Around Berkeley
➤ Jazz returns to Zut! with Berkeley saxophonist Lincoln Adler’s trio playing an early evening set outdoors. Thursday, July 27, 5-7 p.m. FREE
➤ An Austin native who is making his home in Oakland, accordionist Pete Okie Weiss brings his hard-charging band Okie Weiss & the Zydeco Playboys to Berkeley’s social dance headquarters. Thursday, July 27, 7:30 p.m. Ashkenaz, $15-$20
➤ Mandolin ace Tom Bekeny, a longtime collaborator with Berkeley bluegrass icon Laurie Lewis, lets his jazz flag fly at his regular Kensington Circus Pub gig with the Missing Man Quartet, featuring guitarist Greg Reginato, Craig Griffeath on seven-string electric bass and guest drummer Eric Thompson. Thursday July 27, 8 p.m. FREE
➤ Featuring Scott Amendola on drums, percussion and electronics, tenor saxophonist Raffi Garabedian and trombonist Danny Lubin-Laden, the SticklerPhonics bring their loose and limber intertwined lines to a hometown gig. Friday, July 28, 8 p.m. The Back Room. $20
➤ Experimental music has found a welcoming home in Berkeley for more than eight decades, and the Outsound New Music Summit builds on that wild and wooly legacy with three nights of experimental improvised jazz, electronic, noise, ambient, and vocal adventures at the Berkeley Finnish Hall on Chestnut Street. Friday’s double bill pairs spoken word artist and keyboardist Jack Curtis Dubowsky’s ensemble with Charles Sharp on reeds and electronics, double bassist Jeff Schwartz, and dancer Isadora Kolmorgan with Cracking the Surface featuring Thomas Dimuzio on Buchla modular synth and live sampling, Scott Looney on piano and hyperpiano, and David Michalak on phantom harp and various instruments and implements. Saturday’s voice-centric triple bill includes Eki Shola on keyboard, midi controller keyboard, and vocals; Lily Taylor on vocals, keyboard-looping and effects pedals; and the duo Las Sucias with Danishta Rivera and Alexandra Buschman-Román on voice, electronics, and found objects. Sunday’s closing triple bill features Kim Nucci and Mitch Stahlmann on modular synths, drum machine, laptop, voice and winds using samples and live processing; the duo Phog Masheen, featuring William Alma on video and Dr. K and Mark A Soden Jr. on objects and electronics; and Present Quartet with bassist Jeff Schwartz, flutist Ellen Burr, harpist Anne LeBaron, and Charles Sharp on reeds. Friday-Sunday, July 28-31, artist Q&A’s at 7:30 p.m. and performances at 8:15 p.m. $25
➤ Learn about J. Robert Oppenheimer’s impact on quantum mechanics and quantum field theory at a panel hosted by UC Berkeley featuring history professor Cathryn Carson, journalism professor Jon Else, and physicists Yasunori Nomura and Karl van Bibber. (And look through our photo and history tour of Oppenheimer’s life in Berkeley.) Friday, July 28, 11:30 a.m. International House Chevron Auditorium. FREE (RSVP)
➤ The radical revolutionary communist bookstore Revolution Books is also holding a discussion about Christopher Nolan’s film Oppenheimer. Friday, July 28, 7 p.m. FREE
➤ Featuring Julian on drums, Steve on bass and Colin on electric piano and accordion, the Hogan Brothers are practically a Bay Area institution with musical connections encompassing some of the deepest funk, R&B and jazz on the scene. Their last-Friday-of-the-month residency anchors Jupiter’s calendar with a heavy dose of soul. Friday, July 28, 7-10 p.m. FREE
➤ The city’s latest Movies in the Park offering is DC League of Super Pets. Bring blankets, sleeping bags, and low-back beach chairs. Friday, July 28, 8:30 p.m. James Kenney Park. FREE
➤ Interested in adopting a storm drain or helping the city maintain the planted areas of traffic circles? Attend the city’s Adopt-a-Spot Program Volunteer Picnic. Current and potential volunteers are welcome to come — bring a dish to share! Saturday, July 29, 12:30 p.m.-3:30 p.m. Cedar Rose Park. FREE
➤ The city’s final event in its Music in the Park summer series features the Bay Area progressive funk group Purple Fox and the Heebie Jeebies, which specializes in playful, interactive musical performances for children. Saturday, July 29, 3 p.m. San Pablo Park. FREE
➤ BAMPFA will close out its “Shitamachi: Tales of Downtown Tokyo” series with a showing of Akira Kurosawa’s 1948 film Drunken Angel, a gangster flick that serves as an allegory for postwar Japan. Saturday, July 29, 7:30 p.m. $14
➤ The Ashkenaz milonga returns with the all-star Trio Tangazo featuring 2022 Latin Grammy-nominated bassist Sascha Jacobsen, piano maestro Seth Asarnow and Swiss-born bandoneon master Adrian Jost, a founder with Jacobson of the long-running tango favorite Trio Garufa. Saturday, July 29, 8 p.m. $20-$25
➤ Celebrate summer at the Vine Street Block Party in North Berkeley, hosted by the North Shattuck Association. Expect wine pouring stations, food and retail vendors, and live music. Sunday, July 30, 12-6 p.m. Vine Street between Shattuck and Walnut.
➤ Try your hand at making cyanotype postcards at a workshop at BAMPFA. Artist Jenny Rosenberg will teach you how to turn simple chemicals, paper, sunshine and water into indigo blueprints, which you’ll get to take home. The workshop is included with gallery admission. Sunday, July 30, 1 p.m.
➤ Lalo Izquierdo, a founding member of the storied Afro-Peruvian ensemble Perú Negro, was a longtime force on the Bay Area’s Latin American music scene until his death last July at the age of 72. Fiesta Afroperuana, a celebration of his life and legacy, features Coco Linares y su Orquesta Afroperuana Mammaye, a special guest directly from Peru making their first U.S. appearance. Sunday, July 30, 4 p.m. Freight & Salvage. $35 advance ($50 door)
➤ Remi Goode, a classically trained guitarist turned alt folk/pop singer-songwriter shares a Monkey House double bill with the stellar sibling duo of Miles and Teo Quale, rising stars on the Bay Area bluegrass scene. Sunday, July 30, 7:30 p.m. $10-$15
➤ Architecture enthusiast and journalist Dave Weinstein will give a talk on mid-century modernism in Berkeley. Wednesday, Aug. 2, 7 p.m. Berkeley City Club. $5-$10
➤ Berkeley Rep’s Out of Character, Berkeley-born actor Ari’el Stachel’s deeply personal one-man show, closes on July 30. $39-$119
➤ Berkeley resident Josh Kornbluth, who studied the human brain at the Global Brain Health Institute and believes society may be suffering from political dementia, is presenting his new autobiographical monologue, Citizen Brain. The show runs through July 29. Saturdays through July 29, 5 p.m. The Marsh Berkeley. $25-$100
➤ Big Bounce America, which claims to be the world’s “largest touring inflatable event,” is at Golden Gate Fields through July 30. We took a look around. $22-$45
➤ The Berkeley Shakespeare Company’s musical adaptation of Midsummer Night’s Dream runs on weekends through July.
➤ Central Works’ The Dignity Circle, a play that explores what makes people fall for Ponzi schemes, has been extended through July 30. Here’s our theater critic’s review. Berkeley City Club. $15-$40
Beyond Berkeley
➤ The Live in the Laurel music series allows residents and visitors alike to dine, shop, and listen to live music in non-traditional venues along MacArthur Boulevard between 35th Avenue and High Street. This Thursday, Mexican banda group Royales — whose name is derived from Royal and Apricot streets in deep East Oakland, where the group formed — will perform a live set at the Communitē Table parking lot. If you can’t make it, the series runs monthly through Oct. 28. Thursday, July 27, 5 p.m. 4171 MacArthur Boulevard, Oakland. FREE
➤ Attend an outdoor, summer healing clinic at San Antonio Park. Staff from the Freedom Community Clinic — an organization that provides both ancestral indigenous healing practices and Western medicine — will be on-site to offer massage therapy, acupuncture, sound and energy healing and more. There will also be free food provided. The clinic invites Black, brown, Indigenous, and immigrant community members to take advantage of these free services. Saturday, July 29, 1 p.m. to 5 p.m. San Antonio Park, 1701 E 19th St, Oakland. FREE
➤ Soul Beat, the Black-owned public access TV station out of Eastmont Mall, is celebrating its 45th anniversary with a multi-generational community event featuring live performances, food vendors, raffles, and live music. The free event will take place at For the Culture, a Black-owned space that opened in 2021 where Mexicali Rose once was. Saturday, July 29, 2 p.m. to 8 p.m. For The Culture, 701 Clay St, Oakland. FREE
If there’s an event you’d like us to consider for this roundup, email us at the-scene@berkeleyside.org. If there’s an event that you’d like to promote on our calendar, you can use the self-submission form on our events page.
The Oaklandside’s Arts and Community reporter Azucena Rasilla contributed reporting to this story.
