Freebie of the week: It’s known as the New Farm, however its roots return to mid-Nineteen Seventies San Francisco, when no person thought twice a few working farm additionally being a neighborhood heart, environmental artwork gallery and live performance venue. This weekend, these roots can be celebrated in rousing trend with a free live performance of old-school punk. The unique spot, often known as The Farm/Crossroads Neighborhood, was based by Bonnie Ora Sherk, a San Francisco artist, and Jack Wickert on what’s now Cesar Chavez Avenue and Potrero Avenue. It had a vegetable backyard, grazing pasture, an academic heart and gallery, and hosted all method of efficiency artwork occasions and concert events. Within the Nineteen Eighties, after Sherk departed, the positioning grew to become a mixture of fashionable city park and rock/punk spot that hosted such A-Record bands as Camper Van Beethoven, Unhealthy Brains the Descendents and Soundgarden. The location closed and was repurposed in 1987. Flash ahead to 2019: The New Farm is created by a GoFundMe drive organized by Andrew Pollock, president of an environmental nonprofit often known as Inexperienced Metropolis Challenge. The New Farm has a brand new location in Bayview at 10 Cargo Manner, adjoining to a park, a nursery and a grazing pasture, and its house and amenities can be found for occasions, reveals and concert events. Everybody affiliated with the New Farm is a volunteer and all the general public occasions are free, together with Saturday’s One other Day on The Farm live performance that includes a fab lineup of beloved old-school San Francisco punk bands, together with the legendary No Different (nonetheless led by singer-guitarist John “Genocide” Patterson), The Sleepers, Temple Stunning Band, Sacripolitical and extra. The free present runs from 2 to eight p.m., and no tickets are crucial. Extra info on the New Farm is at thenewfarmsf.org; particulars concerning the present are on the New Farm’s Fb web page.
Albany artist Dev Heyrana’s “SOL” is likely one of the works on public show in 2025’s Hearts of SF, a profit for San Francisco Normal Hospital Basis. (Courtesy Hearts of SF through Bay Metropolis Information)
One other freebie: Every year, throughout January’s dreary season, people in San Francisco are visually serenaded by colourful hearts of various sizes bearing all kinds of often-dazzling designs. Whereas it’s pretty to think about that some benign deity or extraterrestrial is depositing the fiberglass-and-resin beauties to perk up a metropolis that hasn’t gained a significant sports activities world championship in who is aware of how lengthy, the actual story is fairly cool, too. Hearts in SF is a 20-year-old annual fundraiser by San Francisco Normal Hospital Basis, which commissions the works and locations them in public areas across the metropolis. Then artwork lovers bid on them, with profitable bids and funds going to the hospital. Notice: Patrons should be artwork lovers: these suckers ain’t low cost. Bidders must be able to half with a five-figure sum (and that’s for the smaller, lesser-in -demand items). The cool factor is it doesn’t price a cent to take a look at them. By means of Monday, many are on view on the Ferry Constructing. Extra info on the hearts, the bidding and the associated gala on Feb. 6 are at sfghf.org/hearts-in-sf-2025. Go to https://sfghf.org/map/ for a helpful map of some hearts on everlasting show within the metropolis.
Bay Space Latin jazz percussionist and bandleader celebrates his new album with a live performance on Feb. 1 on the Freight & Salvage in Berkeley. (Courtesy John Santos through Bay Metropolis Information)
A Latin jazz icon: Latin jazz percussionist and bandleader John Santos has been a mainstay of the Bay Space music scene for half a century and, as hokey because it sounds, we’re darned fortunate to have him. He’s revered across the globe—logging six Grammy nominations over his profession—and for his knack for assembling bands and orchestras representing a staggeringly various vary of sounds. But he retains his deep catalogue of recorded music native, releasing albums on his personal Machete Data label. On Saturday, he’ll star in a live performance on the Freight & Salvage Espresso Home in Berkeley. Billed as a celebration of his new album “Horizontes” and Machete Data’ fortieth anniversary, the present options Santos and his acclaimed Sextet, which was fashioned in 2003. A powerful array of particular company contains the globally revered Orestes Vilató on timbales; vocalists Christelle Durandy, Willie Ludwig and Juan Luis Pérez; violinist Anthony Blea; percussionist Javier Navarrette; and Pedro Pastrana on the cuatro, a type of lute that’s the nationwide instrument of Puerto Rico. The Freight holds a particular place in Santos’ historical past, he has carried out there usually and curated Latin music exhibits. Anticipate a variety of Latin jazz kinds to emerge when Santos and mates take the stage. The present begins at 8 p.m. Tickets are $44 upfront, $49 on the door. Go to thefreight.org.
Composer-singer-songwriter Gabriel Kahane is serving as host and curator for San Francisco Performances’ PIVOT Pageant this yr; the opening occasions are Jan. 29-31 in Herbst Theatre in San Francisco. (Courtesy Jason Quigley through Bay Metropolis Information)
A flip towards innovation: This week brings the return of San Francisco Performances’ annual PIVOT Pageant—this one can be its tenth incarnation —curated this yr by composer-singer-songwriter Gabriel Kahane, whose “emergency shelter intake form” oratorio concerning the rampant housing disaster was carried out by the San Francisco Symphony two years in the past. Kahane will conduct the primary of the three packages of the pageant, which is designed to focus on innovation and increase the boundaries of conventional live performance performances, and host the next two. It opens at 7:30 p.m. Jan. 29 in Herbst Theatre, with Kahane main violinist Carla Kihlstedt, pianist Sarah Cahill, the Del Sol Quartet and members of Sandbox Percussion in a presentation of Kihlstedt’s “26 Little Deaths,” impressed by macabre cartoonist Edward Gorey’s spooky however hilarious run down of the alphabet from 1963. The 7:30 p.m. Jan. 30 program options singer-songwriter-guitarist Haley Heynderickx collaborating with the brass quartet The Westerlies on his personal works and a few of his covers, and the pageant closes at 7:30 p.m. Jan. 31 with Sandbox Percussion returning to carry out “Seven Pillars,” a daring, Grammy-nominated work from 2021 by Pulitzer-winning composer Andy Akiho. Discover single tickets, $45-$65, at sfperformances.org, or name (415) 392-2545. Full pageant tickets are $120-$180.
Meng Su is the visitor soloist with the California Symphony on Feb. 1-2, performing Rodrigo’s “Concierto de Aranjuez” on guitar at Lesher Middle for the Arts in Walnut Creek. (Courtesy Meng Su through Bay Metropolis Information)
Masterful Mozart and extra: Conductor Donato Cabrera and his California Symphony have set out this season to current works by well-known composers written on the top of their achievements, so we’ll hear Wolfgang Amadeus’ most well-known and final symphony, the No. 41 in C Main, generally often known as the “Jupiter,” to shut out this weekend’s concert events on the Lesher Middle for the Arts in Walnut Creek. However the packages, at 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 4 p.m. Sunday, will open with “Breathe,” a meditative piece by American composer Carlos Simon, and can proceed with Spanish composer Joaquin Rodrigo’s most well-known work, the beautiful “Concierto de Aranjuez,” with soloist Meng Su of the San Francisco Conservatory of Music acting on guitar. Tickets, $25-$110, can be found by means of californiasymphony.org or by calling (925) 943-7469.
