The Grand Piano Reading Series, 1976-79
For more than three years, the Grand Piano Reading Series was a venue for writers in the San Francisco Bay Area and visitors to the area to present and hear new work. Hundreds of poets presented work from divergent points on the literary spectrum and many decades of writing practice.
The chronology below is as accurate and complete as we have been able to make if from archival records. Where we have located a flyer for a month, we link to an image of it.
1976
August- 8/3: Mark Hogue, Leslie Nordo
- 8/10: Leslie Rosenberg, Christine Stanfield, Gary Blackman, Quiet on the Western Front
- 8/17: Sandy Berrigan and Maria Gitin
- 9/7: Tom Raworth
- 9/14: Shakespeare Concert
- 9/21: Carla Harryman and Sherril Jaffe
- 9/28: Louis Chabolla, John Svejear
- 10/5: Bob Perelman and John Thorpe
- 10/12: Elliott Schneider and Susan Roether
- 10/19: Gary Blackman, Sketches of Mexico
- 10/26: Steve Benson and Laura Chester
- 11/2: Stu Kremsky, Karen Brodine, and Francis Phillips
- 11/9: Bill Berkson and Ted Greenwald
- 11/16: Ron Silliman and David Bromige
- 11/23: Michael Koch and Renny Pritikin
- 11/30: Kit Robinson and Tom Veitch
- 12/7: Jim Ford and Judith Stevens
- 12/9: Women's Caucus Holiday Benefit
- 12/14: Barrett Watten and Michael Palmer
- 12/21: Pamela Jones and Jimmy Lyons
- 12/28: Chris Hewitt
1977
January- 1/4: Morgan Wines and David Melnick
- 1/11: Eugene Wildman
- 1/18: Abigail Child and Rochelle Nameroff
- 1/25: Tom Mandel and Gloria Frym
- 2/1: Rae Armantrout and Lyn Hejinian
- 2/8: Kathy Acker and "Blue" Gene Tyranny
- 2/15: Simon J. Ortiz
- 2/22: David Gitin's The Careens (with Michael Girard)
- 3/1: Steve McCaffery
- 3/8: Mary Oppen
- 3/15: Steve Vincent
- 3/22: First Poems: 12 poets reading early work
- 3/29: Philip Lopate and David Degener
- 4/5: Richard Tillinghast and Robert Dawson
- 4/12: David Benedetti and Stephen Rodefer
- 4/19: Darrell Gray and Cary Gunn
- 4/26: Karen Brodine and Norma Smith
- 5/3: Laura Beausoleil and Leslie Bowie
- 5/10: Harold Dull and Ed Kissam
- 5/17: Luis Talamantez and Dorinda Moreno
- 5/24: David Glotzer and Louis Tatler
- 5/31: Keith Shein and Steve Lavoie
- 6/7: Ted Pearson and Alan Bernheimer
- 6/14: Norman Fischer
- 6/21: Summer of Love 10th Reunion Reading
- 6/28: Pat Parker and Judy Grahn
- 7/5: Tom Cuson and Jeff Zable
- 7/12: Punk Rock Poets: G.P. Skratz, Victoria Rathbun, and Michael-Sean Lazarchuk
- 8/2: Johanna Drucker
- 8/9: Clark Coolidge
- 8/16: Barry Alpert
- 8/23: Joanne Kyger
- 8/25: Four Women Poets: Karen Brodine, Sukey Durham, Kim Marshall, and Nellie Wong
- 8/30: Harry Lewis and Jack Marshall
- 9/6: Ronald Johnson
- 9/13: Tom Veitch and Ron Silliman
- 9/20: Readings from Gertrude Stein and Jack Spicer
- 9/27: Jim Carroll and Jim Gustafson
- 10/4: Andrei Codrescu
- 10/11: Carla Harryman and Lyn Hejinian
- 10/18: Gerrye Payne and David Gitin
- 10/25: Steve Benson and Julia Vose
- 11/1: Bill Pearlman and Jack Hirschman
- 11/8: Barrett Watten and Bill Berkson
- 11/15: Leslie Scalapino and David Highsmith
- 11/22: Kathleen Fraser and Laura Wessner
- 11/29: John Thorpe
- 12/6: Carla Harryman and Ed Friedman
- 12/13: Joanna Griffin and Beverly Dahlen
- 12/20: Gloria Frym and Norma Smith (at 1025 Carleton Street, Berkeley)
1978
January- 1/10: Rae Armantrout and Maria Gitin
- 1/17: David Bromige and Tom Mandel
- 1/24: Bob Perelman and Sherril Jaffe
- 1/31: Kit Robinson and Alan Lew
- 2/7: Bobbie Louise Hawkins
- 2/14: The work of Jeff Miller, read by Andrei Codrescu, Jim Gustafson, and Bruce Cheney, with a film of Miller reading
- 2/21: Abigail Child and John Mason
- 3/7: Open Reading
- 3/14: Jack Hirschman, Alexander Kohav, "Bilingual Russian Futurists/Constructivists"
- 3/21: Keith Abbott and Michael-Sean Lazarchuk
- 3/28: Robert Harris and Lawrence Kearney
- 4/4: Steve LaVoie and Pat Nolan
- 4/11: George Mattingly and Carol Gallup
- 4/18: Richard Duerden and Michael Wolfe
- 4/25: Michael Palmer and Lorenzo Thomas
- 5/2: Franco Beltrametti and Harry Hoogstraten
- 5/9: Duncan McNaughton and Brian Fawcett
- 5/16: Lewis MacAdams and Stephen Rodefer
- 5/30: Larry Goodell in a theatrical reading
- 6/13: Alan Bernheimer, Erica Hunt, and Rodger Kamenetz
- 6/20: Ron Silliman and Victoria Rathbun
- 6/29: "A"-24 (voices by Steve Benson, Barrett Watten, Kit Robinson, Lyn Hejinian, and Carla Harryman; piano by Bob Perelman)
- 7/11: Jim Gustafson
- 7/18: Michael Davidson and Lisa Nuņez
- 7/25: Radio Plays
- 8/1, Ken Irby
- 8/8: Ted Berrigan and George Stanley
- 8/22: Art Lange and Alan Axelrod
- 8/29: Jack Marshall and David Benedetti
- no readings
- 10/3: Robert Duncan
- 10/10: Beverly Dahlen and Tom Mandel
- 10/17: Robert Glück and Bruce Boone
- 10/24: Lyn Hejinian and Robert Grenier
- 10/31: Stephen Emerson and Ted Pearson
- 11/7: Keith Shein and Andrew Berlin
- 11/14: George Lakoff and Rennie Pritikin
- 11/21: Bernard Welt and Kit Robinson
- 11/28: Larry Eigner
- 12/5: Gail King and John Thorpe
- 12/12: Carrie Gunn and David Highsmith
- 12/19: Tapes of Jack Kerouac's out-of-print records from the '50s, poetry and prose
1979
January – flyer »- 1/2: Steve Benson and Michael Waltuch
- 1/9: Norman Fischer and Beau Beausoleil
- 1/16: Bill Graves and John Mason
- 1/23: Alan Lew
- 1/30: Leslie Scalapino and David Bromige
- 2/6: Carla Harryman and Bill Berkson
- 2/13: Co-Accident (Kirby Malone, Chris Mason, and Marshall Reese)
- 2/20: Charles Bernstein and Barrett Watten
- 2/27: Frank O'Hara's Try, Try, with Bob Perelman, Steve Benson, Carla Harryman, and Nick Robinson
- 3/3: Tom Veitch and Bobbie Louise Hawkins
- 3/19: Bruce Andrews and Rae Armantrout
- 3/17: David Guss and Stephen Fredman
- 3/24: Cynthia Genser and Keith Abbott
- 3/31: Barbara Einzig and Kathleen Fraser
- 4/7: Dennis Cooper and Tobey Kaplan
- 4/14: Ted Greenwald and Robert Grenier
- 4/21: Sherril Jaffe and Jeanne Lance
- 4/28: Ted Berrigan and Pat Nolan
- 5/5: Larry Kearney and John Thorpe
- 5/12: Mary Oppen and David Gitin
- 5/19: Paul Kahn, Laura Schiff, and John Brandi
- 5/26: Duncan McNaughton, Michael Wolfe, and Lewis MacAdams
- 6/2: Laura Chester and Gloria Frym
- 6/16: Mark Linenthal and Patricia Kirkpatrick
- 6/23: G.P. Skratz and Pamela Edwards
- 6/30: Leslie Brody and Laura Beausoleil
- 7/7: Frances Jaffer and Stephen Vincent
- 7/14: Tim Jacobs and Ted Pearson
- 7/21: Steve Lavoie and Erica Hunt (at the new Grand Piano)
- 7/28: John Mason and Geoff Young
- 8/4: Reinhard Lettau and Richard Duerden
- 8/11: James Petrillo, Betsy Davids, and Don Cushman
- 8/18: Andrei Codrescu and Maria Gitin
- 8/25: Joanne Kyger and David Meltzer
- no readings
- 10/6: Phyllis Koestenbaum
- 10/13: Allen Cohen and Alice Rogoff
- 10/20: Deirdre Sharett and Ivan Arguelles
- 10/27: Michael Koch and Tony Vaughan
- 11/3: Julia Vinograd and Gabrielle Daniels
- 11/10: Mary West, Peter Pussydog Stevens, "Beat" presentation
- 11/17: Gloria North and Lena Diethelm
- 11/24: Claudia Chase and Allemainde String Quartet
- no readings
An earlier version of the above chronology appeared in Volume 1 of THE GRAND PIANO, with updates and corrections provided in Volume 4. Documentation that appears in upcoming volumes will be posted to the website.
Many thanks to Jennifer Reimer and Charles Legere for their assistance in compiling this chronology.