Performance

Experiment Failed

Christina Waters takes aim at Sarah Hennies’ The Grain House, a world premiere that closed the Cabrillo Festival’s Defiant Dreams concert, arguing that sonic hostility overwhelmed musical imagination.

Sisterhood is Powerful

Cabrillo Stage’s Sister Act delivers powerhouse vocals, exuberant choreography and a high-energy ensemble led by Karriyma Pekary and Jennifer Taylor Daniels.

Emerging Talent

Kevin Keelan’s Seabright garden venue hosts Saturday performances featuring storytelling, music, comedy, cabaret, live looping and local Santa Cruz talent.

Solstice Symphonies

Espressivo’s season finale brings Mendelssohn, Sibelius and Copland’s Appalachian Spring to life, while Santa Cruz stages and galleries prepare for Kay Martin, Sister Act, 36 North and Boomeria.

Tragedy Into Art

Former Cabrillo choral director Cheryl Anderson brings Considering Matthew Shepard to Peace United Church, reviving a powerful musical response to Matthew Shepard’s life and death for a Santa Cruz Pride benefit.

Beyond the 4th Wall

Robbie Fitzsimmons takes readers behind the scenes of Queerlantis, an immersive Santa Cruz Pride celebration of drag, music, art and queer resilience.

Alien Arrival

Irene the Alien, the sci-fi drag persona of Ian Hill, comes to Santa Cruz Pride’s Queerlantis after turning childhood difference, theater training and RuPaul’s Drag Race into a bold outer-space performance career.

Trigger Plays

UCSC Theater Arts presents Luis Alfaro’s Mojada: A Medea in Los Angeles, a modern Chicano retelling of the Greek tragedy rooted in immigration, sacrifice and healing.

Just Say Yes

Renegade Theater’s ‘Reefer Madness: The Musical’ uses satire and sharp history to challenge the legacy of the War on Drugs, with performances through April 20.

Bach to the Future

From Baroque brilliance to modern vocal innovation, Ensemble Monterey delivers a concert that pushes classical music into new territory. At Holy Cross Church, May 23, 8pm, May 24, 4pm.

Take One for the Violent Femmes

On Tuesday, March 3 Santa Cruz was graced by 1980’s punk rock royalty when seminal folk punks, the Violent Femmes played the Santa Cruz...

Ballistic New Music

An over-the-top multimedia extravaganza celebrates the genre-blending music of Santa Cruz composer Jon Scoville, with dance, film, jazz, and chamber music colliding in a Valentine’s-perfect concert.