BEANBENDER's - Creative Music Series in Berkeley, California:
Who We Are and
How We Got Our Name


Beanbender's Crew: L-to-R: Alan Brightbill (in shadows), Bill Hsu, Dan Plonsey, Doug Carroll, Nancy Clarke and Moe! Staiano.
Photo by Michael Zelner, 3/1/98.

NEW-Thing /
OUT-jazz /
avant-garde /
Creative Music /
Improvised Music /
Anomalous Experience
Yet another odd location
at which serious listeners
can be distracted by the
antics of performers!
Key Resource
Links2Go Key Resource
Bay Area Topic

BEANBENDER's Creative Music Series began on March 1, 1995 in Berkeley, California, managed by Seth Katz, Bill Hsu & me (Dan Plonsey). After Mr. Katz retired, we welcomed Nancy Clarke, Alan Brightbill, Moe! Staiano and Doug Carroll on as partners (Nancy and Doug are more-or-less on leave right now). Through Jan 31, 1999, Beanbender's was housed in a building which was once a Crocker Bank, then became The Berkeley Store Gallery Annex. Then, on April 25, 1999, our home became:
The Berkeley Fine Arts Cinema
(at 2451 Shattuck @ Haste).
(Meanwhile, the building which housed The Berkeley Store Gallery Annex changed hands a couple times in a series of complicated transactions and is presently a branch of Kinko's.)

Now we have no fixed location, but continue to present occasional concerts.

The series is called BEANBENDER's after a club in Daniel Pinkwater's The Snarkout Boys and the Avocado of Death (republished as part of a five-volume Pinkwater omnibus; an absolutely essential tome!) where musical entertainment is at times provided by a Bolshevik accordianist, and a band consisting of guitarist, tap dancer, and singing chicken. (Just one of many fine books in the Daniel Pinkwater oeuvre.)

Upcoming Shows
Past Shows
Reviews

Dan Plonsey
dan@plonsey.com or call (510) 237-9007.