Tag archives: music
Last year, Isabel “Izzy” Fuentes achieved what is just about every teenage ballerina’s dream – getting cast as Clara, the girl who gets to go on a fairy tale journey with the come-to-life title character of The Nutcracker, Tchaikovsky’s famed Christmastime ballet, danced every December by Santa Barbara’s State Street Ballet. Then came the Thomas […]
The SKY Meditation program was just getting a toe-hold in Santa Barbara earlier this year when an unexpected personal situation caused a step back just as the technique, popular around the country, was getting ready to begin a series of regular trainings. After an eight-month hiatus, SKY returned with two free intro evenings earlier this […]
A grant of $20,000 from the Music Academy of the West has enabled pianist Evan Shinners, who attended the Miraflores campus in 2009, to put his keyboard talents to good use with a pop-up shop in Manhattan offering Bach prelude, fugues, and even condoms. The Juilliard-trained pianist has been playing five hours of Bach each […]
With dozens of participants, Westmont College’s 14th annual Christmas Festival at the First Presbyterian Church was undoubtedly the hottest ticket in town, with four performances staged to cater for the demand. With the full arsenal of the Montecito college’s music talent on display, including the orchestra, women’s and men’s chorale, and the chamber singers, the […]
Not surprisingly, the Moldovan-born virtuoso violinist Patricia Kopatchinskaja turned out to be one of the most ambitious and active music directors of the Ojai Music Festival when she headed up the venerable classical music festival this past summer. Her four-day visit to the mountain village veered from a solo performance unplugged in Libbey Park to […]
The UCSB Jazz Ensemble combos directed by Dr. Jon Nathan held a three-hour jazz lunch concert at SOhO on Sunday, December 2. The jam was sold out, with standing room only the entire time. Kudos to SOhO for packing the club on a busy Sunday afternoon during the holidays. The gig started off with the […]
The Kronos Quartet has never shied away from controversy. Over the course of its 45-year history, the ensemble has exploded any previous notion of the limitations of the string quartet, embracing everything from ultra-modern composers and unfamiliar sounds to wildly unexpected and some would say edgy collaborations, most recently with “Sight Machine,” a multimedia piece […]
Eight decades or so into the Great American Songbook, it would seem to be near impossible for artists to find a new way of taking on the classic show tunes and pop hits of a couple of generations of songwriters. There have been straight-ahead vocal stylists bebop jazz interpretations, soul-shaking R&B rounds, and even a […]
A tony triumvirate of talent came together as one for the Santa Barbara Symphony’s back-to-back Igor Stravinsky fest at the Granada, with the performers including the State Street Ballet and members of the Ensemble Theatre. Montecito Emmy-winning actor Christopher Lloyd narrated the Faustian story of The Soldier’s Tale with Ensemble regular Jamie Torcellini as the […]
Santa Barbara Choral Society, which performs its Hallelujah Project 6 at the Lobero on December 8 and 9 with Sound of Music actress Angela Cartwright narrating ‘Twas the Night Before Christmas, celebrated with a fall soirée at the Montecito aerie of Todd and Allyson Aldrich. The fun 30-guest fete, after the Thomas Fire caused the […]
Audrey Murphy, 11th grade Laguna Blanca student, has been invited to perform for the Honors Concert Choir – 2019 High School Honors Performance Series to be held at Carnegie Hall in New York City this February. The Honors Performance Series was created to showcase accomplished individual high school performers on an international level by allowing them […]
Westmont continues to innovate and respond to students’ interests by adding new programs and more choices that fit well with the liberal arts and prepare graduates for a variety of careers. Music students focused on performing can earn a Bachelor of Music once the National Association of Schools of Music approves the program. Beginning in […]
Actor Jeff Goldblum, who has starred in many of Hollywood’s top-grossing films, including Jurassic Park and Independence Day, showed off his musical talents at UCSB’s Campbell Hall when his Mildred Snitzer Orchestra entertained a packed house. An accomplished pianist, Goldblum, 66, and his jazz band of friends play regularly at L.A.’s Rockwell Table and Stage […]
Opera Santa Barbara, celebrating its 25th anniversary, launched its latest season in cracking style with Puccini’s classic work La Boheme at the Granada. Director Omer Ben Seadia, who made her local debut three years ago with A Streetcar Named Desire and L’Italiana in Algeri, has done an artfully crafted four-act show with opera director Kostis […]
Fresh off a season opening concert of audience-pleasing music by Gershwin and others, the Santa Barbara Symphony next takes on two famously adventurous works by Igor Stravinsky, including his ballet score The Rite of Spring, which had a “scandalous” premiere 105 years ago in Paris, when the bizarre story of pagan sacrifice and the composer’s […]
The Santa Barbara Symphony (SBS) took us back to the era of Supper Clubs in a sea of sapphire. The rotunda at the Hilton Santa Barbara Beachfront Resort never looked more beautiful. It was totally draped in royal-blue curtains. The ceiling turned magical as the sun set, the tiny lights looking like we were sitting […]
Members of The Adderley School’s Advanced Conservatory are offering their musical talents this holiday season in an effort to raise funds to underwrite scholarships. The professionally trained company choir, which recently performed onstage with Katy Perry at her benefit concert at the Santa Barbara Bowl, is available for hire for a suggested donation. The Adderley […]
Westmont junior Michael Oldach defended his title and senior Blake Fonda finished second at the Golden State Athletic Conference Cross Country Championships on November 3 in Santa Clarita. Oldach of Colorado Springs completed the 8,000-meter race in a time of 25:26, and Fonda of Lodi finished in 25:39. They earned All-GSAC honors for their […]
An even newer work also gets its Santa Barbara debut over the same two weekends as UCSB Theater presents Vanity Fair, based on William Makepeace Thackery’s classic 1848 novel, and adapted for the stage with a modern twist by playwright Kate Hamill. Thomas Whitaker directs the tale of misadventures, friendship, and morally questionable acts, which […]
At 18, Peter Asher was a former child actor who was plugging along in London with the folk duo Peter & Gordon, and whose younger sister, Jane, just happened to be dating a fellow named Paul McCartney. In fact, the “cute” Beatle was living in the Asher family home when Peter & Gordon got signed […]
