Because I Have To: Bay Area Creatives in Conversation (Oakland)

Submitted by the Event Organizer

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BECAUSE I HAVE TO is a discussion series featuring Bay Area artists, writers, musicians, chefs, and creators who work across multiple artistic and creative mediums, against the grain of their professional lives, alongside it, or within it. Hosted by Jeff Wright, these conversations will delve into creative work in the modern age, the real whys that drive us to make it, how it intertwines with our lives, and what really makes it all possible. 

BIHT #1 will feature Amar Lal and Paolo Bicchieri. If you’re in the Bay Area, their fingerprints are probably already on something familiar to you, due to their presence and commitment to culture and creative work here. Professionally, Amar is fine-tuning and refining songs we listen to at his Oakland studio every day. He also creates visual works of art to express sound, as noted in his latest book, Practicing Joy. Paolo’s creative writing can be found in any given news outlet, narrating underrepresented projects, or throughout his handful of published poetry works. He also organizes community events to uplift local poets, writers, and up-and-coming chefs through Kitchen Table. All of this work takes perseverance, the right settings, creative discipline, and much more that we are set to discuss in the first edition of BECAUSE I HAVE TO.

Amar Lal is a Canadian artist, musician, and mastering engineer currently based in Oakland. He runs the studio Macro Sound, recently published his first book of graphic scores, and previously spent a decade touring internationally as a member of the band Big Ups, while living in New York City. Amar has performed as an experimental composition sound artist and shown unique visual work throughout the Bay Area. 

Paolo Bicchieri is a writer living on the coast. He’s also worked with education nonprofits and farmworker unions, interviewed coffee growers and rappers, and worked the line at bars and restaurants from McDonald’s to Tartine. With bylines throughout SFStandard, KQED, Eater, SF Chronicle, Paolo has also published multiple books and heads up Kitchen Table –  a reading series centered around poetry and literature, food and drink, and culture and politics.

Because I Have To is hosted by Jeff Wright, a Bay Area everything person — participating in creative work across music, writing, food and beverage, business, and more. 

Sliding scale $0 – $20; no one turned away. Free coffee available to anyone attending.

Disclaimer: Please double check event information with the event organizer as events can be canceled, details can change after they are added to our calendar, and errors do occur.