Bob Kenmotsu, saxophone.
Keith Saunders, piano.
Eric Markowitz, bass.
Tony Johnson, drums.

$20 suggested donation per adult / byob.
Teens and students, $10.
Kids free.

Tony Johnson has been a cornerstone of the San Francisco jazz scene since he hit town in 1959.

Tony recorded on Riverside Records with singer Bev Kelly and saxophonist Pony Poindexter (“Bev Kelly in Person, Live at the Coffee Gallery,” 1960, produced by Orrin Keepnews); in 1964 was musical director of the Vagabonds at the Tropicana Hotel in Las Vegas, playing the Ed Sullivan Show with the band in 1964 on the same bill with Sammy Davis, Jr.; toured nationally with Earl “Fatha” Hines in 1971; played with Bobby Short at the Hungry Eye in North Beach and with Peggy Lee in 1973 at the Fairmont Hotel’s Venetian Room; toured and recorded with the Claude Williamson Trio; was in Mike Vax’s Great American Jazz Band for half a dozen years; and was behind the kit for more than forty years in trombonist Brian Gould’s Swing Fever, a premier Bay Area party & wedding band that toured Alaska and the Western States extensively, toured and recorded with Clark Terry, Buddy Di Franco & Terry Gibbs, and played the Monterey Jazz Festival with Clark Terry in 1999. Swing Fever featured singer Denise Perrier for decades as well as singer Jackie Ryan, saxophonists Noel Jewkes and Ray Loeckle, bassist Dean Reilly and many other fine jazz players.

As a sideman and with his own combos, Tony has long been a fixture at the much missed Enrico’s in North Beach and Club Deluxe in the Haight, as well as countless other Bay Area venues still swinging along, including the No Name Bar, Caffe Divino, the Comstock and many more.

For several years now, Tony has led his quartet here at Bird & Beckett four fourth Fridays a year and the 230 Jones Street Band eight more fourth Fridays a year. With either outfit, you can’t go wrong.

“Tony the Tiger,” he’s been dubbed, and he never stops swingin’.