Bohemian North Beach meets Bohemian Mission District Poets Jessica Loos and Marina Lazzara, key figures in overlapping poetry communities, read their work. An open mic follows. Jerry Ferraz and Michael Koch co-host Bird & Beckett’s monthly first-Thursday poetry readings. Jessica Loos is a poet and performer who lives in San Francisco. She organizes the poetry for North Beach First Friday Artwalk, North Beach festival, and events at Specs.  Jessica is also a  member of The Living Theatre, and a collage artist. Marina Lazzara is a poet, small press publisher and musician born & raised in Easton, PA with an MA in Poetics from New College of California, paying the bills as a California native plant gardener and studying Western Herbalism on the side. She’s been published in Processed World, Big Bridge, Fence, Amerarcana and The Brooklyn Rail and has been touring and recording with several San Francisco bands since 1998. Video…

Sunday 1/30 Live + Live Stream, 5:00pm $25 cash cover charge ($10-25 sliding scale) Ahkeel Mestayer Latin Jazz/AfroCuban Quintet Ahkeel Mestayer, percussion Emilio Davilos, percussion Eric Peralta, piano Julio de la Cruz, bass Thomas Pridgen, drumset Catch our live streams on Bird & Beckett’s YouTube channel or Facebook page. Donate per the information on the screen if you can. The stream is a crucial artist/audience lifeline in a tough time, and the support of the home viewing audience is also crucial to make it sustainable. If you’re careful, and just a bit brave, you’ll find there’s nothing like live music and poetry among a few friends. Capacity is 20 in the shop for this month’s shows, so call ahead, don your mask, wash your hands, bring your own beverage, and come to the little village that is Glen Park to enjoy another fine night of San Francisco culture! Bring cash for the…

Ahkeel Mestayer, percussion Emilio Davilos, percussion Eric Peralta, piano Julio de la Cruz, bass Thomas Pridgen, drumset Call for reservations (415) 586-3733. Audience capacity – 20. $25 cash cover charge (sliding scale, pay what you can). proof of vaccination and masks, please BYOB live streamed on Facebook and YouTube Doors open at 4:45pm for the 5:00pm show. Reservations must be claimed by showtime in case there are folks waiting to take whatever empty seats are available. Space often opens up on the second set, so grab a beer at Glen Park Station (the bar on Diamond between Chenery and Bosworth) and come back at the break around 6pm if you couldn’t get in at 5!

listen up! this is not your everyday jazz! Doors open at  7:20 for the 7:30 show. Audience capacity – 20. Call for reservations (415) 586-3733. Also viewable live streamed on the Bird & Beckett Facebook page or YouTube channel. Your donations are appreciated to help us meet the band’s guarantee. They must eat and pay San Francisco rents! $30 cash cover charge for this six-piece band + proof of vaccination and masks. Also, BYOB. Reservations must be claimed by showtime in case there are folks waiting to take whatever empty seats are available. Russian Telegraph is the brainchild of Beth Custer (Trance Mission, Club Foot Orchestra) and David James (Afrofunk Experience, Spearhead, The Coup), who had the inspiration to merge a couple of their separate bands into one. It’s a blend of Beth Custer Ensemble, with their Art Song, their clarinets, and their trumpet; David James’s GPS, with it’s quixotically “political” instrumentals;…

Spend an hour at Bird & Beckett this Thursday evening with Byron Spooner as he reads excerpts from his new book of stories, Rounding Up a Bison, and engages in idle banter & litjabber with interlocutor and long-time friend Robert Mailer Anderson. BYOB. No charge, though you might want to buy Byron’s book once you’ve sampled his wares. Can’t make it down to the shop? You can catch it in the live stream on Bird & Beckett’s YouTube channel or Facebook page. Byron Spooner is the author of Rounding Up a Bison: Stories (Andover Street Archives Press, 2021). He is retired as the Literary Director of the Friends of the San Francisco Public Library where for many years he produced literary events. He founded and edited The Readers Review, the Friends’ literary blog, where he wrote about books, music, film and bookselling. His writing has been published widely on a…

Jinx, a virtuoso of rockabilly, surf and jazz guitar, returns to Bird & Beckett with a trio for an evening of jazz and instrumental exotica, as heard on his cd, “Jinx Jones Trio Live,” recorded where? Recorded here, at Bird & Beckett some years ago. Jinx’s jazz ages well with time. Come share the room with Jinx’s trio — Kenan O’Brien on bass and Ken Owen on drums — feeling the music reverberate in the bookshop. A good time assured. Please BYOB and a twenty for the band. If you can’t make it into the shop, you can catch the music live on our Facebook page or YouTube channel. Your donations to help pay the musicians and support the stream are much appreciated!    

Drummer Tony Johnson leads a quartet on the 4th Friday of each month Tonight: Bob Kenmotsu, tenor sax Keith Saunders, piano Eric Markowitz, bass Tony Johnson, drums Doors open at  7:20 for the 7:30 show. Audience capacity – 20. Call for reservations (415) 586-3733. Also viewable live streamed on the Bird & Beckett Facebook page or YouTube channel. Your donations are appreciated. $20 cash cover charge + proof of vaccination and masks. Also, BYOB. Reservations must be claimed by showtime in case there are folks waiting to take whatever empty seats are available!

Thursday, January 27 7:30pm Live streamed only Catch the live stream on Bird & Beckett’s YouTube channel or Facebook page. Walker Brents III on the Many Masks of William Everson, a.k.a. Brother Antoninus. A plowman, a rake, a conscientious objector, a printing press craftsman, a mad mystic monk, a Dionysian beat poet, a saintly teacher of creative perception, an incisive critical intellect. The voice of the earth at the edge of the continent. Amidst the roaring of the waves, he told of the way things are and we can hear it yet. His legacy is like a mountain range. A testimony out of the depths of time and space, attuned, should we dare to respond, to the particularity of our own need for vision.  

Jeffrey Burr, guitar Adam Shulman, organ Eric Garland, drums with guest organist Brian Charette $20 cash cover charge at the door. Doors open at 7:20pm for the 7:30pm show. Sorry, no reservations. First 20 people in line are admitted. Audience capacity is 20. BYOB, plus proof of vaccination and mask. Please keep your mask on except when actually sipping something! Let’s keep the musicians healthy. Just another fun Tuesday night in Glen Park at Bird & Beckett. Catch the show at home in the live stream! You’ll find it on Bird & Beckett’s YouTube channel or Facebook page.

Kim Shuck, poet & artist, conducts Bird & Beckett’s virtual poetry series twice a month. On the fourth Monday of the month, it’s all open mic. So polish up a gem or grab one you want to try out on other poets and Zoom in. Zoom link, click here Google Meet, click here On the 2nd Monday, there are featured poets in addition to the open mic.

“With its intimations of primal sacred cries, HowellDevine embodies elemental blues and boogie like juke joint prophets. Featuring Eli’s Mile High Club-honed Joshua Howell on slide guitars, harmonica, and vocals, percussion expert Roll ’Em Pete Devine on drums and washboard, and the relentlessly propulsive Joe Kyle Jr. on bass, the combo taps into red clay Delta roots while embracing fierce grooves that speak to urban realities. ” –Andrew Gilbert, East Bay Express Powerful music from a trio that’s the toast of venues up and down the coast and all around the festival circuit. It’s always a pleasure to have them back to Bird & Beckett. Nobody’s who heard HowellDevine is likely to have forgotten the experience. $20 cash cover charge. Audience capacity is 20, so call for a reservation! 415-586-3733. Doors open at 4:45 for the 5pm show. Proof of vaccination & masks required. BYOB. Take in our shows on…

Marco Diaz – trumpet Charlie Gurke – saxes Julio Perez – percussion Saúl Sierra – bass. $20 cash cover charge; BYOB; proof of vaccination & masks, please. Doors open at  7:20 for the 7:30 show. Audience capacity – 20. Call for reservations (415) 586-3733. Also viewable live streamed on the Bird & Beckett Facebook page or YouTube channel. Your donations are appreciated. Bassist, composer, arranger and educator Saúl Sierra, born and raised in México City, began playing professionally in 1990 and graduated from the Berklee School of Music in Boston before moving to the San Francisco Bay Area in 1999. He has performed, toured or recorded with Poncho Sanchez, Paquito D’ Rivera, Zakir Hussain, Arturo Sandoval, Jerry Gonzales, Jerry Medina, Walfredo de los Reyes, Peter Erskine, Donny McCaslin, Charlie Musselwhite, Pete Escovedo, Ernesto Oviedo, Steve Turre, Ray Vega, Hector Tricoche, Paquito Guzman, Antonio Sanchez, Arturo O’Farrill, Larry Harlow, Bobi Céspedes, Jimmy Bosh,…

Come along on a journey to the center of the jazz, a deep dive into the dark caves of improvised music in search of the music’s inner light. The expedition has been conceived and rehearsed and is ready to descend. Come cheer them on as they don the requisite gear and visit a mysterious interior never yet explored by jazz musicians! Bruce Ackley, reeds Scott Foster, guitar Pete Schmitt, bass David Brandt, drums Scott Foster has been bringing us fresh projects on the 3rd Friday of the month for years now, and has never yet run out of prospects. We’re always the richer for it. This time he’s mining for beatcoin. Please bring $20 in cash for the cover charge so we can pay these musicians a guaranteed fair wage. Also bring proof of vaccination and a mask, and something to sip. If you can’t get to the shop or…

Publisher and researcher Tate Swindell hosts author Thomas Antonic, offering a presentation, with audio & visuals, from his book Amongst Nazis: William S. Burroughs in Vienna 1936/37. An onstage Q & A between Antonic and Swindell with audience participation will follow.  A live stream of this event can be found on the Bird & Beckett Facebook page or YouTube channel.

The Jinx Jones Trio, with Angeline Saris, bass & Ken Owen, drums. Two sets of instrumental exotica and jazz! One of America’s finest guitar stylists & an intrepid explorer, dedicated to the psychotropic extremes of rockabilly, surf and your more august & happy traditions. Live streamed and live in the shop to an audience of 20. Call 415-202-4870 to reserve. Bring $20-30 cash for the cover charge to help us pay these fine musicians. Also BYOB, and the usual: keep that mask up, except when sippin’, and bring that card. Tuning in on YouTube or Facebook? Contribute per the instructions on the video screen! It’s on you, too, to make this culture work! And make it work, we shall! Down in Glen Park, with the…