Yoshi's SF Broadens Booking Format

I'd heard after my November Yoshi's Oakland gig from Peter Williams that he was no longer going to be booking both the flagship Jack London Square location and the San Francisco club (opened in late 2007 as part of a Fillmore district revitalization plan). Apparently, business at both clubs has plummeted 20 percent over the past year. Yoshi's owner Kaz Kajimura is quoted in today's San Francisco Chronicle as saying "Yoshi's San Francisco was cannibalizing Yoshi's in Oakland."

Closing one of the locations was a possibility, according to the article by longtime music critic Jesse Hamlin, but an emergency $1.5 million loan will keep the costly SF club open, along with a plan to diversify the types of bands playing the 450-seat venue. Kajimura has hired Bill Kubeczko from Minneapolis' Cedar Cultural Center to book SF:

Kubeczko, who programmed a wide range of music and dance in nightlife-rich Minneapolis, had been hearing musicians like guitarist Bill Frisell rave about Yoshi's for years. "It's got an international reputation," said Kubeczko, a 53-year-old from Chicago who knows his blues and jazz but also grew up on the San Francisco sounds of the Dead, Quicksilver Messenger Service and Mother Earth. Since moving here a few weeks ago, he's plunged into the local music scene, ears open to fresh talent.

Kubeczko, who wants to shift the programming gradually, has booked the Portland-based Irish musician Kevin Burke for Tuesday and the French Gypsy-klezmer band Les Yeux Noirs the next night. Next month he's bringing in Morocco's Master Musicians of Jajouka, led by Bachir Attar, and Nation Beat, a Brooklyn band that mixes up Brazilian grooves, New Orleans funk, Nashville fiddling and whatever else strikes it. Other artists he'd like to book for multinight runs include Bruce Hornsby, Doc Watson, the dancing Senegalese singer Baaba Maal and the Langston Hughes Project.

This is news that may upset Slim's, the Fillmore and Cafe Du Nord, all of which book more diverse acts than just jazz. [Redacted to protect author's performing career: comment about quality of music at some of these clubs] Kubeczko says he wants to cooperate with those venues and revitalize the local economy for all. But it's also sure to be taken poorly by jazz aficionados who may view this as yet another instance of jazz being blamed for overall poor turnout for live music events.