Schedule of Events:

Sunday, June 18, 2023

2pm: Snarky Puppy with Isaiah Sharkey

SNARKY PUPPY:

After over a decade of relentless touring and recording in all but complete obscurity, the Texas-bred quasi-collective suddenly found itself held up by the press and public as one of the major figures in the jazz world. But as the category names for all four of the band’s Grammy® awards would indicate (Best R&B Performance in 2014, Best Contemporary Instrumental Album in 2016, 2017, 2021, and 2023), Snarky Puppy isn’t exactly a jazz band. It’s not a fusion band, and it’s definitely not a jam band. It’s probably best to take Nate Chinen of the New York Times’ advice, as stated in an online discussion about the group, to “take them for what they are, rather than judge them for what they’re not.”

ISAIAH SHARKEY:

Guitar virtuoso, multi-instrumentalist, singer, songwriter, producer, educator and activist are just a few titles used to describe the musical powerhouse known as Isaiah Sharkey. Hailing from a musical family in Chicago, he picked up his first guitar when he was just 3 years old. Creating music came naturally to him and it wasn’t long before his family realized he had an irrefutable gift. By the age of 14, Sharkey was performing in clubs in Chicago and a few short years later he had piqued the interest of music industry giants like The Isley Brothers, D’Angelo, for whom he won his first Grammy Award, John Mayer, Patti LaBelle and many others. Blending his background in rock, gospel, jazz, R&B, blues, and funk, Sharkey has created his own original sound with an unmistakable dose of soul. His highly anticipated debut album "Love.Life.Live."  was released in September of 2017 and earned him the iHeart Radio Artist of the Month Award in November for his single “It’s a Shame”  featuring DJ Jazzy Jeff. His sophomore album "Love is the Key: The Cancerian Theme" was released in June of 2019. During the Covid 19 pandemic, Sharkey wrote and recorded with a few of his colleagues including Cory Henry and Common. Sharkey is also recording new music for his latest release after finishing his U.S. and European tour this summer.

Sunday, June 25, 2023

2PM: Indigo Girls with Neko Case

INDIGO GIRLS WITH FULL BAND:

Released in 1989, Indigo Girls' eponymous major label debut sold over two million copies under the power of singles “Closer to Fine” and “Kid Fears” and turned Indigo Girls into one of the most successful folk duos in history. Over a thirty-five-year career that began in clubs around their native Atlanta, Georgia, the multi-Grammy-winning duo of Emily Saliers and Amy Ray has recorded sixteen studio albums, sold over 15 million records, and built a dedicated, enduring following across the globe. Rolling Stone describes them as the “ideal duet partners.” Committed and uncompromising activists, they work on issues like immigration reform (El Refugio), LGBTQ advocacy, education (Imagination Library), death penalty reform, and Native American rights. They are co-founders of Honor the Earth, a non-profit dedicated to the survival of sustainable Native communities, Indigenous environmental justice, and green energy solutions.

NEKO CASE:

Neko Case steps out, cutting the sky and singing the stars, spinning fury and mercy as she goes. She loves the world and wears her heart on her sleeve, but she might eat it before you get to thinking it belongs to you.

Sunday, July 2, 2023

2pm: Santigold with OGI

SANTIGOLD:

SANTIGOLD–born Santi White–is a creative visionary across multiple platforms who is renowned for her ability to fuse unexpected elements in her boundaryless work. Her era-defining self-titled debut album has been credited as a catalyst for the cross-genre sound of contemporary pop music. Her eclecticism has led to musical collaborations including Jay Z, David Byrne, Tyler, the Creator, Amadou and Mariam, Beastie Boys, Drake, and Pharrell. Along with creating the iconography of her album covers, live shows, and videos, her visual work includes collaborations with artists Wangechi Mutu, Kehinde Wiley, Sanford Biggers, and Kara Walker. Santigold has also brought her signature wit to television with comedic roles on The Office and Adult Swim’s NTSF:SD:SUV. In 2022, Santigold released her album Spirituals as a multi-sensory experience with a corresponding line of teas whose ingredients speak to the record’s themes and a series of video vignettes. She also launched her podcast Noble Champions which is a modern day salon that unites today's leading artists, authors, activists, and progressive thinkers around important issues to push culture forward. An inimitable pioneer, Santigold’s unwillingness to conform to conventions has made her a profound inspiration to many.

OGI:

For as pensive and reserved as Ogi may be in everyday life, the Los Angeles-based Nigerian-American singer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist speaks her mind when she sings. Growing up in Wisconsin, she played viola and joined jazz choir in highschool and listened to everyone from J. Moss, Mary Mary, and Bebe & CeCe Winans to Marvin Gaye, Nina Simone, and T-Pain. Meanwhile, mom and dad played Culture, Bob Marley, and Nigerian highlife music. Recognizing her sense of perfect pitch, she experimented with piano and guitar. During college at Northwestern University, she performed in an acapella group and composed demos in GarageBand. Just prior to senior year, she began to post covers on Instagram, starting with a ukulele and vocal cover of Musiq Soulchild’s “Just Friends (Sunny).” Her take on PJ Morton’s “Alright” caught fire when PJ posted it on his page, and GRAMMY® Award-winning producer No I.D. [JAY-Z, John Mayer, Kanye West] took notice. She finished her final year at school and moved to L.A. Working in the studio with No I.D., she cultivated a soulful style of her own equally informed by that lifelong connection to harmony, eclectic resonances, and expressive intonation. She ultimately taps into a spirit agnostic of era yet connected to any age. Now, she expressed who she is through every note on her previous series of singles and her 2022 debut.

Sunday, July 9, 2023

2pm: Lyle Lovett & His Large Band with Andrew St. James

LYLE LOVETT AND HIS LARGE BAND:

A singer, composer and actor, Lyle Lovett has broadened the definition of American music in a career that spans 14 albums. Coupled with his gift for storytelling, the Texas-based musician fuses elements of country, swing, jazz, folk, gospel and blues in a convention-defying manner that breaks down barriers.

Whether touring as a 'Duo' or with his 'Acoustic Group' or his 'Large Band,' Lovett's live performances show not only the breadth of this Texas legend's deep talents, but also the diversity of his influences, making him one of the most compelling and captivating musicians in popular music.

ANDREW ST. JAMES:

Andrew St. James has always found his voice in defining moments. The San Francisco-born songwriter spent 2020, unlike most musicians, out on the road. Performing over 100 self-described “drive-by concerts” on the sidewalks and driveways of the Bay Area, St. James unwittingly reinvented the live music experience- swapping dark clubs for daylight, distance for eye contact, all while the heft of the world- metaphorically and literally on fire- howled. In the middle of it all, he sat down in the summer of 2020 and began writing what are now his first songs to be released in two years. The result is LIGHT AFTER DARKNESS, 11 tracks that comprise his most intimate, most honest work to date, out now.

Sunday, July 16, 2023

2pm: Angélique Kidjo with Jupiter & Okwess

ANGELIQUE KIDJO:

Four-time Grammy Award winner Angélique Kidjo is one of the greatest artists in international music today, a creative force with fourteen albums to her name. Time Magazine has called her "Africa's premier diva”, and named her one of the most influential people in the world for 2021; The BBC, Forbes Magazine, and The Guardian have all highlighted her importance to the people of the African continent. She is the recipient of the 2015 Crystal Award given by the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, the 2016 Amnesty International Ambassador of Conscience Award, and the 2018 German Sustainability Award.

JUPITER & OKWESS:

Explosive! Na Kozonga, the new album by Jupiter and his band Okwess is a blast of energy that bewitches the body and feeds the spirit. Since the beginning, the Rebel General and his fellow pyrotechnicians have been drawing the rhythms of the Congo out of obscurity to reveal their superpowers: the powers of rock and funk, ready for every kind of musical coupling and any kind of invitation! From Damon Albarn to Money Mark (Beastie Boys) via, on this new album, the samba of Rogê, the rap of Marcelo D2, the horns of New Orleans or the voice of the militant Chilean singer Ana Tijoux. Jupiter & Okwess have no fear of strange encounters, nor the craziest journeys. They’ve even managed to conquer Latin America, and are currently busy recreating the triangular trade, in sounds! No surprise from one who, on his first album, declared “Ich bin ein Congolese...The world is my land.” “We all have ancestors in Africa,” Jupiter reminds us, “and they also played music. And if Africa looks like a revolver, its trigger can be found...in the Congo!’ Ready, Steady, Go! Jupiter and his joyous pistoleros are giving us the go-ahead. A new world tour awaits them. It’s up to you to follow their incandescent star.

Sunday, July 23, 2023

2pm: SF Symphony with Special Guest Lettuce

SAN FRANCISCO SYMPHONY:

Program:

Edwin Outwater Conducting SF Symphony

Classic “Golden Age” Film Scores

Intermission

Chris Dragon conducting SF Symphony with Special Guest Lettuce

Sunday, July 30, 2023

2pm: Bob Moses with Neil Frances

BOB MOSES:

Bob Moses, the Vancouver-bred duo consisting of Tom Howie and Jimmy Vallance, came to life in the Brooklyn underground scene in 2012. Early single releases on taste-making electronic label Scissor & Thread led to signing with Domino and the late 2015 release of their debut album Days Gone By.

NEIL FRANCES:

Neil Frances is a Los Angeles-based alternative pop duo making music with soul that you can dance to and believe in.

Sydney-born Jordan Feller and Southern California native Marc Gilfry met in 2012 and formed the group in 2016, having both relocated to LA from London and New York, respectively, in pursuit of new projects. Feller began his music career back home in Australia as a hip-hop obsessed, self-taught electronic music DJ, while Gilfry grew up in a musically-inclined household and played and sang in multiple bands. With Gilfry’s inherent knack for hooks and melodies and Feller’s encyclopedic sonic recall ability and vast knowledge of production, the pair hit it off and began to develop their brand of beat-driven pop ear worms infused with a more organic warmth than most modern electronic dance music. Putting special emphasis on their enthralling live sets—always performed with a multi-piece band and never relying on playback—the group quickly developed a reputation as a must-see stage artist. Soon their reputation as a diverse act with a wide range of talents began to build among listeners of all kinds.

Sunday, August 6, 2023

2pm: Buddy Guy Damn Right Farewell Tour with Eric Gales

BUDDY GUY:

At age 86, Buddy Guy is a Rock & Roll Hall of Fame inductee, a major influence on rock titans like Jimi Hendrix, Eric Clapton, and Stevie Ray Vaughan, a pioneer of Chicago’s fabled West Side sound, and a living link to the city’s halcyon days of electric blues. Buddy Guy has received 8 GRAMMY Awards, a 2015 Lifetime Achievement GRAMMY Award, 38 Blues Music Awards (the most any artist has received), the Billboard Magazine Century Award for distinguished artistic achievement, a Kennedy Center Honor, and the Presidential National Medal of Arts. Rolling Stone Magazine ranked him #23 in its "100 Greatest Guitarists of All Time."

ERIC GALES:

Eric Gales is a blues firebrand. Over 30 years and 18 albums, his passion for the music and his boundless desire to keep it vital has never waned, even when his own light dimmed due to his substance struggles. Throughout it all, he continued to reinvigorate the art form with personal revelation in his lyrics and bold stylistic twists in his guitar playing and songwriting.

Sunday, August 13, 2023

2pm: Patti Smith with Bob Mould

PATTI SMITH:

Patti Smith, born in Chicago and raised in South Jersey, migrated to New York City in 1967. Her extensive achievements as a performer, author, recording and visual artist is acknowledged worldwide.

Released in 1975, Smith’s first recording, Horses, was inducted into the National Recording Registry at the Library of Congress in 2010 by the National Recording Preservation Board. Her subsequent albums include Radio Ethiopia, Easter, which included Because the Night, cowritten with Bruce Springsteen, Wave, Dream of Life, which included People Have the Power cowritten with her late husband Fred Sonic Smith, Gone Again, Peace and Noise, Gung Ho, Trampin’, Land, Twelve, Banga, and Outside Society. She is a four-time Grammy® nominee and a Golden Globe nominee for the song “Mercy Is” cowritten with Lenny Kay for the film Noah. Steven Sebring’s 2008 documentary, Patti Smith: Dream of Life, received an Emmy nomination.

BOB MOULD:

Bob Mould began his career as one of the angry upstarts of the hardcore punk scene, and over several decades he's matured into one of the elder statesmen of alternative rock without giving up his integrity, his intelligence, or the fierce passion of his best music. In the early '80s, Mould emerged as one of the founding members of Hüsker Dü, a Minneapolis-based punk band who blended furiously fast tempos with melodic pop structures on influential, groundbreaking albums like 1984's Zen Arcade and 1985's New Day Rising. After the breakup of Hüsker Dü, Mould launched a solo career with 1989's introspective, largely acoustic Workbook, but soon returned to a hard, angry sound on 1990's Black Sheets of Rain. In 1992, Mould formed another band, Sugar, who picked up where the pop-oriented sound of Hüsker Dü left off on albums like 1992's Copper Blue and 1994's File Under: Easy Listening.

Sunday, August 20, 2023

THE BIG PICNIC STARRING THE FLAMING LIPS WITH ALAN PALOMO (NEON INDIAN DJ SET)

The Big Picnic is our annual fundraising event to raise funds and continue to present admission-free concerts and outreach programs to the people of the Bay Area.

Schedule:

12:30 PM Check-In & Valet open
1:30 PM All guests seated at concert tables for lunch service
2:00 PM Opener: Alan Palomo (Neon Indian DJ Set)
2:45 PM Intermission
3:00 PM The Flaming Lips
4:30 PM Event ends

Fest Date: June 18 - August 20, 2023

Location: Sigmund Stern Grove Park, 19th Avenue and Sloat Boulevard, San Francisco, CA 94101

Click here for Reservation.

Click here for more information.