SBDI’s “Event-of-the-Year” is the culmination of our yearlong educational dance programs. Hundreds of Santa Barbara County children have been taking dance classes once a week for the entire school year to prepare for this very special event.

Rhythms from Around The World will feature over 420 energetic young performers from area elementary, middle, and high schools, as well as special guest performers including schoolteachers, parents, and community members. SBDI’s Event-Of-The-Year is an inspiring hour of dance and music that is perfect for the whole family.

In 2010, the Event-of-the-Year was awarded Santa Barbara Independent’s “Best Youth Performance” by Elizabeth Schwyzer, and coined the “Feel-Good Show of the Year,” by our previous County Arts Commissioner Ginny Brush. As Bill Cirone, County Superintendent of Schools says, “This is one show you won’t want to
 miss!”

Rhythms from Around The World, is an original dance/theater piece, written and directed by Rosalina Macisco. The shows creative team includes Michael Mortilla, Rod Lathim, Rick Mokler, Patricia Frank, and SBDI’s Teaching Artists, Lauren Macioce and Mariah Korte. Hop aboard SBDI flight 805 and take a journey on a celebratory tour around the world. Travel plans include a stop at a wedding celebration in Italy, a ceilie at the Errigal Arts Festival in Ireland, folkloric dancing from Mexico, a street carnival from Brazil, and much more. Not only is this flight affordable, you won’t experience jet lag, lost luggage, or delays. Appreciating sounds from other cultures helps us see the world from a new perspective by opening our eyes, ears, and hearts. This trip guarantees a good time for the whole family.

This year SBDI will have two performances.  At 4:00pm, Adelante and Solvang Elementary schools will perform and at 7:00pm Aliso and Canalino Elementary Schools will perform.

Pacific Standard Presents

The Fresh Water Crisis

What We Must Do: A Call to Action!

Come to a Sunday afternoon discussion moderated by Adam Nagourney, Los Angeles bureau chief of the New York Times, to find out what we must do to meet the rising demand for water, what is happening around the world and in our own backyard, and what the impact on the Central Coast will be from climate change, desalination, privatization, contamination, and the rising cost of water. Panelists will include Peter Gleick, president and co-founder of the Pacific Institute, MacArthur Fellow, member of the National Academy of Sciences, and author of A Twenty-First Century U.S. Water Policy; Professor Robert Wilkinson of the Bren School of Environmental Science and Management at the University of California-Santa Barbara, author, member of the Public Advisory Committee for California’s State Water Plan, and former coordinator for the Climate Impacts Assessment of the California Region for the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy; and Jane Gray, Regional Planner at Dudek Environmental and Engineering Consultants, appointee to the Santa Barbara County Agricultural Advisory Committee, and gubernatorial appointee to the Central Coast Regional Water-Quality Control Board.

This event is brought to you by Pacific Standard, a non-profit, award-winning national magazine published in Santa Barbara by the Miller-McCune Center for Research, Media, and Public Policy. The Center’s mission is to disseminate information to a wider audience based on cutting-edge academic research in order to address today’s problems and help advance sustainable and equitable solutions.

What began as a modest storytelling collective in its founder’s living room has grown into an epic, nationwide phenomenon with a cult-like following. The Moth’s Mainstage events are the critically-acclaimed storytelling group’s hottest ticket, featuring five hand-picked storytellers who develop and shape their stories with The Moth’s directors.

Each show starts with a theme, and the storytellers explore it, often in unexpected ways. Since each story is true and every voice authentic, the show dances between documentary and theater, creating a unique, intimate, and often enlightening experience for the audience.

Hosted by comedian and Moth mainstay Brian Finkelstein, with stories from:
Writer, psychotherapist and teacher Terrance Flynn
Writer, comedian and storyteller David Montgomery
Author, rapper and poet Omar Musa
Community educator and poet Dame Wilburn
Retired Army Serviceman and Purple Heart Recipient Jon Nunemaker

Top level ticket holders will have access to a pre-party with complimentary drinks and bites from State & Fig before the show, with a live set spun by KCRW DJ Raul Campos.

*All ages are welcome but please note that there may be some adult content.

Outdoor bar opens at 6:00pm
Theater doors open at 6:30pm
Show begins promptly at 7:00pm

Ben Schneider conjured Lord Huron from the depths of Lake Huron during a trip to his family home in northern Michigan in 2010. Ancient memories, smoke over the moon and nights full of perilous laughter all bolstered the brew from which Lord Huron emerged. Ben brought Lord Huron back with him to Los Angeles, where strange young things are known to flourish, unhindered.

As the songs grew, so did the need for a band to play them. Answering the call ringing out from California, grand brethren from years past, friends and fellow Michiganders, Mark Barry, Miguel Briseno and Tom Renaud, left their respective paths, or bent each road to their own will, to reconvene out west. An old crew reformed in a new harbor.

After a pair of EPs, a debut album, Lonesome Dreams saw release in 2012. Tours followed that found the boys in blistering deserts, reveling in sinister paradises, wandering frozen coasts and lost among the hanging fog of bygone forests. Who can say but the soles of their shoes how far they travelled and how wide?

In 2014, trail-weary but intrepid, Lord Huron set up camp deep in Los Angeles at Whispering Pines Studios to notch their latest songs and abet the journeys of others. Lord Huron will release the next chapter of their adventures, Strange Trails, in April 2015

Andy McKee

Andy McKee is among the world’s finest acoustic guitarists, and his crossover success to over 150 million YouTube viewers underscores his emergence as one of today’s most unique and influential artists. To fans of virtuoso musicianship it is Andy’s attention to song structure and melodic content that elevates him above the rest. To fans of popular music Andy entertains both the eye and the ear as he magically transforms the steel string guitar into full orchestra via his use of altered tunings, tapping, partial capos, percussive hits and a signature two-handed technique. He’s been featured as a cover story in both Acoustic Guitar Magazine in the U.S. and Acoustic Magazine in the UK, and is also the figurehead of the unique Guitar Masters tours which have traveled the world over the past three years. Andy now looks to challenge himself even further with more surprise collaborations, diverse music releases, development of new instrument products and ceaseless international touring.

Claude LaFlamme

When Claude discovered the harp guitar, it was love at first sight! As a guitarist, pianist, composer and arranger, he was seduced by the versatility of the instrument with its an impressive register like the piano and the harp which allows him to benefit from the diverse facets of his talent. Through his music, Claude expresses a wide range of feelings, styles and sounds; you will be touched by the fineness and the beauty of the arrangements. Claude performs regularly in Canada, the United States and Europe.