UPDATE: This is all still happening! Eric sends this email:
Wayne Delacruz is ripping it up on a full-on Hammmond B3 as we speak with the terrific Nancy Wright, tenor player and her drummer Kent Bryson. Where you at? They’re on the big Bird & Beckett stage ’til 6:30. Still time to skitter down if you’re in the neighborhood!
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Bird & Beckett Books hosted a two day piano marathon this weekend to sponsor the purchase of a new sleek Yamaha upright from the Piedmont Piano Company in Oakland who generously loaned the instrument to the store for more than a year. Thanks to the great community support and the talent of many pianists, over $2000 was collected making it a sure bet for future sweet sounds along Chenery Street.
“From Si Perkoff’s opening Monk tune to Macy Blackman’s killer closing set that encapsulated the whole history of New Orleans piano styles, from Jelly Roll Morton to Dr. John and Henry Butler — with stops along the way for brilliant turns at the piano by Don Alberts, Jon Jang, Randy Craig, Steve Shapiro, Betty Wong, Shirley Wong, Dorothy Lefkovits, Nora Maki, Allison Lovejoy, Rebecca Whittington and Bonnie Knight… Alena Howard was there for the entire nine hour stretch, and she’ll tell you it was a magnificent day.”