Daryl Davis sets a February Sunday at the Birchmere

The boogie-woogie pianist who held down Chuck Berry's piano chair returns to his home-turf room in Alexandria on Feb. 21.

Some players you go see for the songs. Daryl Davis you go see for his left hand — the rolling, relentless boogie-woogie bass line that keeps a room moving long after the right hand has gone off somewhere wild. Northern Virginia gets another dose of it this winter.

Davis plays the Birchmere in Alexandria on Sunday, Feb. 21, 2027, at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are $53.65 through Ticketmaster. The date was announced Oct. 21, and it's billed as a "Daryl Davis Presents" night — the format he has used at the Birchmere before for multi-artist evenings built around his band and invited guests, like the Thanks for the Memories shows in past years.

If the name rings a bell for reasons that have nothing to do with music, that's fair. Davis is widely known for something few musicians would attempt: sitting down with members of the Ku Klux Klan and talking with them, an effort covered by NBC Washington and others and credited with leading many of them to walk away. But on a Birchmere stage, the conversation is the piano.

And the musical résumé is serious. His own bio lays out the lineage: he was mentored by Pinetop Perkins, of the Muddy Waters band, and Johnnie Johnson, Chuck Berry's original pianist, both of whom claimed him as a godson. He later filled that same piano slot for Berry himself — a St. Louis station put it at more than 100 shows. In 1985, Perkins picked Davis to succeed him in the piano and vocal chair of the Muddy Waters Legendary Blues Band, and Davis was the featured pianist on Cephas & Wiggins' Grammy-winning *Flip Flop and Fly*. Add a jazz degree from Howard, per the Kennedy Center, and sessions or stages shared with Jerry Lee Lewis, B.B. King and Bruce Hornsby, and you have a player who connects the region straight back to the source.

On a Birchmere stage, the conversation is the piano.

The Birchmere is the right room for it. The Alexandria hall has become enough of an institution that it now has its own book, *All Roads Lead to the Birchmere: America's Legendary Music Hall*, and it's the kind of seated, listening crowd that knows when to hush and when to holler. Davis has been a regular presence there — most recently alongside the Nighthawks for an October tribute to Chuck Berry — which makes a February return feel less like a tour stop and more like a standing appointment.

A Sunday at 7:30 also means you'll be home at a reasonable hour on a school night, which is one more reason this one tends to draw a mix of longtime blues heads and families bringing a kid who just started piano lessons. If that's you, sit where you can see his hands.

Bring dancing shoes anyway. Boogie-woogie doesn't care that it's Sunday.

Sources: Daryl Davis — Music Bio (official site) (daryldavis.com); Daryl Davis — Wikipedia (en.wikipedia.org); Daryl Davis, Pianist, Actor, Race Relations Consultant — Kennedy Center (kennedy-center.org); The Daryl Davis Band pays tribute to Pinetop Perkins — Chestertown Spy (chestertownspy.org); Musician talks to KKK members — KSDK (ksdk.com); Musician fights racism by speaking to white supremacists — NBC Washington (nbcwashington.com); Chuck Berry's longtime pianist discusses meeting with Klansman — LifeAudio (lifeaudio.com); Live review: Daryl Davis @ The Birchmere 7/11/20 — Parklife DC (parklifedc.com); A Tribute to Chuck Berry featuring the Nighthawks with Daryl Davis — Live Nation (livenation.com); All Roads Lead to the Birchmere: America's Legendary Music Hall — Owensboro Times (owensborotimes.com); Daryl Davis tickets — Ticketmaster (ticketmaster.evyy.net)