The 2024-25 classical music season actually gets underway this weekend via an early start for the Santa Barbara Music Club, who are congregating to present a concert in memory of Betty Oberacker. The longtime Santa Barbara-based, internationally-known concert pianist, educator and coach passed away June 28 at the age of 91. “Betty was a tremendous […]
I talked with Tommy Faragher this week about his band, The Faragher Brothers, who will be doing a two-night residency at the Alcazar Theatre, Carpinteria, August 9 and 10. The original band was formed in the 1970s up in Redlands, CA by four brothers, Tommy, Davey, Jimmy,and Danny Faragher. While their long history in the […]
Recently Trending
More from Montecito
The Music Academy of the West launched a directing fellow position three years ago, but MAW still doesn’t have something similar for conductor trainees, despite offering five to six orchestral concerts every summer. If they ever decided to create such a position, luring David Robertson to direct it would be a great idea. The Malibu-raised […]
Bill Lanphar wasn’t the best-known singer-songwriter-guitarist who called Santa Barbara home. But he might very well have been the best-loved among his peers. Lanphar, who had a rock band when he lived in L.A. before relocating to Santa Barbara and La Conchita, started playing music during open mic nights at Dargan’s Pub and quickly became […]
Continue motoring down the 101 this weekend for more musical adventures, including the first installment of the 2024 Ventura Music Festival, the seaside city’s long-running boundary-busting fest that extends to various venues and genres. Grammy winner and 12-time IBMA Fiddle Player of the Year Michael Cleveland brings boffo bluegrass to Olivas Adobe Historical Park with […]
Lawrence Brownlee is one of today’s most celebrated bel canto tenors, in demand for opera performances as well as song cycle recitals with major orchestras across the country and around the world. He’s particularly praised for his interpretations of Rossini – his Grammy-nominated album Virtuoso Rossini Arias prompted famed New Yorker critic Alex Ross to […]
Ken Cazan, the director of the Music Academy 2024 opera Carmen, last helmed a production of the famed and beloved work nearly 30 years ago, and has been happily ensconced in recent years taking on smaller, more experimental pieces. But he was tempted to field the fiery fan favorite once again by both the offer […]
Grammy-winning violinist Joshua Bell, music director of London’s Academy of St, Martin-in-the-Fields, joined iconic pianist Jeremy Denk in a dazzling duo performance at the Granada. The tony twosome’s concert, part of the Music Academy of the West’s Summer Festival, featured works by Franck, Beethoven, and Mozart. The sold-out 90-minute performance featured Mozart’s “Sonata No. 18 […]
Montecito-based music makers Doublewide Kings have had a pretty busy summer. But their attention is also focused on the fall, as the country/classic rock band is once again headed to the grand stage at the Granada Theatre. One year after The Kings and the Santa Barbara Symphony rocked our world with the Van Morrison tribute […]
Read more...
The Music Academy audience has already seen a lot of Jeremy Denk. The piano great is in his 10th season as a faculty teaching artist on campus, which assignment began less than two years after Denk was awarded a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, and the summer after he served as the Ojai Festival’s music director. In […]
Concerts in the Park is a long-cherished Santa Barbara institution, a summertime frolic featuring free live music on the Great Meadow in Chase Palm Park along Santa Barbara’s waterfront on Cabrillo Blvd. The gently-sloping hill facing the permanent concrete stage (often the setting for weddings and other private functions) provides sensational sightlines and surroundings with […]
When Paige Cameron enrolled at Northwestern in her home state of Illinois to study vocal performance, the plan was to sing her way to stardom. “I really thought I was going to be an opera singer,” said Cameron, who goes by either she or they and has recently decided to lop off her hyphenated last […]
Maybe the Music Academy of the West had some unanticipated smarts in scheduling the annual Percussion Fest for the first Saturday of the season, just four days into the 2024 Summer Festival. With the fellows flying in from San Francisco, Cleveland, Houston, and New York and driving up from L.A. they’d all have to arrive […]
You might say Navasard Hakobyan had a pretty good summer in Santa Barbara last year. The Armenian baritone not only made his debut as Marcello, one of the principal roles in La Boheme at the Granada, he also secured the most coveted and longstanding prize of the festival in the Music Academy’s 2023 Marilyn Horne […]
