Yoshi's Artistic Director Peter Williams on the Booking Format Change

This Saturday's San Francisco Chronicle reported the hiring of a new booker and a change in format for the SF Yoshi's club, opened in 2007. Owner Kaz Kajimura has hired Bill Kubeczko from Minneapolis' Cedar Cultural Center to book San Francisco with an assortment of non-jazz as well as jazz acts. Noting his absence from the Chronicle piece, I decided to call Yoshi's Oakland artistic director Peter Williams for his take on the situation.

Williams has been Yoshi's artistic director for nearly 10 years. Prior to his current post, he was executive director of the Tucson Jazz Festival. A very busy man, he took a few minutes to chat with me by phone today:

When did it become clear that the new San Francisco club was "cannibalizing" the Oakland audiences (to quote Kajimura)?
It was a bit of a worry about the two clubs from the beginning. But in the last year, if we had the same band playing in both the Oakland and SF clubs, Oakland was just getting killed.

Are there ever surprises such as a major-label/well-known artist drawing poorly?
I don’t want to name names, but some real superstars didn’t do as well as they should have if it were a normal year.

So if it was 1997, two clubs would be no problem?
Or 2001, it wouldn’t be a problem.

Yeah, remember when everyone in the Bay Area was a millionaire?
I wasn’t, but I do remember that.

I wasn’t either. So how will the clubs differentiate? Will it be a question of percentage of non-jazz shows?
Oakland will be more of the jazz club, and San Francisco will be doing other things. The jazz had definitely been watered down in Oakland in the last year. This is going to make my life a little bit better. I’ll do occasional world and salsa shows at Oakland, but this will be the jazz club.

The guy that’s coming in [Kubeczko] has good eclectic tastes and he’s going to be doing new stuff, but I don’t think we’ll be going toe to toe with the Fillmore.

Do you think a booker's taste is an important success factor?
[Pause] It's kind of a weird question. Yes, I do.

What changes in your booking process in a recession?
There have been times when people were more apt to take a chance to take on a new band. Right now it’s more difficult for me to bring in untested artists. We have an in-house promotion and marketing team, but a new artist will need to do a lot in addition to that.

But I’ve noticed more local artists recently.
Lately there have been more local artists because we’ve shortened the run of national artists from four to three days.

Both due to the economy and the economy of jazz?
Both.

Have you heard any feedback that this format change for Yoshi’s SF is another nail in the coffin for jazz?
We’ve gotten a couple of emails from people who were disappointed. I’m sure there will be more [as the news spreads].

Do you get letters anyway from diehards who say “How can you book this or that band, they’re not jazz?”
Yes, it’s pretty much par for the course.

Thank you for talking with me. Just a caveat ... I hope my wearing my journalist hat doesn't dissuade you from booking me in the future as a jazz musician!
That, or wearing your marathon runner hat!