s Bay Area jazz scene playing bebop. On the recent Sunnyside album he co-leads with East Bay saxophonist Michael Zilber, Mike Drop,…

Come out for a special night with NYC-based jazz pianist Joe Davidian. A consummate musician, Joe’s deep affinity for feel-good rhythms and strong melodies is evident in his dynamic playing. Joined by local musicians John Wiitala (bass) and Brian Fishler (drums), the trio will regale us with tunes from The Great American Songbook with a few Davidian originals peppered in. For lovers of Bill Evans, this is one not to miss! $20 cover / byob / reservations 415-586-3733 Catch the show live streamed on Bird & Beckett’s YouTube channel or Facebook page if you can’t make it down to the shop to hear them in person. Donate to help us pay the musicians. Video link: No Moon At All - Live at Mezzrow, NYC  “…a deeply talented pianist who maintains a delicate balance between forward thinking and jazz tradition…” – The Nashville Scene “…what lifts Davidian’s playing above the crop of…

Vibist Dan Neville is home for the holidays, and he’s slipping into Bird & Beckett for a quartet date, joined by pianist Bilge Gunaydin, bassist Aaron Germain and drummer Mike Mitchell! Dan has been studying composition this past semester in the renowned jazz program at William Patterson University back east in New Jersey, and for this engagement he brings along a classmate, pianist Bilge Gunaydin, one of the “brightest lights of the Istanbul jazz scene,” according to a review on the “All About Jazz” site. Bilge’s 2020 release “Daydreams” rides on “the evocative pulling-power of Bilge’s compositions. They charm the listener with quirky harmonic turns, melodic imagination and variety in the arrangements.” The reviewer goes on to note that “From open-sounding wind arrangements to nostalgic Turkish tango evocations, this album makes you indeed daydream.” Just the ticket for a Sunday evening during the holidays… $20 cover charge; byob doors open…

Darren Johnston – trumpet/vocals Ben Goldberg – clarinets Marcus Shelby – bass Dillon Vado – marimba $20 cover / byob / reservations 415-586-3733 Catch the show live streamed on Bird & Beckett’s YouTube channel or Facebook page if you can’t make it down to the shop to hear them in person. Donate to help recompense the musicians!  

Two jazz composers meet for the first time.   Beth Schenck, saxophone Scott Foster, guitar Matt Small, bass Jason Levis, drums   $20 cover charge, byob doors open at 7:20 for the 7:30 show for a reservation, call the shop at 415-586-3733   Catch the show live streamed on Bird & Beckett’s YouTube channel or Facebook page if you can’t make it down to the shop to hear them in person. Donate to help recompense the musicians!

Bart Schneider’s new book from Kelly’s Cove Press, The Daily Feast, is a joyous and savory collaboration between old friends, Sonoma painter Chester Arnold and Berkeley poet Bart Schneider. All the work focuses on food and drink, from oysters on the half shell to dirty martinis, with an afterword by legendary Napa chef and restaurateur Cindy Pawlcyn. Read Jonah Raskin’s review & profile of the poet/publisher at this link.   Also on hand, short story writer Daniel Coshnear, whose collection Occupy and Other Love Stories was brought out by Kelly’s Cove in 2012. Dan Coshnear lives in Guerneville, California with his wife and two children, works at a group home for the homeless and mentally ill, and teaches writing at UC Berkeley Extension and in other North Bay facilities. He is author of Jobs & Other Preoccupations (Helicon Nine 2001) and Occupy & Other Love Stories (Kelly’s Cove Press 2012) and a novella, Homesick, Redux (Flock…

                    Featured poets Preeti Vangani and Charlie Getter Preeti Vangani is a poet and personal essayist. Born and raised in Mumbai, she is the author of Mother Tongue Apologize (RLFPA Editions), her first book of poems (selected as the winner of RL India Poetry Prize.) Her work has been published in BOAAT, Gulf Coast, Threepenny Review, among other journals. She is the Assistant Poetry Editor for Glass Journal, a Poet Mentor at Youth Speaks, and holds an MFA (Writing) from University of San Francisco. https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84350265713?pwd=eE84V3BYdWxiSFBHNHhmdUt1WTUzdz09 Meeting ID: 843 5026 5713 Passcode: 244211  

Americana noir from a master songwriter, with bassist Mike Anderson, Henry Salvia on piano, and special guest vocalist Pamela Brandon. $20 cover charge; byob. Can’t make it to the shop with your cover charge? Donate ten or twenty and watch it in the stream on our YouTube channel or Facebook page!  

San Francisco journalist Denise Sullivan conducts a monthly series of conversations (the second Sunday of each month from 10-11 a.m.) with The City’s activists, educators, arts and cultural leaders and lesser-known workers, the everyday people who help make this place we call home, live streamed from Bird & Beckett Books. December 11 at 10 a.m., Denise and photojournalist Mabel Jiménez will have a conversation from our stage in a live stream viewable on the Bird & Beckett Facebook page and YouTube channel. Mabel Jiménez is an award-winning journalist and documentary photographer with over 15 years of experience in nonprofit local media. She worked for over a decade at El Tecolote bilingual newspaper, most notably as the publication’s Photo Editor. During the Trump era, Jiménez documented the refugee crisis at the U.S./Mexico border, receiving awards for reporting and photography. In 2021, she documented the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on San…

Jazz standards and hard bop favorites arranged by Omar Aran in the classic jazz trio style. Adam Shulman, piano Eric Markowitz, bass Omar Aran, drums $20 cover charge, byob. Doors open at 7:20 for the 7:30 show. For a reservation, call the shop at 415-586-3733. Catch the show live streamed on Bird & Beckett’s YouTube channel or Facebook page if you can’t make it down to the shop to hear them in person. Donate to help recompense the musicians!

John Calloway, flute and percussion Hafez Modirzadeh, saxophone Tony Stead – piano Saul Sierra – bass Dillon Vado – drumsJohn Calloway, master musician and educator, is unable to join us tonight due to a positive virus test with minor symptoms, but will return with his ensemble on February 4th, so please mark your calendar and wish him well! He will be well represented tonight by the stellar rhythm section he assembled for this date with his estimable colleague Hafez Modirzadeh stepping in on reeds. Do join us for two splendid sets of music. $20 cover charge, byob. Doors open at 7:20 for the 7:30 show. For a reservation, call the shop at 415-586-3733. Catch the show live streamed on Bird & Beckett’s YouTube channel or Facebook page if you can’t make it down to the shop to hear them in person. Donate to help recompense the musicians!

Tonight at Bird & Beckett! 7pm. If you can’t make it to the shop, catch the live stream on Bird & Beckett’s Facebook page or YouTube channel. We are pleased to host Carol Gigliotti, author of The Creative Lives of Animals, offering “intimate glimpses of creativity in the lives of animals from elephants to alligators to ants.” She’ll present her book in dialog with Calder G. Lorenz, her son and the author One Way Down (or Another), “a novel content to follow its narrator’s lead, not looking for trouble but sometimes finding it, thriving instead on the strength of his rich inner dilemmas.” (Seattle Book Review). Less interested in artificial intelligence than in the creativity of sentient beings other than homo sapiens, and already know something of trees and mushrooms? Then this is the place to be Thursday evening! Take a listen to this NPR Morning Edition interview with Carol aired on…

Trombonist Grachan Moncur III emerged from the Benny Golson-Art Farmer Jazztet, steeped in hardbop, to become one of the more original improvising composers of the mid-’60s New York jazz scene. With evocative titles like Gnostic, Esoteric, Love and Hate, Frankenstein, Air Raid and Ghost Town, his pen and his bone discovered new solutions to jazz problems of the era. New forms, old forms, no form. Bay Area stalwarts Mezzacappa, Ewing and Glenn are joined by Rova’s Bruce Ackley, and led through Moncur’s wonderland by East Bay treasure, vibraphonist Dave Casini. The music is swinging, compelling and drenched in fresh shades of blue. The casual fan of early to mid-1960s jazz knows well the names and the work of Wayne Shorter, Herbie Hancock and Tony Williams. Most have a pretty good handle on Cecil McBee as well, or should… We dare say many likely don’t fully register the name of the…

On December 4, the San Francisco Conservatory of Music’s Roots, Jazz & American Music B.Mus. degree program fields the B105 Seminar Jazz Ensemble coached by drummer Akira Tana. Remarkable talent on display! Come down to the shop, or tune in to the live stream on our YouTube channel or Facebook page. Your donations support the musicians and the stream. Thanks for that! The first Sunday of each month, Bird & Beckett proudly presents a jazz combo comprising students from a local college or high school opening the program, followed by a student jam session led by a professional trio. Co-produced and underwritten by Jazz in the Neighborhood and Bird & Beckett, the students in the combos receive a small stipend and the professional musicians receive a guaranteed fair wage. Your contributions are much appreciated. Your ears as well! All young and youngish students aspiring to a career in jazz —…