[dropcap]S[/dropcap]udden. Tremendous. Explosive. These are the rough English translations for the word fulminante, and the best descriptions for the powerful music behind the local three-piece act that bears the name. They are a melting pot of sound, marinating rock ’n’ roll with a cabinet of flavors from jazz and Latin to surf and even a dash of reggae.
“We don’t want to be pigeonholed,” says bassist Paul “Wolfman” Grimm. “People always say, ‘Oh, you play upright bass? You must play rockabilly or jazz.’ No, I play music.”
“It’s important to us because we all grew up with different kinds of music,” agrees drummer Josue Monroy. “I think it’s especially important in our current political culture with so many minority populations feeling ostracized.”
The result is a bold mix of catchy songs that range from headbangers to romantic melodies that leave you dancing under the moon’s soft glow. I’ve personally witnessed strangers to the band see them once and leave as their biggest fan. But for those hardcore doubters, the magic can be heard on their debut, 2016 self-titled EP—or wait another week or two for the first single off their debut full-length.
“We’re going to do it in a series of singles first,” explains guitarist Brenda Martinez. “And then release the whole album.”
While there is no exact date as of yet, that isn’t stopping the Fulminante engine from powering forward. Not only do they have a shows at the Appleton Grill on Feb. 1 and at the Crepe Place on Feb. 9, but they are already planning their first video—of the latest single, “Torn.”
And trust me, after hearing a couple of advanced tracks, the wait is well worth it. Recorded locally by Olav Tabatabai at Noise Eater Recordings, the songs are crisp with clear production quality. Tabatabai managed to catch their live energy on the tracks, an elusive quality that remains a constant struggle for many.
“He’s a great engineer who had a lot of input,” says Monroy. “He was really into the project.”
A celebration of the “craziest, flavor bending, once-in-a-lifetime creations from your local brewers, cider makers, distillers, and food artisans,” Twisted Tasting is a not-to-be-missed event for local foodies, craft beverage enthusiasts and fans of Santa Cruz’s thriving artisanal culture. A benefit for the Arts Council of Santa Cruz County, this annual event that runs in conjunction with SF Beer Week promises taste delights and one-of-a-kind creations. This year’s event has a 1970s theme and attendees are encouraged to “think Studio 54 and dress to impress.” Dig?
INFO: 7 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 17. Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium, 307 Church St., Santa Cruz. $85. 426-6966. WANT TO GO? Go to santacruz.com/giveaways before 11 a.m. on Friday, Feb. 9 to find out how you could win a pair of tickets to the event.
I used to reveal my Top Ten movies of the year in December, when all of the other year-end wrap-ups appear. But it’s become increasingly ridiculous to stick to that pattern, since so many of the movies that might be contenders don’t even get to Santa Cruz until January. So now that the awards season is in full swing—the Oscar nominations were announced last week—it feels like the right moment to look back on the movie year, and pay homage to my personal candidates for Best Movies of 2017. Catch them if you can!
OK, I’m right in step with the Academy on this one, Guillermo del Toro’s perverse fantasia on forbidden romance (inter-species) and the solidarity of the oppressed against the oppressor. For my money, it’s the onscreen love story of the year.
French filmmaker Francois Ozon revisits the complex aftermath of WWI in this moody, engrossing tone-poem on love, loss, and absolution. With a disturbingly timely theme about the wages of nationalism, this haunting, immersive movie features the compelling Pierre Niney as a mysterious young Frenchman who shows up in a small German town grieving for its war dead.
Set in 1940 London, during the Blitz, Lone Scherfig’s smart, entertaining, femme-centric movie follows a film crew trying to complete a morale-boosting epic to help the war effort. The mood is witty, urbane, and irreverent. Gemma Arterton, Sam Claflin and Bill Nighy head a marvelous cast in a movie that consistently engages with its wit, skill and heartfelt emotion.
Dan Stevens is great as Charles Dickens, who, beset by financial worries, sets out to write and publish A Christmas Carol in only six weeks. Dry facts are transformed into delicious fiction by scriptwriter Susan Coyne, who combines Dickens’ real life with the volatility of his imagination, as his impudent characters haunt him like ghosts. Hugely entertaining.
Frances McDormand is superb as a middle-aged mother with a spectacularly vulgar mouth, a fearless take-no-prisoners attitude, and a relentless drive to see justice done after the unsolved murder of her teenage daughter. Filmmaker Martin McDonagh mixes raucously funny dialogue and irreverent observation of human nature with an uncompromising sense of morality.
Matt Tyrnauer’s excellent documentary shows how engagement, activism and a keen sense of moral outrage can foil the best-laid plans of rats and politicians. In 1950s New York City, the Utopian, post-war urban planning of neighborhood-killing high-rises is opposed by Jane Jacobs, journalist and architectural critic, who believes life lived out on the streets and the stoops of old buildings creates community. Their showdown becomes a fascinating “battle for the soul of the city.”
The consequences of violence—on victims, families and friends—is rarely portrayed with this much somber eloquence. Thoughtful, infuriating and heartbreaking, this searing, expertly-told tale of crime and punishment on a Wyoming Indian reservation leaves you breathless. In his second feature, director Taylor Sheridan combines swift and cogent storytelling with an impressive sense of visual composition.
Writer-director GretaGerwig delivers a wry, warm-hearted portrait of family, home, and dreams in modern America. The family is not dysfunctional in any clichéd movie comedy way, but Gerwig captures the gulf of potential calamity in the fractious relationship between a Sacramento high-school senior (Saoirse Ronan) and her loving but harried mom (Laurie Metcalf).
Emma Stone is terrific as Billie Jean King, and Steve Carell plays Bobby Riggs with gleeful gusto. The media frenzy around their 1973 match becomes this thoughtful, entertaining movie about gender, identity, politics, and celebrity, at a pivotal cultural moment in American history. Directed by Valerie Faris and Jonathan Dayton (Little Miss Sunshine).
As a woman so completely warped by a monstrous society that she becomes a monster herself, Florence Pugh delivers a chilling gemstone of a performance in this Victorian-era tale of female suppression, sexual awakening, and revenge. Not a movie to love, but a grueling and profound psychological thriller.
[dropcap]M[/dropcap]utari chocolate popped up three years ago with high-end sipping chocolate that delighted local taste buds. A couple of years ago, they sold the business to Katy Oursler and Stephen Beaumier, who have made some changes, like a new location next to Assembly. The biggest news is the introduction of their White Label chocolate bar line. Oursler explained to us why its top-of-the-line stuff.
What’s the difference between White Label chocolate and high-end bars you can find on grocery shelves?
KATY OURSLER: One of the big differences between two- or three-ingredient bars and what’s on the shelf is we don’t use soy lecithin. A lot of folks use a lot of cocoa butter. We keep our cocoa butter to a minimal amount, under 5 percent. It dilutes the experience of the origin; it mutes some of those nuances. We don’t use a vanilla. You would be surprised at how much you associate the taste of chocolate with vanilla when you start consuming bars that don’t have vanilla. Most of our bars are two-ingredient bars: Cacao and sugar. It’s more dynamic. You can taste the origin. I compare it to winemaking.
Do you have specific beans you work with, or does it change all the time?
There are some staples and communities that we find that folks are drawn to that we keep on our menus. For example, our Madagascar bar and are Tanzanian bar, those are two very likeable origins. The Tanzanian is pretty quintessential roast-y chocolate-y. Whereas the Madagascar is bright, red berry fruit, raspberry. And I usually find that folks’ palates fall into one of those two categories. They like the heavier chocolate-y roast, or they like the brighter, more acidic fruit-forward and floral. We do keep some basics on the menu, and then we experiment. We just brought in some beans from India, from Anamalai, which we’re very excited about. I think a better or more interesting bean and bar is our Honduras, La Masica. We won an International Chocolate Award for it last year. It comes from FHIA (Fundacion Hondureña de Investigación Agrícola) in Honduras, which is an incredible cacao gene bank with a plethora of pure genetic strains and subsequent clones. It’s places like this, with its robust breeding/cloning programs, that will enable cacao to be more resilient to climate change while also not losing its fine flavor.
Factory & House is at 504 Front St. A, Santa Cruz, 687-8141; Winter Shop at 1108 Pacific Ave., Santa Cruz. Open Friday, Saturday and Sundays. mutarichocolate.com.
California political analyst Dan Schnur posed a question to the Santa Cruz Chamber of Commerce on Tuesday, Jan. 23, at the group’s annual member breakfast. Unemployment is at 4 percent nationally, and yet most Americans’ optimism these days remains in the gutter, defying all conventional wisdom.
“So here we are in this time of remarkable economic growth and job creation, but there’s still—according to public opinion polling, and just the conversations we have in our lives—a sense of disquiet. So how could that be?” asked Schnur, who teaches at USC and UC Berkeley. “Why do we have, by most traditional measures, such a sordid economic outlook, and why are people so unsettled?”
Before politics, the 8 a.m. event began with breakfast. The chamber’s new Chair Mark Mesiti-Miller introduced the board’s new members in front of a coastal backdrop at the Dream Inn’s Aquarius restaurant.
In his talk, Schnur painted Santa Cruz as a fortunate town—lucky to have the beach, Schnur’s favorite tortilla chips at El Palomar, and what he calls a “community spirit very rarely seen.” It seems fitting that the chamber would bring in a political analyst at a time when no one seems willing to talk about anything besides elections, even when the midterm races are more than 10 months away.
More than looking ahead, Schnur wanted to examine lessons from the recent past.
“In the 2016 election, not even two years ago, we heard a lot about the angry American voter: Americans are furious, Americans are livid. Underneath every angry person is a frightened person,” said Schnur, explaining that he was speaking as much as a father and a teacher as he was a political expert. “And so let us talk for just a moment about the frightened American voter.”
In 2016, older and less-educated frightened voters, mostly on the right, went for Donald Trump, Schnur said. They didn’t attend college because they were told, in their day, that they didn’t have to in order to make a living. They worked their fingers to the bone, with the goal of retiring comfortably with a reliable pension—something that, for many Americans, looks less reliable than ever.
Younger and more-educated voters, meanwhile, mostly on the left, broke for Bernie Sanders, Schnur said. Many of them went to college and graduated into the worst financial crisis since the Great Depression.
Both groups, Schnur explained, have done everything asked of them, and with little to show for it.
“The factory worker and the barista really have a great deal in common,” Schnur said. “They’re motivated by the same fears, because we are going through a time of economic and social change, and our political leaders haven’t told them how to navigate that change.”
Frightened voters, he explained, run from the things that scare them, just as all frightened people do. Leaders, he said, do something else, entirely—pointedly dropping a not-so-subtle hint to a room filled with leaders.
“Leaders walk toward those scary things,” Schnur said. “And before leaders like you walk toward those scary things, they turn to the frightened people on both sides of them—real leaders turn to people on the left and their right—and they reassure them, and they remind them that if we walk toward those scary things together, that’s how we win.”
“It was the most exciting New Year’s Eve I’ve had in years,” says Kate Pavao, co-founder of local nonprofit Live Like Coco. She spent it glued to a screen, but unlike most people, she wasn’t watching the ball drop in Times Square. She was watching the running total of donations to her group on the Santa Cruz Gives (SCG) website, as Good Times’ holiday giving drive rolled into its final hours.
Specifically, she was watching how many people were giving. Each year, SCG awards a $1,000 bonus to the participating nonprofit that gets the most donors. In 2016, that bonus was won by the Warming Center. (There are also awards for Most Donors Under 35 Years Old, and Most Innovative Program, with all three sponsored by the restaurant Oswald.)
In 2017, Pavao and her husband Aaron Lazenby, who founded Live Like Coco together the year before, saw a chance to compete in that category. With a simple, accessible project called Birthday Books From Coco that brings new books to county students—many of them low-income—on their birthdays, their idea was inspiring a flood of donations. But as SCG reached its close—midnight on New Year’s Eve—the Warming Center was closing the gap, fueled by founder Brent Adams’ gift for networking and a project that was also clearly connecting with local donors: providing shelter to those living on the streets with physical mobility challenges.
As the two groups began to leapfrog over each other in the final stretch, they developed a friendly rivalry, using the competition to inspire new donors. Because the leaderboards on the SCG website show running totals, both groups were able to watch the race to the finish play out.
“We were excited to get into that thing with the Warming Center,” says Pavao. “It activated our base like crazy. To watch it happen in real time was super exciting.”
“We just watched it go up, up, up,” says Adams. “For the last few days, it was a dead heat. That was really awesome. Without that competition, we would have had far fewer donors.”
In the end, Live Like Coco won with 182 donors (raising a total of $8,525—which will allow them to distribute 1,705 new books to schoolkids) and Warming Center came in second with 158 donors (who gave $9,917). In total fundraising, the environmental nonprofit Coastal Watershed Council came in first, with $13,425 raised; the award for Most Innovative Program went to the Homeless Service Center’s Smart Path to Housing and Health.
“It’s funny to be in competition with someone doing amazing things,” says Pavao. “Hopefully we brought some dollars and attention to what the Warming Center is doing, as well.”
In fact, that’s exactly what the results of this year’s Gives program suggest. With a total of $197,459 donated to the 33 local nonprofits selected for this year’s program, donations were 9 percent above last year, even as giving nationwide grew only 2.7 percent on average. More importantly, there was a 55 percent increase in number of donors who gave through SCG. And more than half of the total donations were from people who made donations to more than one nonprofit while they were on the SCG website. In fact, 17 of the 20 largest donors to this year’s program gave to multiple nonprofits. It’s clear that a rising tide of charitable giving is lifting all of the nonprofits in Santa Cruz Gives.
Adams thinks that’s partly because of the design of the SCG website—someone may come to it planning to donate to only one nonprofit, but once there, they see all of the innovative work that other nonprofits are doing in the community, as well.
“The platform is the really helpful thing in that regard,” says Adams. “You’re visually aware that there are other things there when you’re making a donation.”
To see all the results of this year’s Santa Cruz Gives campaign, go to santacruzgives.org.
Live music highlights for the week of January 31, 2018.
WEDNESDAY 1/31
A CAPPELLA
LADYSMITH BLACK MAMBAZO
Little was known about Ladysmith Black Mambazo in the U.S. prior to 1984, when Paul Simon tapped the South African a cappella group to record with him on his Graceland album, merging his unique storytelling style with world-beat influences. The group was already famous in South Africa, having formed in the ’60s. Their stirring call-and-response vocal style is known as isicathamiya, and was developed by coal miners in South Africa. Since Graceland brought attention to this group, everyone from Stevie Wonder to Sarah McLachlan has asked to work with them. In 1993, Nelson Mandela even proclaimed them as “South Africa’s Cultural Ambassadors to the World.” AARON CARNES
INFO: 7:30 p.m. Rio Theatre, 1205 Soquel Ave., Santa Cruz. $35/gen, $55/gold. 423-8209.
THURSDAY 2/1
ROCK
OF MICE AND MEN
Since 2009, Orange County’s Of Mice and Men has been on the forefront of the metalcore scene, continuing to mold and change ahead of current trends. Their latest endeavor, Defy, shows the band at full power, changing the music they originally capitalized on while driving it forward to new heights and still remaining solid in the rock scene, covering tracks such as Pink Floyd’s “Money.” MW
The Ethnic Heritage Ensemble’s bandleader Sir Kahil El Zabar, who has toured with Dizzy Gillespie, Cannonball Adderley, Nina Simone and others, rejoins with Corey Wilkes and Alex Harding for a night of improvised soul straight from the heart. MW
INFO: 7:30 p.m. Michael’s on Main, 2591 Main St., Soquel. $25/adv, $30/door. 479-9777.
FRIDAY 2/2
FOLK
EVIE LADIN
It’s no surprise that Evie Ladin grew up to be a singer-songwriter, banjo player and dancer. Ladin’s parents were a folk dance teacher and an old-time folk music enthusiast. As the story goes, her New Jersey childhood home was a hostel for musicians and dancers traveling through the East Coast area during the folk revival of the early 1970s. Ladin picked up her skills from what she described as “constant contact with traditional artists.” As an adult, she has performed solo and with numerous groups, including San Francisco favorite the Stairwell Sisters. On Friday, Ladin and her band, comprising multi-instrumentalists Keith Terry and Erik Pearson, hit the Ugly Mug. CAT JOHNSON
Harnessing the spirit of a throwback soul band and the energy of a contemporary, woke Bay Area band, Royal Jelly Jive brings the swing, the funk, the groove and the jive to Moe’s this Friday night. In “Stand Up,” one of the band’s signature tunes, frontwoman Lauren Bjelde urges listeners to stand up for what they believe in and to not “lose sight of the love.” Backing up the magnetic Bjelde is an ace band featuring horns, accordion, keys and upright bass. The result is tight, old-school soul steeped in fresh perspectives. Also on the bill: Midtown Social, a California soul, funk, and rock nine-piece. CJ
The list of “Band Interests” on local old-timey bluegrass/country ensemble Naked Bootleggers’s Facebook page is exactly what you’d imagine: “Writing music while drinking whiskey,” “choppin’ wood,” “driving trucks,” “making sweet love.” The list goes on. If anything, this speaks to the group’s attachment to not only old school mountain music, but to the simple lifestyle the music celebrates. And why not—they’re from the Santa Cruz mountains, after all. But while these songs will make you think of the American acoustic music of yesteryear, they have a little bit of a modern spin in the way they filter this through a Santa Cruz lens. AC
Hoot and Holler is a roots duo out of Boston that draws inspiration from Roscoe Holcomb, Gillian Welch and David Rawlings, Townes Van Zandt and the like. Comprising guitarist Mark Kilianski and fiddler Amy Alvey—both singer-songwriters in their own right—the outfit performs traditional American music, including bluegrass and country. Graduates of the Berklee College of Music, Kilianski and Alvey are skillful songsmiths and respectful interpreters of roots songs and styles. Also on the bill: Santa Cruz old-time duo Scythe and Spade. CJ
Ranging freely through a century of songs, Paula West is a jazz singer who can transform just about any tune into an incisive investigation of love, loneliness, lust, loss and the rest of the human condition. With her pleasingly dry velvet contralto, she’s honed an uncommonly catholic repertoire that encompasses David Bowie and Irving Berlin, Bob Dylan and Cole Porter, Oscar Brown Jr., Bobbie Gentry, John Lennon and Rodgers and Hart. Her band features some of the Bay Area’s top accompanists, with drummer Greg Wyser-Pratte, veteran bass master John Wiitala, and pianist Adam Shulman, a UC Santa Cruz grad who’s also worked extensively with bass/composer Marcus Shelby. ANDREW GILBERT
INFO: 7 p.m. Kuumbwa Jazz, 320-2 Cedar St., Santa Cruz. $28/adv, $33/door. 427-2227.
MONDAY 2/5
HIP-HOP
J.I.D. AND EARTHGANG
Atlanta has been a critical source for hip-hop since the mid-’90s, when Outkast and the Goodie Mob hit an international audience. Rapper J.I.D. and duo EarthGang are two new Atlanta acts you should keep your eyes on. J.I.D. met the members of EarthGang back in 2012, and clicked right away; they’ve contributed to each other’s projects ever since. J.I.D. and EarthGang both carry on the tradition of the classic “dirty South” hip-hop style, with elements of the newer trap sound. But they also bring a little New York-style boom-bap, and weird offbeat flows to the mix. AC
Event highlights for the week of January 31, 2018.
Green Fix
Guided Elephant Seal Walks
Overflowing in their own floppy blubber, elephant seals have a rather unfortunate-looking nose and are quite territorial. After migrating as far as 13,000 miles, they relax at the beach and make farting noises to make sure everyone knows they are there. Is it a 5,000-pound mammal, or an annoying 5-year-old? Like both, they aren’t as docile as you’d think and are best observed from a distance. Guided walks are around three miles and about 2.5 hours long, with frequent stops.
INFO: Walks begin daily at 8:45 a.m. and continue every 15 minutes through 2:45 p.m. Available through Saturday, March 31. Año Nuevo State Park, 1 New Years Creek Road, Pescadero. 650-879-2025. reservecalifornia.com. Vehicle fee is $10, $7 per person. Reservations are also available for a $3.99 reservation fee.
Scott Wells is a Santa Cruz favorite. A contact improvisation specialist, he is a two-time winner of the Isadora Duncan Award for Outstanding Choreography and former Santa Cruz native. On Saturday, his company Scott Wells & Dancers presents a 30-minute quartet “Was That Good for You?” with Kathleen Hermsdorf. The piece is inspired by the 25th anniversary of Wells and Hermesdorf dance partnership, and is an ode to the struggle to make a career out of dance in light of his company’s recent eviction. Wells will be spending a week in residency at Motion Pacific developing an additional two pieces.
INFO: 8-10 p.m. Saturday, Feb. 3. Motion Pacific Dance, 131 Front St. #E, Santa Cruz. 457-1616. motionpacific.com. $18-$25.
Composers are people too—just ask these living, breathing, tax-paying ones! Better yet, check out Cabrillo College’s panel featuring seven local composers, including Susan Alexjander and Philip Collins, who will talk about their piecesand livelihood, and take questions from the audience. The composers will then perform, which is a way better finale than the one at the less-popular event “Night of the Living Dead Composers,” where the panelists just eat the audience.
INFO: 6 p.m. discussion, 7:30 p.m. show. Cabrillo College Samper Recital Hall, 6500 Soquel Drive, Aptos. 425-3526. newmusicworks.org. General admission $25/$28, senior admission $20/$23, students $10/$13. Tickets at cabrillovapa.com/tickets.
Trevor Noah’s New York Times bestseller Born a Crime tells a harrowing story of South African life under apartheid and follows Noah’s journey to “The Daily Show.” The Aptos Library’s “Our Community Reads” program features more than 15 events from film series’ to art shows and book discussions around Noah’s recollection, while including a larger scope of diversity and racial biases in Santa Cruz. If you are interested in talking more about the book, Judy McNeely leads an Aptos Library group discussion on Feb. 8 at 1 p.m. All of the events are free and open to the public.
INFO: Event times, dates and locations vary, check friendsofaptoslibrary.org for listings, email fr**********************@fs***.org, or call 427-7702.
Wednesday 1/31, Thursday 2/1, Monday 2/5
Informational Legal Cannabis Meetings
Want to know more about how the new cannabis laws affect you, and Santa Cruz more largely? Santa Cruz County is hosting three public meetings to discuss legalized cannabis cultivation and manufacturing in Santa Cruz County. The first two meetings are informational presentations with opportunity for questions. The Board meeting, in which County staff will present its suggestions for the county’s new cultivation and manufacturing ordinance, will have a formal public comment section.
INFO: 5:30 p.m., Wednesday, Jan. 31. Governmental Building, 701 Ocean St., Santa Cruz, 5th Floor Board Chambers. 5:30 p.m. Thursday, Feb. 1. Felton Community Hall, 6191 Hwy. 9, Felton. 9 a.m. Monday, Feb. 5. The Board of Supervisors, 701 Ocean St., Room 500, Santa Cruz.
[dropcap]S[/dropcap]anta Cruz County’s Good Times and Monterey County Weekly have a friendly rivalry brewing, and decided to get in on the spirit of the most classic of traditions by making it into a contact sport. Here, we each make the case for the superior virtues of our respective territory. From the arts and culture scene to food and booze, there’s a lot to love about each place—and reason to knock our competition across the county line.
Our readers are the real referees; tell us who you think is #winning in these categories by tweeting using #mocovsc or sending us letters to the editor.
Sara Rubin and Steve Palopoli
Literary Legacy
Monterey County: We could end this conversation with two words: John Steinbeck. The Salinas author has created a world-revered body of work—a lot of it inspired by and set in Monterey County—that few people in history can approach, including The Grapes of Wrath, Cannery Row, Of Mice and Men and East of Eden. But to continue, there’s Henry Miller, Robinson Jeffers, George Sterling and the Carmel Bohemians crowd, Jane Smiley, Riane Eisler. And that’s not counting people who stayed for a time and got inspired by Monterey County’s landscape, including Jack Kerouac, Robert Louis Stevenson and Robert Bly. In screenwriting, there’s Dustin Lance Black (Milk, Edgar). Do comic books count? Then count Greg Rucka (Wonder Woman, DC’s 52). River House Books and Old Capitol Books keep us in touch with all of these folks and more. We could go on, but just to reiterate: John Steinbeck. WR
Santa Cruz County: We’ll give you Steinbeck, as we’re sure you’re aware that his 1936 novel In Dubious Battle may have been set here, and he visited his sister and nieces in Watsonville often—their house is now on display at the Santa Cruz County Fairgrounds. Our well-read county (which can boast 10 public libraries and where book groups are a way of life), is also home to the first Acid Test, which took place in late 1965 in Soquel and nurtured a literary counterculture. The gathering included novelist Ken Kesey (One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest); Beat poet Allen Ginsberg (Howl, Kaddish) and his lover, poet Peter Orlovsky; and Beat poet Neal Cassady (of On the Road fame). Robert Heinlein lived in Bonny Doon, and Thomas Pynchon, despite his perpetual stealth mode, is widely known to have lived in Aptos. This county has also given the world the late, great James D. Houston (Bird of Another Heaven, and 1973’s best-selling Farewell to Manzanar, co-authored with his wife Jeanne Wakatsuki), philosophy and science writer Ralph Abraham, as well as award-winning and critically acclaimed poet Ellen Bass and best-selling novelist Elizabeth Mckenzie. We’re also home part-time to novelist Jonathan Franzen and number-one sexpert Susie Bright. MG
Food
MC: Carmel has nearly 50 restaurants, including Michelin-star worthy Aubergine, chef favorite la Balena and breakout new star Seventh & Dolores—and it’s the smallest city in the county. Big Sur has only a handful of restaurants, but they include one of the best bakeries (Big Sur Bakery), most iconic eateries (Nepenthe) and some of the best fine dining (Sierra Mar, Sur House) in the state. Add in Monterey’s fast-burgeoning downtown foodie scene, Seaside and Marina’s wealth of ethnic options and still-undiscovered Oldtown Salinas, and Monterey County, Salad Bowl of the World, for myriad fresh and tasty reasons, is the clear Super Bowl champ on the food front. And for dessert—sorry Santa Cruz, this one’s going to sting—now we even have better ice cream, thanks to Revival Ice + Cream. MCA
SC: Aw, that’s so cute that you think your ice cream is better! Guess you haven’t had time to grab a scoop up here, where Penny Ice Creamery and Mission Hill Creamery are on the cutting edge of creating inspired seasonal flavors using fresh ingredients from local farms, candy makers—even breweries—and Marianne’s Ice Cream is an institution that’s been a gold standard for 70 years. As for dining, you don’t need to be getting private-chef company meals at your tech workplace to enjoy a great meal in Santa Cruz County. What we lack in Michelin stars we make up for in accessibility. For starters, there are more food artisans in Santa Cruz County than you can shake a fork at—baking bread, roasting coffee, curing salamis, fermenting vegetables and making chocolate. Some of the most creative food can be found at pop ups, food trucks, breweries and taquerias. That being said, star chefs at places like Gabriella Cafe, Home, Soif, Oswald and Bantam are deliciously inventive and playful with our plentiful local produce and agriculture products. LS
Mascot (and Higher Ed)
OH LOOK, A BUNCH OF FISH The Monterey Aquarium is no doubt very exciting for five-year-olds!
SC: Is there any mascot in America more iconoclastic, more anti-establishment, more suited to the university it represents than UC Santa Cruz’s Banana Slug? It’s so famous and beloved that legendary folk-country group the Austin Lounge Lizards even gave it its own (appropriately alternative) fight song, “Banana Slugs! Racing Down the Field,” with lyrics like “Sla-sla-sla-sla-slather you with slime/ We we we we win another time.” You see, UCSC was conceived not just as an educational experiment, but as a cultural experiment, and though it has evolved over the years (farewell, narrative evaluations instead of grades), it has continued to attract the country’s most powerfully innovative thinkers, from instructors like Angela Davis, Adrienne Rich and Art Spiegelman to alumni like artist Miranda July, comedians Maya Rudolph and Andy Samberg, former Dead Kennedys vocalist Jello Biafra, Serial podcast co-creator Julie Snyder, and salon.com founder David Talbot. SP
MC: When it comes to mascots, you might think of fierce and proud animals (the Philadelphia Eagles, perhaps?), with attributes like wings or arms, enabling their athletic prowess to be easily replicated by costumed humans. UC Santa Cruz’s Sammy the Slug offers none of these. The native banana slug is slow, solitary and is the prey, not the predator. Comparatively, CSU Monterey Bay’s number-one cheerleader, Monte Rey Otter, checks all of the boxes: besides possessing teeth and claws, it’s fighting its way back from near-extinction, accesses its food source through brute force and is a team player. Plus, he’s cute! And when it comes to real hometown spirit, Santa Cruz residents and UCSC students have been brewing bad blood for a while when it comes to straining housing and water. MA
Technology
MC: Tech in Monterey County is not people at computers writing code, like the overflow of tech bros you may see populating Santa Cruz. There’s a growing ag tech industry happening in the field, deployed by tractor and by drone. Meanwhile, cutting-edge oceanographic research is happening offshore (one recent Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute study, for example, revealed the significance of deep-sea jellies as predators). Some of the most futuristic tech is happening at the Naval Postgraduate School in Monterey, where on Feb. 2, the Aerodynamic Technology Branch of the U.S. Air Force Research Laboratory presents on the latest efforts to reduce drag and make planes faster—specifically, “the upswept fuselage aft body of C-130 and C-17 aircraft.” Outpace that if you can, Santa Cruz. SR
SC: They don’t call us Silicon Beach for nothing. Santa Cruz is the beach town that NorCal techies want to live in. It’s close enough to Silicon Valley to commute, yet far away enough that they can leave their misery at work and eventually retire young to Santa Cruz. We have Google buses, new Amazon offices and over 150 new and old startups from sustainable shrimp-shell surfboards to sleep-tracking beds. Like Netflix, Santa Cruz-based data analytics company Looker, grew up in Santa Cruz. After partnering with Sony, Amazon, Spotify, and Lyft, Looker has expanded overseas, but is still based here. Santa Cruz is also a biotech hub of companies working on genomic cancer cures and bacteria-identifying software. Make already fast planes faster? Let’s cure cancer first. To support all of this city-wide innovation, Cruznet has begun installing a fiber-optic network to provide high-speed, net-neutral, independent internet access across downtown Santa Cruz—talk about nerd necessities. GJ
Leisure
MC: When it comes to leisure destinations, Santa Cruz doesn’t stand a chance against Monterey County, which attracts visitors from all over the world to play on some of the best golf courses on the globe at Pebble Beach, and stay at some of the most stunning hotels in the country—think Hyatt Carmel Highlands, Ventana Big Sur and Post Ranch Inn. And scenic drives? Forget about it. Highway 1 in Big Sur takes drivers through the most breathtaking coastline in America, where the sheer slope of Santa Lucia Mountains make it feel like the edge of the earth. As far as beaches go, there are few more lovely (and dog-friendly) than Carmel Beach, but perhaps the most magical are tucked away in Big Sur, where beachgoers in the know can get a slice of paradise to themselves. DS
SC: Oh yeah, golf (yawn), what a wonderful, exorbitantly expensive pursuit for the 1 percent! And driving for your scenery? Er … no thanks. We like to get out and actually experience real nature. Then again, so would any place that featured majestic redwood trees, and some of the best hiking in the world at Big Basin (California’s oldest state park, and home of the unbelievable Berry Creek Falls), Wilder Ranch, Pogonip, Henry Cowell Redwoods, and many more. In Santa Cruz, leisure is a democratic pursuit, and with just a couple of miles separating the beaches and forests, there’s something for everyone. SP
Drinking scene
SORRY NOT SORRY The Boardwalk is obviously more fun than anything in Monterey County.
MC: The Santa Cruz Mountains grow some fantastic grapes, but c’mon. For years Monterey County produced more wine grapes than most countries, and even Napa and Sonoma counties, and provided comparable quality for a fraction of the price. Santa Cruz has not and will not be named one of the Best Wine Travel Destinations in the World, as was Monterey in 2013. Each of its wine trails—artsy Carmel, sunny Carmel Valley and stunning River Road—could challenge Santa Cruz’s trail on its own. Eight different AVAs—including the historic Chalone AVA and the legendary Santa Lucia Highlands AVA—host more than 150 unique vineyards. Full disclosure: Santa Cruz has comparable cocktails and, admittedly, a more mature and versatile craft beer scene. But we were too busy drinking Pisoni Pinot to notice. MCA
SC: Hanging out at the beach all day can really make you thirsty, which may be why Santa Cruz is home to so many craft beverage makers. The county has been drawing oenophiles for decades thanks to the Santa Cruz Mountains AVA, one of the first to be defined by its topography in 1981 and home to more than 60 small, family-owned wineries that produce some of the best wine in the world. Always on the cutting edge of cool, it’s also booming with 14 craft breweries that each manage to balance being a beloved community gathering spot and brewing damn good beer. Santa Cruz County is also home to five craft cideries and a nationally-recognized craft distillery, Venus Spirits. And that’s just booze! Countless health beverages are also made locally—which is convenient, because we need something to take the edge off of this hangover. LS
Agriculture
MC: Santa Cruz County farmers might grow strawberries as big as footballs, but so do Monterey County farmers—and more of them. Our 2016 strawberry harvest alone (and leaf lettuce) exceeded the entire Santa Cruz County agricultural product value. Consider the numbers: a $4.3 billion in ag sales ($725 million of that was strawberries) compared to $637 million in Santa Cruz. That’s not even a close enough margin to summon a referee, but why not: Organic production has been steadily climbing, with 179 certified producers and 32,947 acres (more than 5 times as much as Santa Cruz County). Not to mention the great diversity of crops, from berries and lettuce to lemons and wine grapes, earning the Salinas Valley the moniker The Salad Bowl of the World. SR
SC: No matter the time of year, strolling through a farmers market in Santa Cruz County is a feast for the senses. Tables struggle to maintain their structural integrity under the weight of so much local bounty, from deep-hued greens and fiery root vegetables in the winter to a rainbow of tree fruit and tomatoes in the summer. Chefs literally move here—sometimes from Monterey County (see: Brad Briske of la balena)—because of the incredible produce and products available to them. Our coastal climate is perfect for berries, making Watsonville the Strawberry Capital of the World and home to Driscoll’s, one of the world’s largest berry suppliers. But bigger isn’t always better, and unlike surrounding counties, many of our farmers would rather grow without pesticides than compromise health for profit. Thanks to numerous organizations pioneering sustainable farming practices, including USDA-recognized organic certifier CCOF, which was founded in Santa Cruz over 40 years ago, organic is a way of life here. LS
Recreation
SC: Santa Cruz’s San Lorenzo River mouth was the first break ever surfed anywhere in the Americas, waaaaay back in 1885, when three Hawaiian princes hopped on 17-foot olo boards that were custom built out of redwood. By the end of the century, the town was already known as “Surf City,” which still rings true today, as there are hardly any bad surf days here. Each beach is unique, and from Aptos to Davenport, it’s always breaking somewhere. The hiking, too, is in endless supply—with stunning trails at UCSC, local reserves and redwood-rich state parks. Our county is also the place to be for kiteboarding, windsurfing, ziplining through the redwoods, mountain biking, and so much more. We even have world-class disc golf courses, namely at Delaveaga Park and Pinto Lake. JP
MC: Recreation opportunities are not only superior, they are the main reason many of the county residents live here. Sure, Santa Cruz has a reputation for its surf, but Monterey County shores have excellent breaks too—with less of crowd on the waves. Point Lobos State Natural Reserve is among the most popular state parks in California, but you’ll find local hikers at Garland Ranch, Jacks Peak, Toro Park, Pinnacles National Park and of course, Big Sur, which has so many trail miles it would take years to hike them all. Mountain biking on the Fort Ord National Monument offers the chance to race through coast live oaks for hours, and the waters off the Monterey Peninsula are one of the best scuba spots in the world, where kelp forests support a rich array of awe-inspiring marine life. And when you’re inspired to play flag football, there’s no shortage of parks for that purpose. DS
Tourist Attractions
MC: The Monterey Bay Aquarium is a seamless merger of architecture and rocky seashore, science and wonder, tourist attraction and conservation hub. Big Sur is one of the Top 10 most visited places in California—period. Anyone who has ever had a deep appreciation for wine knows Carmel Valley and Salinas Valley (aka the Salad Bowl of the World, aka Steinbeck Country). Speaking of whom, “Cannery Row in Monterey in California is a poem, a stink, a grating noise, a quality of light …” Fisherman’s Wharf is quaint. And the Monterey Fairgrounds is home to a piece of rock ’n’ roll history in the Monterey International Pop Festival. Add Pinnacles National Park, all things natural and outdoorsy and festival, and you’ve got a place with a magnetic attraction as powerful as any in the state. WR
SC: Hello, no-brainer. Santa Cruz’s Beach Boardwalk has been around for more than 110 years—more than three times as long as the Monterey Bay Aquarium. The boardwalk is the Central Coast’s most loved vacation spot, ideal for classic rides and deep-fried everything. Not a beach person? The Mystery Spot has you covered, and is sand-free. Many believe the gravitational anomaly to be a magma vortex—when’s the last time you saw that? Others believe that underneath the landmark is an underground spaceship left by intergalactic aliens thousands of years ago. That explains the puzzling variations of gravity, perspective, and height. Even the aliens decided to come to Santa Cruz over Monterey. GJ
Transportation
MC: With or without the statewide gas tax, Monterey County is investing in its transportation future with countywide Measure X. There are 38 projects set for 2018 and 2040. This includes the paving of the 30-mile Fort Ord Rec Trail and Greenway between Monterey and Marina, an inland alternative to the existing (and stunning) coastal Rec Trail. Meanwhile, pedestrian- and cyclist-forward efforts are improving with better sidewalks and bike paths, especially near schools. Other proposed improvements include widening Highway 101 in Salinas from four to six lanes and roundabouts on Highway 68 between Monterey and Salinas—all stuff that will make traffic flow more smoothly, so driving at rush hour doesn’t make you feel like tackling someone. CM
SC: Santa Cruz entered elite transportation status in late 2015, when it became gold-certified for cycling, according to the League of American Bicyclists, making it one of only 24 communities in the country holding that honor. The city recently installed a new bike/pedestrian bridge near the San Lorenzo River, completing a four-mile levee system loop, and it’s been painting bike boxes at major intersections. Planners are getting ready to break ground on a segment of the Coastal Rail Trail for walking and riding. A network of buses spans the far reaches of Santa Cruz County, and for $7, anyone can hop on the Highway 17 Express to get over the hill to San Jose. JP
Power Brokers
MC: A partial list of Leon Panetta’s accomplishments is enough to make even the toughest linebackers shiver: lifting a ban on women in combat; helping engineer the killing of Osama Bin Laden; designating the Monterey Bay National Marine Sanctuary. When Panetta retired in 2013, he returned home to his Carmel Valley walnut farm, and leaves behind a formidable legacy of public service. When he started his 50-year career in public service, he was expecting it to be just a two-year stint as a congressional aide in Washington. Instead he went on to serve as a member of Congress, President Bill Clinton’s chief of staff, and both CIA director and Secretary of Defense under President Barack Obama. What he’s accomplished (either good or bad) has effects that reverberate far beyond either county. SR
SC: It’s all fine and good to claim Leon Panetta because he lived in Monterey County, but also a bit odd since he represented Santa Cruz County, as well. In any case, besides the massive nexus of cultural influence that has come out of UCSC thanks to luminaries like Angela Davis, Santa Cruz has also been a hub of progressive politics for decades. While Carmel was choosing Dirty Harry in the ’80s, Santa Cruz was electing one of the first openly gay mayors in the U.S., John Laird. Gary Patton, who served as a Santa Cruz County supervisor from 1975-1995, was a pioneer of environmental advocacy and green policy. Fred Keeley, who served as a county supervisor before being elected to the state assembly, authored the two largest environmental protection bonds in U.S. history. SP
Movies and Celebrity Sightings
SC: Two words: Lost Boys. OK, it’s officially called The Lost Boys, so that’s three words. But the 1980s vampire classic—which seems even cooler than it did when it came out 30 years ago—is so closely identified with Santa Cruz that the boardwalk is on the freaking poster. And who can forget other Santa Cruz cult films like Killer Klowns from Outer Space and Andy Kaufman’s Heartbeeps? OK, lots of people! But Santa Cruz County is where Alfred Hitchcock escaped to when he needed to get away from Hollywood, and where the great director found inspiration for films like The Birds (based, it’s said, on a real-life incident in Capitola). We’ve been home to historical Hollywood greats like Beverly Garland and Zasu Pitts, and continue to produce talents like actor Adam Scott and Pixar great Elissa Knight. SP
MC: Sorry, Santa Cruz, Monterey County has you beat when it comes to a long history of filmmaking and big stars illuminating the scenery. The earliest known filming took place in Monterey in 1897, compared to Santa Cruz’s first foray into film in 1915. More than 200 films have been shot in Monterey County, and it’s now home to HBO’s acclaimed Big Little Lies. (And mega-stars Reese Witherspoon, Nicole Kidman, Laura Dern and Shailene Woodley are coming back to film Season 2 in April.) Monterey County has so much rich film history ranging from classics like National Velvet, to thrillers like Play Misty for Me and fun romps like Turner and Hooch, it sustains a small tourism business in Monterey Movie Tours. It’s no Super Bowl, but those movies have had millions of viewers over the years. Oh, and did we mention that Clint Eastwood—recently observed at the Monterey Jazz Festival and at Whole Foods—was mayor? PM
Cannabis
MC: Recreational marijuana has come to California as of Jan.1, and Monterey County has made its move to supply the region with reefer. Though Santa Cruz enjoys an abundance of dispensaries, we’re catching up faster than a running back can make it down the field. New dispensaries (with medical and recreational offerings) include Emerald Skyways in Salinas and Big Sur Canna+Botanicals—which cultivates its own strains like Key Lime Cookies—in Carmel. But the real green isn’t at the retail level, it’s in greenhouses throughout the Salinas Valley where they’re growing weed in bulk to distribute throughout the state. It’s not impossible to envision the Salinas Valley becoming the kush capital of California in addition to the Salad Bowl of the World. IG
SC: Evolutionary biologist Mowgli Holmes, Ph.D., recently confirmed something we already knew: that when it comes to cannabis, “Santa Cruz has some of the best breeders in the world.” With a long history of advocacy and as the home of the groundbreaking collective WAMM (Wo/Men’s Alliance for Medical Marijuana), Santa Cruz has been an incubator for cannabis culture, and the compassionate, conscious use and appreciation of the plant. During the not-so-distant years of the Campaign Against Marijuana Planting, when the DEA was burning huge piles of cannabis up north, the Santa Cruz Mountains provided a safe hiding place for certain prized strains, and a genetic stock that can today be traced in virtually every cannabis cup winner in California. So while your county fills its greenhouses with dollar signs (and subpar product), Santa Cruz is working hard to preserve its values for high quality, boutique cannabis, in the face of greed-fueled commercial monocrops. MG
Music and Nightlife
MC: While Santa Cruz staples like The Catalyst, Rio Theatre, Kuumbwa Jazz Center and Moe’s Alley attract and accommodate music that Monterey County can’t, consider something Lou Adler said after Jimi and Janis helped immortalize the Monterey County Fairgrounds after the Monterey Pop Fest in 1967: “Monterey Pop will always belong to Monterey.” The Fairgrounds is also ground zero for the world’s longest continuously running jazz fest and now Cali Roots, the world’s largest reggae-rock festival. The festival scene is like the Superbowl of Monterey County music—the big events that everyone watches. But we also have smaller off-the-beaten-path offerings. Big Sur, it turns out, is just as alluring to the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Arcade Fire and the Flaming Lips—who’ve all performed there in recent years—as it is to all of the other roadtrippers. AJ
SC: The question is never what show to catch this week; the question is what show to go to tonight. Santa Cruz County has music venues for just about every size and niche—with venues like Moe’s Alley, the Catalyst, the Civic, the Crepe Place, the Rio and Kuumbwa Jazz representing only a small sliver of what nightlife has to offer. Over the years, the music scene has produced names like Bassnectar, Devil Makes Three and Camper Van Beethoven. There’s a burgeoning local comedy scene as well, buoyed by free weekly comedy nights on Thursdays at the Blue Lagoon. And before the show, there may be time to catch a D-League game, played by a local Warriors team that boasts four winning records over its five seasons in Santa Cruz. JP
Written by: Mark C. Anderson, Marielle Argueza, Ivan Garcia, Pam Marino, Charles Montesa, Sara Rubin, Walter Ryce and David Schmalz for Monterey County Weekly; Maria Grusauskas, Georgia Johnson, Steve Palopoli, Jacob Pierce and Lily Stoicheff for Good Times.
[dropcap]A[/dropcap]ccording to an old Chinese proverb, “Women hold up half the sky.” You couldn’t dream up a better tagline for the lyrical play Silent Sky, the new production from the Jewel Theatre Company, in which women at the turn of the last century defy traditional domestic female roles to join the team of astronomers at Harvard in the work of mapping the stars. Sort of a prequel to the movie Hidden Figures, it’s a tale of unsung heroines finally getting their props, beautifully told in this exhilarating production.
First produced in 2011, Silent Sky was written by prolific American playwright Lauren Gunderson. She structures her play around real-life astronomer Henrietta Leavitt, who had a knack for mathematics and a deep hunger to know the vastness of the world, and the place of humanity within it. Gunderson charts Henrietta’s personal course through sexism and ridicule in an extraordinary age that produced the theories of Einstein and the rise of the suffragist movement, touchpoints conveyed with wit and grace by director Susan Myer Silton in the JTC production.
The production looks terrific. Scenic and Media Designer Steven Gerlach uses projected images and multiple revolving scrims to great effect, whether suggesting snowfall or ocean waves, and especially when he bathes the stage in revolving star fields.
The story begins in Wisconsin, circa 1900, where the Leavitt family resides. Supported by her minister father, Henrietta (a vivid performance by Michelle Drexler) has graduated from Radcliffe. She accepts an offer from Harvard to work as a “computer” (filing and recording data) at the school’s famed observatory—even though it means leaving behind her beloved (if often disapproving) sister, Margaret (Marissa Keltie). “You know I’m just going to get more annoying unless I go,” Henrietta reasons with her.
But her dream job comes with some caveats. The female computers working for observatory director Edward Pickering, called his “harem,” are like glorified secretaries, cataloging the photographic glass plate images from the telescope they are never allowed to touch. Working on their own research projects is forbidden, yet Henrietta loves the camaraderie of her colleagues, the at-first daunting, but fiercely supportive Annie Cannon (played with authority by Marcia Pizzo), and droll Scotswoman Williamina Fleming (Diana Torres Koss, in another entertaining turn).
Despite a hearing disability, Henrietta pioneers a theory in star luminosity as a way to measure its distance from Earth and find out how vast the universe really is. The joy of her discovery (which influenced Edwin Hubble, among others) is weighed against her tentative romance with male colleague, Peter Shaw (an eager Aaron Wilton). Shaw, like sister Margaret—who stays home to marry and raise a family—are the play’s only fictional characters, introduced to illustrate what these groundbreaking women stand to lose in pursuit of their work.
The production looks terrific. Scenic and Media Designer Steven Gerlach uses projected images and multiple revolving scrims to great effect, whether suggesting snowfall or ocean waves, and especially when he bathes the stage in revolving star fields. The right side of the stage represents Henrietta’s roots, with its images of family life and Margaret’s piano; the left side is the observatory, decorated with charts and graphs, where the women at their adjoining desks share the excitement of their work, the enormous telescope ever looming in the background.
The elevated upstage bridge between the two is used to highlight key moments in the drama. This is where Henrietta first appears, goddess-like, floating in a vast sea of stars in the play’s breathtaking opening moments.
Modern contributes handsome period costumes, the women in suits and skirts as functional as corsets and petticoats will allow. And since all of the women scientists in the play are historical personages, it’s a nice touch that the video playing in the lobby features photographs of the real Henrietta, Annie, and Williamina. Check it out while pondering this inspiring story of mapping out a life by charting the stars.
The Jewel Theatre Company production of ‘Silent Sky’ plays through Feb. 18 at the Colligan Theater in the Tannery Arts Center. Call 425-7506, or visit jeweltheatre.net.
I used to reveal my Top Ten movies of the year in December, when all of the other year-end wrap-ups appear. But it’s become increasingly ridiculous to stick to that pattern, since so many of the movies that might be contenders don’t even get to Santa Cruz until January. So now that the awards season is in full swing—the...
Live music highlights for the week of January 31, 2018.
WEDNESDAY 1/31
A CAPPELLA
LADYSMITH BLACK MAMBAZO
Little was known about Ladysmith Black Mambazo in the U.S. prior to 1984, when Paul Simon tapped the South African a cappella group to record with him on his Graceland album, merging his unique storytelling style with world-beat influences. The group was already famous in South...
Event highlights for the week of January 31, 2018.
Green Fix
Guided Elephant Seal Walks
Overflowing in their own floppy blubber, elephant seals have a rather unfortunate-looking nose and are quite territorial. After migrating as far as 13,000 miles, they relax at the beach and make farting noises to make sure everyone knows they are there. Is it a 5,000-pound mammal, or...
Overflowing in their own floppy blubber, elephant seals have a rather unfortunate-looking nose and are quite territorial. After migrating as far as 13,000 miles, they relax at the beach and make farting noises to make sure everyone knows they are there. Is it a 5,000-pound mammal, or an annoying 5-year-old? Like both, they aren’t as docile as you’d think and are best observed from a distance. Guided walks are around three miles and about 2.5 hours long, with frequent stops. 
Scott Wells is a Santa Cruz favorite. A contact improvisation specialist, he is a two-time winner of the Isadora Duncan Award for Outstanding Choreography and former Santa Cruz native. On Saturday, his company Scott Wells & Dancers presents a 30-minute quartet “Was That Good for You?” with Kathleen Hermsdorf. The piece is inspired by the 25th anniversary of Wells and Hermesdorf dance partnership, and is an ode to the struggle to make a career out of dance in light of his company’s recent eviction. Wells will be spending a week in residency at Motion Pacific developing an additional two pieces. 
Composers are people too—just ask these living, breathing, tax-paying ones! Better yet, check out Cabrillo College’s panel featuring seven local composers, including Susan Alexjander and Philip Collins, who will talk about their pieces
Trevor Noah’s
