Tony Saunders on Bass & Vocals Marc Daniels Guitar Tina Bryant Keys Don Schiff Bass Larry Vann Drums $25, byob Advance reservations – 415-586-3733 You can leave your hat on! Celebrate Valentine’s Day with Tony Saunders & Co. and celebrate as well the 89th anniversary of Tony’s late father Merl Saunders’ birth.   Tony grew up playing music with his father, who put him through the San Francisco Conservatory of Music studying piano, but Tony gravitated to the bass and his father launched him on a career that has included four lps as a leader and countless others as sideman, composer and producer. In the mid-1970s, Merl formed the “Aunt Monk” band with Larry Vann on drums and a young Tony on bass — in a super line up that included guitarist Chris Hayes (of Huey Lewis & the News) and saxophonist Martin Fierro (Zero). Fantasy Records released Merl Saunders…

https://us02web.zoom.us/j/84350265713?pwd=eE84V3BYdWxiSFBHNHhmdUt1WTUzdz09 Meeting ID: 843 5026 5713 Passcode: 244211 Robert Eugene Rubino is a retired newspaper copy editor and sports columnist who has published prose and poetry in various print and online journals. In 2016 he was nominated for a Pushcart Prize in creative nonfiction and in 2022 published three collections: “Aficionado,” prose & poetry, hummingwordpress.com “Vanity Unfair,” poetry, cathexisnorthwestpress.com “Douglas Knocks Out Tyson,” poetry, rawartreview.com Born and raised in New York City, for more than 50 years he has lived in California, including Berkeley, San Francisco, Oakland, the Gold Country, the San Joaquin Valley and  for 30 years in the North Bay. He currently lives in Palo Alto with his wife, Terry. Karen Llagas’s new chapbook, All Of Us Are Cleaved, is recently published by Nomadic Press. Her first collection of poetry, Archipelago Dust, was published by Meritage Press in 2010. A recipient of the 2022 RHINO Founder’s Prize, Filamore Tabios, Sr. Memorial Poetry Prize, an Elizabeth George Award and…

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 workers, the everyday people who help make this place we call home, live streamed from Bird & Beckett Books and viewable on the Bird & Beckett Facebook page and YouTube channel. This month Denise is in conversation with Dr. Ahimsa Porter Sumchai, one of San Francisco’s leading experts in environmental toxins and a persistent advocate for environmental justice for residents of the Bayview-Hunters Point community. Sumchai is the founder and principal investigator for the Hunters Point Community Biomonitoring Program, founding chair of the Hunters Point Naval Shipyard Restoration Advisory Board’s Radiological Subcommittee and contributor to the 2005 Draft Historical Radiological Assessment and medical director of Golden State MD Health & Wellness, a UCSF and Stanford trained author and researcher, and…

original latin jazz rock fusion explosion! Adrian Areas proudly carries a tradition that encompasses all the San Francisco jazz rock fusion history that constellates around the Azteca/Malo/Santana years. His uncle Chepito was right in the midst of that wonderful maelstrom. Thomas Molina, trumpet Josh Icban, guitar Jeff Patterson, bass Jimmy Toor, drums Adrian Areas, Moperc tumbadoras $25 cash cover charge. Doors open at 7:20 for the 7:30 show BYOB and a mask. Live in the shop! You can also take it in live streamed on our YouTube channel or Facebook page. Donate if you can!

Eric Shifrin has brought the In Crowd to Bird & Beckett countless times in the past twenty years, but it’s never been enough! He’s been the favorite of the swells & the swindlers in the finest saloons and boites of this town for decades, and when he brings the In Crowd in here, we’re all in. So now, we’ve invited him to come into Bird & Beckett every second Friday, for the happiest 2.5-hour happy hour you’ll find. This Friday, he’s featuring the wonderful Lara Louise on guitar and vocals, and the marvelous Simon Planting on bass. You may arrive in a mood shaped by the travails of the working week, but when you leave at 8 you’ll be singing a different, snappier tune– we can assure you of that! BYOB and a twenty for the musicians! On the skids or the dole? Bring what you can afford and sip…

Pieces to be read this evening from the anthology will include: Janet Alvarado’s Introduction to Claming Our Stories – read by the author/editor Albert A. Acena’s “Where Have the Nurses Gone? – read by Laarni San Juan Rhys Alvarado’s “1946” – read by Alohi Alvarado Emil Guillermo’s “Centennial Club Members Ricardo and Willie: Filipinos in the Heart of San Francisco” – read by Janet Alvarado Baylan Megino’s “Dancing My Filipino Roots” – read by the author Oscar Peñaranda’s “Babaylan in Playland by the Sea” – read by Edwin Lozada Giulio Sorro’s “My Dad Is a Flower” – read by the author _________________________________________________ Bios of the writers and readers: Alohi Vega Alvarado is native born of Maui, Hawaii. She is an artist, freelance model and designer. In high school, Alohi pursued live theater performance and art.  In 2021, Alohi was featured in underwater fashions by Justin Drew, Fashion Le Cour.  Alohi,…

Ten musicians on the Bird & Beckett stage tonight! Ten musicians to pay! Sliding scale $10-40 cover charge requested. No reservations. No comps.  Only 30 seats! Doors open at 7:15. BYOB.GRUPO OKÁN TOYÉ is an Afro Cuban folkloric troupe dedicated to learning, performing and preserving the musical traditions specifically from Matanzas, Cuba! The group is co-directed and managed by Ahkeel Mestayer and Toribio Villamil, most recently the director of Grupo AfroCuba de Matanzas in Cuba. Personnel: Yaimel Villamil Ahkeel Mestayer Christelle Durandy Julio Areas Orlando Torriente Toby Gaster Emilio Davalos Jacki Corona Genesie Reinoso Ceferino Vergara-Tucker

This latest historic match-up between kaleidoscopic pianist Ira Kamin and drummer PC Muñoz is a celebration of their new album, “St. Anne’s Band”, available exclusively on bandcamp. Come experience the battle in person! $10-20 sliding scale cover charge, to help us pay the musicians a guaranteed fair wage! byob

John Calloway, flute & percussion Tony Stead, piano Ollie Dudek, bass Brian Andres, drums   $20 cash cover charge at the door, please! BYOB. For a reservation, call 415-586-3733. Reservations are held until showtime. San Francisco native flautist, composer and arranger Dr. John Calloway has spent the last four decades in the Bay Area as one of the vanguard flute players known nationally in Latin jazz, jazz and Afro-Latino music.  Since returning to the Bay Area in the mid 1980s after a stint in New York, John has performed with Omar Sosa, Israel “Cachao” Lopez, Rebeca Mauleon, Marcus Shelby, Jesus Diaz, Wayne Wallace, Kularts and Quijerema, and has had an almost 50-year working collaborative relationship with Bay Area legend John Santos.  He has performed internationally in Cuba, Chile, Venezuela, Europe, Singapore and the Philippines; he has composed and arranged music for GRAMMY nominated projects and for films, including “Hemingway &…

She’s back! Come hear the boogie woogie & blues maven Wendy DeWitt blow the house down with her partner Kirk Harwood on drums and the inestimable blues guitarist Takezo Takeda, the Soul Man from Japan! BYOB and a twenty for the trio! Reservations, call 415-586-3733 Here’s the trio’s last Bird & Beckett show! Check it out… Wendy caught the attention of Western Swing Hall of Famer Tommy Thomsen (Sonoma) at age 10, and hasn’t stopped since. Former pianist for Hank Ballard and Steve Freund, Wendy has also played with Hank Ballard and the Midnighters, Charlie Musselwhite, Otis Rush and Jimmy Thackery. She tours national and international festivals and produces the annual Queens of Boogie Woogie and San Francisco International Boogie Woogie Festival, which draws artists from around the world. “All the cool kids already know DeWitt is one smoking boogie woogie piano/organ gal and it’s time for the word to…

Bird & Beckett presents featured poets and an open mic on the first Thursday of each month, hosted by Michael Koch and Jerry Ferraz. James Cagney’s second poetry collection, Martian: The Saint of Loneliness is the winner of the 2021 James Laughlin Award from the Academy of American Poets. His first, Black Steel Magnolias In The Hour Of Chaos Theory won the PEN Oakland Josephine Miles Award in 2018. Both titles are available from Nomadic Press. For more information, please visit JamesCagneypoet.com. Tureeda Mikell, is an Oakland native, award winning poet, MoAD 2022 Poet in Residence, original Black Panther alum, griot, story medicine woman, Qi Reader, author, and educator. She has published over 70 at-risk student anthologies from 5 bay area counties.  Hailed, activist for holism hell bent on asserting life, her works have been published and or traveled from Africa, France, UK, Australia, Japan, and China. Her book, Synchronicity:…

Vince Lateano, drums Peter Barshay, bass Ben Stolorow, piano All jazz players welcome to take the stage. Or just come to listen. No cover charge. If you can’t make it into the shop, you can catch the live stream on our Facebook page or YouTube channel.  Your donations to help pay the trio and support the stream are much appreciated! Bird & Beckett adheres to the guaranteed fair wage standard promoted by the Independent Musicians Alliance.

Gerald Beckett, flute Michael Gold, saxophone Greg Jacobs, piano Carl Herder, bass Greg German, drums $25 cover charge; byob Reservations, call 415-586-3733 Streamed live on our YouTube channel and Facebook page. Born and raised in Texas, flutist Gerald Beckett is a stalwart of the San Francisco music scene. Eight years of classical training at the San Francisco Conservatory, combined with extensive jazz studies with some of the leading teachers in the Bay Area, has left Beckett with a firm command of both his instrument and the jazz idiom. About his most recent CD, his sixth, Downbeat Magazine had this to say: A common juke-joint sound is pervasive on several of flutist Gerald Beckett’s compositions—particularly on “Down Low,” “Club Raven” and “Shacktown.” Each tune has a rollicking mood that resonates with a gut-bucket blues feeling. But there are other sounds on MOOD, and none more chocked with hard-bop ingredients than “Minor…