Tag archives: Ojai

For the past five years, former Indy arts editor D. J. Palladino and writer/publisher Jim Buckley (not to be confused with our former publisher) have teamed up to produce Bloomsday Santa Barbara, a celebration of James Joyce’s Ulysses on June 16, to coincide with the international celebrations of the iconic novel – whose entire main […]

Phil Burgers, the L.A.-based writer, comedian, clown, actor, director and clown teacher, is best known for performing as Dr. Brown, with stand-up comedy that blends absurdity, precision, and audience interaction. His show BEFRDFGTH centers on spontaneity, physicality, and the unpredictable dynamic between performer and audience. Perhaps most importantly, his performance leans into what may be […]

Hello Loves! Monday, April 27, I was invited to Kerry Docherty’s book tour stop in Ojai at the Light and Space Yoga Center owned by Samantha Jones Garrison. She was promoting her second book that just landed April 21, 2026, titled, Selfish: Unlearning, Reclaiming, and Telling the Truth. Yes, that Kerry Docherty.The woman who co-owns […]

Opportunities abound in Ojai, the longtime oasis for retreat, reflection, and personal growth, starting this weekend with “Be With Us,” slated for 7 pm on April 10 at Ojai Underground. The interactive evening of music, storytelling, and soulful connection is spearheaded by Ojai’s own Kathlyn “Katie” Hendricks, the bestselling author of Conscious Loving, co-lead of […]

I am an early bird.  It’s 5 am and I am lounging in the very spacious patio of my sweet room #24 at Ojai’s newly opened and fantastically reimagined El Roblar Hotel so as not to awaken my beloved goddaughter Alpha who is snoozing away in her bed. A half-moon hangs in the Valley of […]

Frank Meeink, a former neo-Nazi skinhead recruiter turned Jewish educator, will share his extraordinary story in “Hate to Hope,” a public talk on Thursday, August 14, at 6 pm at the Louise Lowry Davis Center in Santa Barbara. Raised in South Philadelphia, Meeink was drawn into violent white supremacy as a teen before prison friendships, […]

Over the years, every time I visited Ojai, I’d stop at the bend in the curve on Besant Road at The Ranch House’s kitchen door bakery to grab a loaf of their rye bread to bring home. Sometimes there would be a meal there – but there was always a bread stop accompanied by a […]

When I started graduate school, my children were three and five years old, so each semester I would escape to The Ojai Valley Inn for two nights as a “Am I Crazy, What the Hell Was I thinking” reset. Last week, I went back with my daughter after a seven-year absence and driving up the […]

Santa Barbara County has crowned its grand prize winner in the 2025 WaterWise Garden Recognition Contest: Teri and Pat Guillies of Montecito. Their vibrant, eco-conscious garden, dubbed a “pollinators’ dream,” captured top honors for its dazzling display of over 65% California native plants, including sagebrush, blue-eyed grass, island buckwheat, and more. Designed and maintained by […]

Something Rotten! imagine the birth of the musical as brothers Nick and Nigel Bottom’s bid to foil William Shakespeare’s reign as the Renaissance rockstar playwright. The idea arrives via a local soothsayer determined to assuage Nick Bottom’s agony of defeat, foretelling thus that the future of theater will simultaneously stitch together acting, singing, and dancing. […]

Claire Chase, the innovative virtuosic flutist who has “world premiered” hundreds of compositions by a new generation of artists, was the first flutist to be awarded a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship (2012) as well as the nearly-as prestigious Avery Fisher Prize (2017). Two years later, she was a Mosher Guest Artist at Music Academy of the […]

Hot on the heels of the milestone 25th Ojai Film Festival, and just a week after the launching of the new SBIFF Film Center in the former home of the Fiesta Five, the historic Ojai Playhouse is reopening on November 22 after being closed for a decade. Similarly but on a much smaller scale than […]

It’s that time of year for the Santa Barbara area and our neighbors in Ojai to host their annual Studio Artist Tours. Both tours’ ticket proceeds are to benefit a charity they are supporting this year. The artist tours and their respective reception kickoff parties are an all-ages event. The tours are self-guided with maps […]

Libbey Bowl lies in an idyllic park setting in the charming mountain village of Ojai, and the amphitheater is finally getting its due as a special summer venue. Acts at Libbey this week include Los Lonely Boys, the veteran trio of Texas born and bred brothers Henry, Jojo and Ringo Garza who play a mix […]

Audiences will once again have the chance to witness staged readings of potential future classics at the Ojai Playwrights Conference’s 27th annual New Works Festival from August 1-4. The readings are the culmination of a two-week workshop immersion for the five selected playwrights to develop their creations, with the writers joined by professional actors and […]

It’s not just the views that impress from atop Sulphur Mountain in Ventura County. It’s the wines, too. Ojai Mountain Winery is one of the newest wine projects on the Central Coast. Its first releases hit the market just last year, and the buzz around them has been swift and upbeat. Their acclaim stems from […]

Pianist and conductor Mitsuko Uchida, Musical America’s 2022 Artist of the Year and a Grammy nominee in 2023, serves as music director of this year’s Ojai Music Festival, the 78th edition of four days of musical brainstorming in an enchanted setting amid audiences eagerly anticipating challenge and discovery. The 2024 Ojai Festival takes place June […]

Film festivals are coming fast and furious in the middle of fall, with the Jewish Film Festival continuing for four more days through November 5, and the Ojai Film Festival set to hit the theater November 2-6. The latter fest found in the mountain community will screen more than four score films from around the […]