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Christian McBride, Revered in Jazz, Is Playing the Long Game

At 50, the bassist is always focused on the next gig and fresh collaborations. His 18th album as a band leader is due this month.

By Hank Shteamer

On a Friday night in late January, it was almost showtime at the Village Vanguard, but Christian McBride, the eminent jazz bassist, had not yet arrived.

Earlier that evening, he had enthused about the gig — part of a week of sold-out shows with a new quintet led by the pianist Brad Mehldau — in between sips of Sandeman port and puffs of Mac Baren pipe tobacco at the Carnegie Club, a Midtown smoking lounge. “It’s starting to sound like a band,” he said.

As the set time approached, he was navigating heavy Times Square traffic in his Lincoln S.U.V., air-drumming along to Bernard Purdie fills on the SiriusXM station Soul Town. Slipping into the venue just a few minutes late, he demonstrated what he’d said earlier, in his smooth rumble of a voice, about not requiring any preshow rituals: “I can show up and hit.”

McBride’s assurance now seems like a given. At 50, he boasts one of the most impressive résumés of any jazz musician in his age bracket: eight Grammy wins; hundreds of recording credits alongside names such as Willie Nelson, Paul McCartney, Abbey Lincoln, Queen Latifah and his high school classmate Questlove; and prominent roles such as the host of NPR’s Jazz Night in America and the artistic director of the Newport Jazz Festival .

He leads a portfolio of groups, including a brassy, hard-swinging big band, the elegant hard-bop quintet Inside Straight and the quartet New Jawn, which is heard on the freewheeling “Prime,” McBride’s 18th album as a leader, out later this month. And among fellow musicians, he’s cultivated a level of intergenerational good will that few other artists, inside or outside jazz, can claim.

“Christian is among the cats who are sure about things,” the guitarist Pat Metheny, a collaborator on and off since the early 1990s, wrote in an email. “There isn’t a moment of indecision or waiting around with Christian. He’s on it and aware of everything that is happening and adjusting and allowing for the moment, but always with a vision of the tune, the changes, the time, and most importantly, the spirit of it all.”

The drummer Savannah Harris works with McBride in a new, not-yet-named project that the bassist has called his Gen Z band. “There’s a few people of his generation that are key folks in that they both hold the respect of the arts institutions and hold the respect of their peers and the generations beneath them in the streets,” she said, characterizing McBride as one of those “bridge” figures. “And of the people that I’m thinking of,” she continued, “he might have the most traffic on his bridge.”

Though he began garnering wide notice in the early to mid-90s, McBride stresses that his ascent was gradual. “Revisionist history says that my career started with a bang,” he said with a laugh. “No, it started with a very slow burn.”

His prospects were shaky in the spring of 1990, when, on the cusp of his 18th birthday, he dropped out of the Juilliard School after two semesters, in part to pursue a gig with the vocalist Betty Carter that ended up falling through. He began working with older masters such as the trumpeter Freddie Hubbard but had to contend with the hazing that was then a rite of passage within jazz. He retains numerous stories of humiliations endured when he was first establishing himself on the scene, like the time a veteran saxophonist pop-quizzed him during a jam session, calling out chords from what turned out to be a nonexistent tune.

But McBride had a sturdy inner core. Growing up in Philadelphia, he’d often been the target of bullying. “I was always getting teased about my size, my teeth — ’cause I had big teeth — ‘fat boy,’ all that kind of stuff,” he recalled in the kitchen of his Montclair, N.J., home, while Ella Fitzgerald, his 15-year-old beagle and Cavalier King Charles Spaniel mix, snored peacefully in her bed and pregame coverage of that week’s NFC Championship matchup played silently on ESPN. “But the thing that made it bearable was basically my family,” a loving, tight-knit unit centered on his mother, grandparents and uncle.

“‘I’m going to be better than you,’” McBride recalled thinking of those who mocked him. “‘I’m going to work hard and I’m going to have good grades and I’m going to get out of school and do something.’ So I think there was a part of me that knew to play the long game.”

Once he picked up the electric bass at age 9 — inspired by his father, Lee Smith, a bassist for acts such as the Delfonics and Mongo Santamaria, and encouraged by his great-uncle, Howard Cooper, who worked with avant-garde musicians around town — McBride began treating it as a life’s calling. Soon moving on to the upright, studying classical technique and performing in a local big band, he arrived in New York in 1989 with an unimpeachable work ethic that has never wavered.

“Say what you want to,” he said at the Carnegie Club, “you can’t get me on the hours put in.”

McBride’s dedication still impresses even his closest collaborators. The drummer Brian Blade has played with him since the early ’90s, notably in a quartet led by the saxophonist Joshua Redman, also including Mehldau, that has reactivated during the past few years . “I still wonder every time we play together — rather, I look in wonder as a witness to Christian’s gift working, and the care and attention which he has obviously given much time to cultivating,” Blade said. “He’s not resting on what he did yesterday; he’s still pushing forward. And in turn, it gives me that same spark and fire.”

Early on, McBride was pegged as a so-called Young Lion , a diligent acolyte of time-tested, bebop-derived jazz. But while he established himself through work with esteemed elders like Hubbard, the saxophonist Joe Henderson, the drummer Roy Haynes and the pianist McCoy Tyner, he revealed the breadth of his personal pantheon on his own albums: On “A Family Affair” from 1998, he played as much funky electric bass as woody upright, nodding to an elemental James Brown obsession, while the sprawling “Live at Tonic” from 2006 found him staking out territory somewhere between the Meters, Herbie Hancock’s early-70s Mwandishi band and Jimi Hendrix’s Band of Gypsys.

New Jawn is one of McBride’s most satisfying bands. Featuring Marcus Strickland on tenor saxophone and bass clarinet, Josh Evans on trumpet and Nasheet Waits on drums, it’s a quartet without a chordal instrument that convincingly encompasses elastic post-bop, dirge-like abstraction and strutting funk, sometimes uniting diverse strategies within the same piece . McBride credits Waits, best known for his role in the pianist Jason Moran’s acclaimed, long-running Bandwagon trio , with fueling the quartet’s adventurous spirit.

“Sometimes we’ll be swinging really hard,” he said, “and the next thing I know, ohhh, here we go — and then we’re gone .”

That love of collaboration has brought him wildly different opportunities. He spoke admiringly of a recent first performance alongside Billie Eilish at a 2022 tribute to the singer Peggy Lee. (“She knew that material like the back of her hand, so I’ve got nothing but big-time, hard-core dap for her.”) And he reflected on the “torturous” but ultimately rewarding task of reconciling the disparate approaches of the saxophonists Ornette Coleman and Sonny Rollins from behind the bass when Coleman sat in at Rollins’s 80th birthday concert in 2010 .

For a musician like McBride, who has seemingly played with everyone by age 50, who’s left?

“I have three people left on my bucket list,” he answered without hesitation. “Gladys Knight, Dolly Parton and Mary J. Blige.”

“I want to write for them,” he added. “I would want to do a big-band project with each of them.” Then he doubled back to clarify his answer, showing the combination of determination and nonchalance that’s become a trademark of his. “I mean, it kind of wouldn’t matter,” he said. “I want to just play some notes with them.”

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Things to do | review: what’s a ‘new jawn’ only christian mcbride’s hottest band yet.

Victor Hilitski/for the Chicago Tribune

Bassist Christian McBride plays at Constellation on March 23, 2023.

Christian McBride during his concert at Constellation, a performing arts nightclub in Chicago, on March 23, 2023.

Then again, it’s not every day a musician of Christian McBride’s stature rolls into the intimate North Center venue. McBride is one of the most admired bassists of his generation, a Grammy winner eight times over, a syndicated radio host and the artistic director of the titanic Newport Jazz Festival. He tends to headline the city’s hugest stages, like Orchestra Hall and Millennium Park. By contrast, Constellation has carved out a niche in the city for all things experimental and offbeat. Turning just a decade old next month, it tends to both punch above its weight and do things a little more on the DIY side. Which did not escape McBride’s notice when he played two sets there with his New Jawn quartet Thursday night.

“Last time I was here (in 2017), there was no stage.” He gestured to the modular bandstand under his feet, assembled for the show. “Looks like things have been on the upswing.”

McBride and Constellation might have a history that makes the latter ripe for ribbing, but it was a venue debut for his band: trumpeter Josh Evans, reedist Marcus Strickland and drummer Nasheet Waits. New Jawn’s ranks come from all over the eastern seaboard, but the name is a tribute to McBride’s upbringing in Philly, where “jawn” is a catch-all noun. (Example sentences provided on the cover of the group’s self-titled album: “Hey man, did you see McBride’s in town this week with his new trio?” “Naw, bruh, it’s not the trio, he’s got a new jawn! “) New Jawn’s 2018 debut was funky, fun and tight as hell, a welcome addition to the pantheon of chordless jazz combos. But was it great ? Debatable.

With its latest album “Prime,” New Jawn has hit its stride. The compositions better bottle the smirking virtuosity of McBride’s formidable colleagues, seizing on the off-the-wall harmonic freedoms possible when you aren’t anchored by a keyboard. Big-band politesse has been tossed to the wind, or maybe burned.

So it was Thursday. Some audience members — notably older than the usual Constellation set — visibly gaped when McBride cued the band directly into the cacophonous intro of “Head Bedlam.” Strickland’s bass clarinet and McBride’s bass eventually coalesce into a thick, sauntering funk groove, forming cosmos from chaos. (McBride later joked with the audience that the number was “a sonic portrait of us looking at Twitter … The groove is what happens when you put your phone down.”)

“Obsequious” hurtled even faster in New Jawn’s first set than it does on “Prime.” But the band’s tight sense of ensemble didn’t crack one bit, the knotty opening played in razor’s edge rhythmic unison by the pitched instruments before opening into a solo by Evans. Evans is tall, unassuming and almost monklike onstage, curling around his instrument like a shell. But out of his bell came some of the most blistering improvisations of the evening, hard-bop restlessness conveyed through a dusky, veiled sound that never overpowered his colleagues. Evans often stepped off the stage so as not to block sightlines of Strickland, who distributed his economical, deftly pivoting solos (especially in “Prime,” the title track he composed) between bass clarinet and tenor.

“Dolphy Dust,” Evans’ aptly named contribution to “Prime,” passed that semi-manic energy around to the entire band in the second set. Their precision was just as remarkable here. The Jawns doubled their soloing colleagues so neatly that it called to mind assembling a jigsaw puzzle on the back of a high-speed train.

The lion’s share of that astonishment has to be funneled toward Waits, a marvel when both soloing and supporting. His farsighted and magisterial spotlight in “Obsequious” opened up into a deep disco backbeat, ushering the band into “Open Sesame” (as in “Saturday Night Fever,” not Freddie Hubbard’s 1960 debut of the same name). During Waits’ solo in “Prime” — an unbroken, maximalist explosion of wit and might — McBride just leaned against his bass and grinned, watching him in stupefied ecstasy.

McBride is a consummate collaborator, and one got the sense here that he really intended for it to be the band’s night. But he still made off with a few solos on his upright — in Waits’ elemental “Moonchild,” Evans’ “Pier One Import” and his own “John Day” — that demonstrated why he’s working with an expressive palette wider than just about any bassist on the circuit today. McBride tossed off right-hand impressionistic percussive effects, left-hand vibrato trills and divebombing glissando fills with both ease and impregnable intonation — itself a testament to his hyper-rigorous early jazz education in Philly.

The band closed out the evening by reprising “The Good Life,” also played during the first set. That tune was Ornette Coleman and Pat Metheny’s head-turning calypso rebrand of a movement from Coleman’s “Skies of America,” written for the London Symphony (1972). Sunny and breezy, “The Good Life” is a far cry from Coleman’s better-known free jazz abstraction. But hearing it, the pairing makes a whole lot more sense than you might think. Just like New Jawn at Constellation.

Hannah Edgar is a freelance writer.

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• December 5, 2023 Setlist

Christian McBride Setlist at Village Vanguard, New York, NY, USA

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Note: Late show; Remembering Ray Brown with Christian McBride (bass), Benny Green (pinao), and Gregory Hutchinson (drums)

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Christian McBride's New Jawn: Tiny Desk Concert

The start is chaotic for sure, but that's the intent. Two minutes of craziness is an accurate description of the intro and outro of "Head Bedlam." "A sonic description of us looking at Twitter particularly during the pandemic," leader Christian McBride explains after the first tune of his Tiny Desk set, "when you put your phone down, that's when the groove starts."

The groove is funky too. For almost eight years, McBride and his bandmates — trumpeter Josh Evans, Marcus Strickland on woodwinds and drummer Nasheet Waits — have been playing exploratory post-bop music without a polyphonic instrument — one that can easily play more than one note at a time — like a piano or a guitar. This makes for a genuinely distinct sound, one that's less dependent on strict harmonic understructures and more creative interplay between instrumentalists.

Strickland wrote the soulful second song, "Prime," which is also the title track to the group's second album released earlier this year. You can hear each player's personality shine through their instruments as they support one other with an impeccable demonstration of the call and response method. Towards the end, Waits' explosive drum solo is quite extraordinary.

The last song, "Walkin' Funny" is a bluesy swinger from the band's first album . McBride anchors the piece with his signature thumping bass style and a fantastic solo — just try and tap your foot along with the crazy meter changes that are unpredictable but fun.

• "Head Bedlam"
• "Walkin' Funny"
• Christian McBride: bass
• Josh Evans: trumpet
• Marcus Strickland: tenor sax, bass clarinet
• Nasheet Waits: drums

TINY DESK TEAM

• Producer: Suraya Mohamed 
• Director: Joshua Bryant
• Audio Engineer: Josh Rogosin
• Creative Director: Bob Boilen
• Series Producer: Bobby Carter
• Editor: Mitra I. Arthur
• Videographers: Joshua Bryant, Maia Stern, Zayrha Rodriguez
• Production Assistant: Sofia Seidel
• Photographer: Catie Dull
• Tiny Desk Team: Kara Frame, Ashley Pointer, Hazel Cills
• VP, Visuals and Music: Keith Jenkins
• Senior VP, Programming: Anya Grundmann

Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

GRAMMY-Nominated Quartet

Christian McBride's New Jawn

w/ JOSH EVANS, MARCUS STRICKLAND & NASHEET WAITS

SEP 21-24 | Traditions in Transition

Sep 24, 2023, miner auditorium.

PLEASE NOTE: This page is an archive of a past production Please visit our calendar for all upcoming SFJAZZ shows.

Original show description below.

Beyond his incomparable reputation as the standard-bearing bassist in modern jazz, Christian McBride has always been a restless explorer, constantly immersing himself in different musical environments with stimulating collaborators. After seven years of SFJAZZ performances that have run the gamut from bass duo and classical sextet to big band and his funk-infused Situation band, McBride presents the long-awaited return of New Jawn, a quartet named in reference to that most Philadelphian of indefinable words. Echoing the two horns/no piano lineup of the classic Ornette Coleman quartet, New Jawn is comprised of some of the most forward-thinking jazz artists on today’s scene. First recorded on their 2018 eponymous debut, they return with music from their 2023 Mack Avenue follow-up Prime .

Trumpeter Josh Evans is a protégé of the great Jackie McLean and in addition to work as a bandleader, has had extensive alliances with drummers Rashied Ali, T.S. Monk, and Winard Harper.

Marcus Strickland topped both the DownBeat Critics and Readers Polls for Rising Star Saxophonist, and lent his indelible artistry to work with Roy Haynes, Dave Douglas, and Jeff “Tain” Watts.

Son of drumming luminary Freddie Waits, drummer Nasheet Waits is a founding member of pianist Jason Moran’s Bandwagon trio and has an extensive résumé including stints with Andrew Hill, Fred Hersch, and Antonio Hart.  

This evening presents the long-awaited return of McBride’s New Jawn, a quartet comprised of trumpeter Josh Evans, saxophonist Marcus Strickland, and drummer Nasheet Waits.

PRESS ›   Christian McBride finds the groove again in his latest album, Prime  (NPR Music)

CONCERT SPONSOR Allison Johnson and Ron Espeseth

The deep, dark-maple tone that Christian McBride elicits from an upright bass is one of jazz’s forthright pleasures

The new york times.

Christian McBride bass Marcus Strickland saxophones Josh Evans trumpet Nasheet Waits drums

The musician with the technical, compositional and emotional skills to take jazz to another plane

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Christian McBride's The Movement Revisited

A Concert with Christian McBride featuring Tonality!

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Powered by a relentless energy and boundless love of swing, eight-time Grammy Award-winning bassist Christian McBride leads a Big Band and Gospel choir in an exuberant and powerful musical tribute to Rosa Parks, Martin Luther King, Jr., Muhammad Ali, Malcolm X, and Barack Obama—heroes of the Civil Rights movement celebrated at The Soraya during Black History Month.

Christian McBride's New Jawn: Tiny Desk Concert

The start is chaotic for sure, but that's the intent. Two minutes of craziness is an accurate description of the intro and outro of "Head Bedlam." "A sonic description of us looking at Twitter particularly during the pandemic," leader Christian McBride explains after the first tune of his Tiny Desk set, "when you put your phone down, that's when the groove starts."

The groove is funky too. For almost eight years, McBride and his bandmates — trumpeter Josh Evans, Marcus Strickland on woodwinds and drummer Nasheet Waits — have been playing exploratory post-bop music without a polyphonic instrument — one that can easily play more than one note at a time — like a piano or a guitar. This makes for a genuinely distinct sound, one that's less dependent on strict harmonic understructures and more creative interplay between instrumentalists.

Strickland wrote the soulful second song, "Prime," which is also the title track to the group's second album released earlier this year. You can hear each player's personality shine through their instruments as they support one other with an impeccable demonstration of the call and response method. Towards the end, Waits' explosive drum solo is quite extraordinary.

The last song, "Walkin' Funny" is a bluesy swinger from the band's first album . McBride anchors the piece with his signature thumping bass style and a fantastic solo — just try and tap your foot along with the crazy meter changes that are unpredictable but fun.

• "Head Bedlam"
• "Walkin' Funny"
• Christian McBride: bass
• Josh Evans: trumpet
• Marcus Strickland: tenor sax, bass clarinet
• Nasheet Waits: drums

TINY DESK TEAM

• Producer: Suraya Mohamed
• Director: Joshua Bryant
• Audio Engineer: Josh Rogosin
• Creative Director: Bob Boilen
• Series Producer: Bobby Carter
• Editor: Mitra I. Arthur
• Videographers: Joshua Bryant, Maia Stern, Zayrha Rodriguez
• Production Assistant: Sofia Seidel
• Photographer: Catie Dull
• Tiny Desk Team: Kara Frame, Ashley Pointer, Hazel Cills
• VP, Visuals and Music: Keith Jenkins
• Senior VP, Programming: Anya Grundmann

Copyright 2023 NPR. To see more, visit https://www.npr.org.

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Thursday 23 March 2023

Christian McBride

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3111 N. Western 60618 Chicago, IL, US

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Doors open: 19:00

Tour name: Christian McBride’s New Jawn

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• Fri  |  Jun 23, 2023 5:00 PM

Event Description

Bassist Christian McBride was named artistic director of the Jazz Aspen Snowmass Summer Sessions (2000), co-director of the National Jazz Museum in Harlem (2005) and creative chair for jazz for the Los Angeles Philharmonic Association (2005). He now serves as artistic advisor for jazz programming at the New Jersey Performing Arts Center and as artistic director of the Newport Jazz Festival. From jazz to R&B to pop/rock to hip-hop/neo-soul to classical, McBride is a luminary with one hand ever reaching for new heights -- and the other extended in fellowship. McBride will be joined by Nicole Glover (sax), Ely Perlman (guitar), Mike King (piano) and Savannah Harris (drums).

Awarded a Grammy for Best New Artist in 2023, Samara Joy won the Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition in 2019. She’s appeared on the TODAY show and released several viral video performances. With more than 200,000 TikTok followers, Joy is introducing jazz to a whole new generation. Her musical lineage stretches back to her paternal grandparents, Elder Goldwire and Ruth McLendon, who performed with Philadelphia gospel group the Savettes, and runs through her father, Antonio McLendon, a singer, songwriter and producer who toured with gospel.

New Mexico Jazz Festival

Christian mcbride.

With a career now blazing into its third decade, jazz bassist extraordinaire Christian McBride has become one of the most requested, most recorded, and most respected figures in the music world today. Drawing from the lexicon of his hometown, Philadelphia, McBride returns to the Lensic with a vibrant intergenerational band that will raise the roof and leave you wishing for more and more.

Christian McBride is an eight-time Grammy Award-winning bassist, composer, and bandleader. McBride is the artistic director of the historic Newport Jazz Festival, New Jersey Performing Arts Center (NJPAC) and the TD James Moody Jazz Festival, and the National Jazz Museum in Harlem. Christian is also a respected educator and advocate as the Artistic Director of Jazz House KiDS, and the Jazz Aspen Snowmass Summer Sessions.

In addition to consistent touring, McBride hosts NPR’s “Jazz Night in America” and “The Lowdown: Conversations With Christian” on SiriusXM. Whether behind the bass or away from it, Christian McBride is always of the music. From jazz to R&B, pop/rock, hip-hop/neo-soul, to classical, he is a luminary with one hand ever reaching for new heights, and the other extended in fellowship—and perhaps the hint of a challenge—inviting us to join him.

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Blue Note Jazz Festival Napa announces 2024 lineup, without Dave Chappelle

S oul, hip-hop and R&B stars John Legend , Jill Scott and André 3000 are set to headline the Black Radio Experience presented by the Blue Note Jazz Festival in Napa this summer.

Scheduled to take place at the Meritage Resort and Spa from Aug. 30-Sept. 1, the three-day Wine Country concert is a rebranded, scaled down version of Blue Note Jazz Festival Napa, which was curated by Grammy-winning pianist, producer and songwriter Robert Glasper and first launched in Northern California in 2022. 

The Black Radio Experience is once again curated by Glasper and features around 30 musical acts and comedians across three stages. The lineup includes Nile Rodgers & Chic, Andra Day, Ledisi, Common, Pete Rock, Marcus Miller, Cimafunk, Tank and the Bangas, Madlib, DJ Jazzy Jeff and Christian McBride, among others.

Notably absent is Dave Chappelle , who hosted the first two years of the festival. During both multi-day concerts, the controversial comedian joined Glasper on stage, repeatedly defying Napa Valley’s strict 10 p.m. curfew for outdoor events and cussing out local authorities.

Oakland native and former KMEL radio personality Sway Calloway is slated to serve as the emcee for this year’s event. 

In 2023, the Blue Note Jazz Festival Napa attracted approximately 7,000 attendees at the Silverado Resort in Napa, while the inaugural event at the historic Charles Krug Winery in St. Helena drew 6,000. Glasper and Blue Note organizers said they decided to stage this year’s outdoor concert in a more intimate setting to foster a closer connection between the artists and their fans.

The event boasts gourmet food and wine experiences, pool parties and on-site after-parties featuring many of the performers on the bill. Hosted during the Labor Day weekend, Blue Note is offering a variety of hotel and VIP ticket packages via bluenotejazz.com . 

The Black Radio Experience is an extension of the Blue Note Napa jazz club, which opened in 2016 as an offshoot of the original Blue Note Jazz Club in New York’s Greenwich Village. It is distinct from the Blue Note record label. 

The Blue Note Jazz Festival, a staple of the New York City summer concert calendar, is hosted at various venues in June. 

Reach Aidin Vaziri: [email protected]

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Bay Area Music Festivals and Outdoor Concerts for Summer 2024

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There’s something magical about Bay Area summers, with our famously not-too-hot, not-too-cold weather, plus ample access to natural wonders and, of course, too many concerts to choose from.

Of these dozen outdoor concerts and festivals, some are in public transit-accessible parks; others require a drive up to wine country. Some are worth the splurge; others are free. The Bay Area is full of curious listeners with eclectic taste, and there’s something for everybody here.

May 18, 2024 Frost Amphitheater, Stanford $25-$55

Blxst is the velvety-voiced R&B accompaniment to the big players in LA’s rap scene. On his recent Tupac-sampling single with Tyga and YG, “ West Coast Weekend ,” he comes off as a modern-day Nate Dogg with a nostalgic, G-funk feel. He also regularly collaborates with Northern California artists, including Kehlani and Mozzy. Blxst headlines this year’s student-organized Frost Music & Arts Festival at Stanford’s Frost Amphitheater. Joining him is singer-songwriter UMI, who often invites audiences to take a meditative pause in her uplifting live shows, and Alameda, whose eclectic sound blends R&B with indie rock and drum’n’bass.

Town Up Tuesday

May 21, 2024 Lake Merritt Bandstand, Oakland Free with RSVP

Town Up Tuesday is a party with a purpose put on by Urban Peace Movement, a local nonprofit that fights mass incarceration. It seeks to uplift Oakland culture at a time when negative media narratives about the Town abound, and operates under the idea that music and culture can unite neighbors and make communities safer.

This year’s intergenerational lineup is full of heavy hitters, not least Too Short, The Conscious Daughters (Oakland’s premier ’90s female rap group) and a legendary surprise guest. Trunk Boiz (of “ Cupcake No Fillin ” fame!) and dance crew Animaniakz will serve up hyphy movement nostalgia. Other artists on the bill represent the diverse sounds of today’s generation, notably the quirky, experimental and soulful Michael Sneed and the darker and more streetwise ALLBLACK and 1100 Himself , among others.

May 24–26, 2024 Napa Valley Expo, Napa Single-day GA: $243; three-day GA: sold out

Set in beautiful wine country, BottleRock is a festival with broad appeal. Not only does its lineup feature all-time musical greats like Oakland funk band Tower of Power and Stevie Nicks (who’s enjoying a Gen Z-fueled career resurgence), but it’s also a place to experience pop’s vanguard. That includes Kali Uchis, the bilingual singer-songwriter whose dreamy, Spanish-language 2024 album Orquídeas envelops listeners in a romantic exaltation of love and beauty. Megan Thee Stallion — who has the hip-hop world watching her every move following her explosive track “Hiss,” dissing basically the entire industry — will also grace the stage amid her highly anticipated Hot Girl Summer tour.

June 1–2, 2024 Napa Valley Expo, Napa Single-day GA: sold out; two-day GA: $358

If you miss Maná’s set at BottleRock, the good news is that they’ll be back at the same Napa Valley fairgrounds one weekend later, this time headlining new Latin music festival La Onda. On its diverse lineup, you’ll find old-school rock en español acts like Mexican band Cafe Tacvba ; Farruko, one of today’s hottest reggaetoneros; and rising young regional Mexican music stars Junior H, Fuerza Regida and Eslabón Armado, who combine styles as wide-ranging as trap and corridos.

LaRussell’s Backyard Residency

June 2, July 7 and Aug. 4, 2024 The Pergola, Vallejo Pay what you want

LaRussell has done it his way at every step of his career — notably, building a pergola and stage in his parents’ Vallejo backyard, which has allowed him to essentially bypass the corporate venue ecosystem that can be very disadvantageous to emerging artists . These intimate shows truly feel like a family affair. When I checked one out last year, the audience was full of LaRussell diehards — even small children — rapping along enthusiastically to every bar. LaRussell’s team passed out ice packs and water bottles to protect fans from the heat. It really felt like a community. To get into one of these shows, you have to name your price for a ticket — and entry is not guaranteed. But that doesn’t mean tickets only go to the highest bidders, as LaRussell has said that he likes to keep his offerings accessible to fans of all income levels.

Larry June and Goapele at San Francisco Juneteenth

June 8, 2024 Fulton Street Plaza, San Francisco Free

The day of San Francisco’s Juneteenth Parade, there’s a free concert celebrating Black music and culture at Fulton Plaza. It stars Larry June, whose laidback, luxurious rhymes about real-estate deals and gourmet meals have put a spotlight back on San Francisco rap. He’ll be joined by angel-voiced R&B hitmaker Goapele , whose classic song “Closer” continues to resonate with a new generation of Bay Area music lovers. Stunnaman02 , who’s currently on a major salad kick; Ronski, creator of the Fillmore anthem “ That Filthy ”; Zion I collaborator Dustin Sharpe; and DJs Big Von, D Sharp , Red Corvette, Daghe and World Famous Rick and Russ Show will represent the Bay’s wide-ranging, active hip-hop scene. Hosted by KMEL’s Shay Diddy, the concert also offers much in the way of jazz, soul and gospel, including Martin Luther’s Rebel Soul House Party, The Glide Choir and Fillmore Jazz Ambassadors. SF Poet Laureate Tongo Eisen-Martin will read, and the young Feline Finesse Dance Group will show off their moves.

Parliament-Funkadelic featuring George Clinton

Jun 12, 2024 Mountain Winery, Saratoga $49.50–$89.50

George Clinton is a national treasure. In the ’70s, the funk father and his bands, Parliament and Funkadelic, made hits that altered the course of American popular music. They influenced monumental stars like Prince, and became some of the most sampled acts in hip-hop history, paving the way for ’90s groups like The Coup and Digital Underground as well as more recent artists like Childish Gambino. Clinton pushed Afrofuturism forward — so much so that P-Funk’s spaceship stage prop has been immortalized in the Smithsonian. Though Clinton, now 82 years old, talked about retiring years ago — he said he funked too hard for his pacemaker — he’s continued touring with a new lineup of younger musicians.

Stern Grove

Sundays June 23-Aug. 25, 2024 Sigmund Stern Recreation Grove, San Francisco Free with RSVP

Every Sunday this summer, there’s a free concert in the park at Stern Grove . The series’ 87th season opens with a performance from queer indie rock duo Tegan and Sara on June 23. Other lineup highlights include psychedelic pop band Chicano Batman on June 30; R&B singer and saxophonist Masego on July 21; jazz-funk legend Herbie Hancock on Aug. 11 and a Big Picnic closer with queen of funk Chaka Khan on Aug. 25. But before you round up your friends and pack your cooler, make plans: RSVPs open a month before each concert date, and spots are limited.

Mosswood Meltdown

July 6–7, 2024 Mosswood Park, Oakland Single day: $99+; two-day: $159+

Punk festival Mosswood Meltdown is truly a family affair: In addition to teenage, 20-something and 30-something-year-old punks, you might see punk grandparents holding punk babies. And that vibe is reflected in its intergenerational lineup of alternative acts. Day one of the festival features ’80s art pop mainstays the B-52’s, and celebrates queer culture with a drag contest hosted by Peaches Christ and sets from Pansy Division and Hunx and His Punx. Day two, with OG garage punks The Mummies headlining, leans into hip-hop culture with a DJ set from 808 mastermind Egyptian Lover and the queen of New Orleans bounce, Big Freedia.

Outside Lands

Aug. 9–11, 2024 Golden Gate Park, San Francisco Single-day GA: $199+, three-day pass: $449+

You can thank Beyoncé for the fact that Outside Lands is more country than ever this year: Post Malone and Shaboozey, both featured on Beyoncé’s Cowboy Carter , are performing, and country hitmaker Sturgill Simpson is a headliner alongside Tyler, the Creator and the Killers. On the lineup you’ll also find buzzworthy breakout pop acts like Tyla, Renée Rapp and Victoria Monét. Outside Lands, which attracts tens of thousands of fans each day, prides itself on its wide appeal. In addition to its four main music stages, it features a queer performance zone called Dolores’, the open-air electronic music club SOMA and even a new wedding venue — and that’s on top of its many culinary and cannabis offerings.

Aug. 14–16, 2024 Greek Theatre, Berkeley $69–$120

No band better represents today’s psychedelic rock revival than Texan trio Khruangbin. Their vintage sound, recorded with warm fuzz as if on a reel-to-reel from the ’70s, combines global influences of Jamaican dub, Southeast Asian funk, surf rock and a country twang from their home state. The result is a soothing mélange that goes down slow — a perfect soundtrack for swaying under the night sky while slightly stoned, if that’s your persuasion. Celebrating their new, bilingual Spanish-English album A La Sala , Khruangbin performs three nights in a row at Berkeley’s Greek Theatre. The second two are sold out, but Aug. 14 still has tickets available.

The Black Radio Experience

Aug. 30–Sept. 1, 2024 Meritage Resort & Spa, Napa Three-day passes: $499+

For jazz, grown-and-sexy R&B, lyrical hip-hop and general musical excellence, the Black Radio Experience is a new, more intimate event from the producers of the Blue Note Jazz Festival in Napa, which is on hiatus until 2025. Jazz pianist and prolific hip-hop collaborator Robert Glasper curated the lineup, which includes John Legend, Jill Scott and Andre 3000 (with his wooden flute ) as headliners. Also performing are Nile Rogers & Chic, Ledisi, Madlib, Andra Day, Christian McBride, Common and more, with Oakland-raised Sway Calloway as host.

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