Outfest!
Jazz on the Avant Side
Every Sunday in August

Sunday, August 21st, 4:30 & 5:30 (two sets)

Time is Now, Not Money
featuring Kasey Knudsen, sax

Kasey Knudsen has been taking the avant garde jazz scene by storm since her graduation from Berklee School of Music ten years ago.

Today, she’s featured on sax with an ensemble that is returning for its third performance at Bird & Beckett — “Time Is Now, Not Money” — led by bassist Bishu Chatterjee. Bishu’s a regular on our Friday evening straight-ahead jazz series, and has a number of side projects that range across a wide imaginative terrain.  One such project is the fusion of his native Bengali musical roots with his adopted American jazz base, called “Bengal and Beyond.”   Another of Bishu’s explorations, embodied in the ensemble called “Time is Now, Not Money,” (which can be heard at this link), is typically constituted as a quartet, with Scott R. Looney on piano, Bishu on bass and Bryan Bowman on drums providing the instrumental environment for the scat vocalizations of Loren Benedict.  Together, the four musicians weave a fascinatingly enigmatic aural tapestry.  With Kasey on saxophone (Lorin’s partner in the band called “The Holly Martins”), ever deeper and more exciting textures are bound to emerge.

Today’s performance is the fourth in a five-week series of avant garde jazz dates that started at the end of July with this same band sans Kasey, and that concludes on August 28th with Rent Romus’ “Lords of Outland.”

This series of concerts, dubbed “Outfest!,” is co-presented by Rent’s organization, “Outsound Presents,” and the Bird & Beckett Cultural Legacy Project’s “which way west?” Sunday concert series.

Once the Outfest! series concludes, the music will continue!

Our September 4th date with Anthony Brown & Friends — Anthony Brown, drumset, percussion; Mark Izu, bass, Sheng (Chinese mouth organ); Masaru Koga, saxophones, flute, Shakuhachi, Brazilian percussion — will provide solid evidence that jazz transcending all boundaries, and Bird & Beckett’s commitment to it, is endless.

Anthony is one of the Bay Area’s most influential composers and performers, extending the music into new possibilities and plumbing its history simultaneously.  His Asian American Jazz Orchestra, of which this trio is a microcosm, is internationally renowned.

Don’t miss these opportunities to open your ears and your mind to some very exciting music, and some terrifically talented musicians.