Audrey Martin: plays Berkeley’s California Jazz Conservatory (formerly the Jazzschool) Sunday. Photo: Irene Young Audrey Martin: plays Berkeley’s California Jazz Conservatory (formerly the Jazzschool) Sunday. Photo: Irene Young On her 40th birthday Audrey Martin decided to sing. As a marriage and family therapist, she had spent years helping other people work through traumas, resolve deep-seated conflicts, and […]
Berkeley Arts Festival
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The It List: Five things to do in Berkeley this weekend
Students register for classes at Vista College during its earliest years. Now called Berkeley City College, the institution is celebrating its 40th anniversary. Photo: www.berkeleycitycollege.edu BERKELEY CITY COLLEGE 40TH ANNIVERSARY Berkeley may be best known for one of its higher-ed institutions, but this week a much-deserved spotlight will be trained on the other. Although it has gone […]
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Great sounds from Africa at Afropop Spectacular
Bassekou Kouyate: plays at Zellerbach Hall on Saturday as part of the Afropop Spectacular. Photo: Courtesy Cal Performances Bassekou Kouyate: plays at Zellerbach Hall on Saturday as part of the Afropop Spectacular. Photo: Courtesy Cal Performances As a griot, Mali’s Bassekou Kouyaté traces his musical lineage back to Sundiata Keita’s expansive 13th century empire, a wealthy polity […]
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Berkeley concert marks free speech movement’s birthday
Singer-songwriter-activist Hali Hammer will lead a song circle at the free speech movement concert at Ashkenaz in Berkeley on Saturday Sept. 27. Photo: courtesy Ashkenaz As a brief catalytic blast of energy, the Free Speech Movement achieved its primary goals so quickly that it didn’t have much time to inspire enduring songs and anthems. But […]
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The It List: Five things to do in Berkeley this weekend
Berkeley based singer/songwriter and youth mentor Austin Willacy will perform at the Subterranean Arthouse on Saturday. Photo: www.austinwillacy.com THREESOME: ARTISTS FOR SOCIAL CHANGE The eye-catching title refers to an artistic trifecta — performance, visual, and literary. All three modes of expression will be squeezed onto one bill at the Subterranean Arthouse on Saturday, August 30. Berkeley […]
Posted inEvents
The It List: Five things to do in Berkeley this weekend
The David Brower Center is the site of a series of panel discussions on the California drought on Friday. Photo: David Brower Center RESOURCES ROUNDTABLE California has been quite dry this year — but Friday’s roundtable on the drought will be anything but. The Berkeley Energy and Resources Collaborative is hosting its annual day of panel […]
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Pianist Sarah Cahill plays Berkeley Arts Festival
Berkeley pianist Sarah Cahill will play at the Berkeley Arts Festival on Sunday Sept. 22. Photo: Christine Alicino About six years ago, anguished by America’s ongoing foreign wars, Sarah Cahill decided to take matters into her own hands. Ever since John Adams wrote his early breakthrough piece “China Gates” for her in 1977 the Berkeley […]
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Long journey back for Berkeley bassist Kurt Ribak
Kurt Ribak: playing Jupiter in Berkeley every Tuesday in September, as well as some dates for the Berkeley Arts Festival A reoccurring gig is rare enough to inspire a musician’s gratitude these days, but Berkeley bassist/composer Kurt Ribak feels particularly fortunate that he’s playing at Jupiter in downtown Berkeley every Tuesday in September. Still on the […]
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Steven Emerson steps out of the studio… other gigs
Berkeley based Steven Emerson plays Jupiter on Friday. Photo: John Gibbel Some three decades ago Steven Emerson got a taste of the rock ‘n’ roll lifestyle when he joined True West, a San Francisco band at the heart of the West Coast’s then-thriving Paisley Underground scene. On a circuitous creative path ever since, he’s honed […]
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A long time coming: John Ettinger plays Berkeley
John Ettinger, one of the East Bay’s best kept musical secrets, plays Saturday at the Berkeley Art Festival. Photo: Sylvia Ettinger John Ettinger, one of the East Bay’s best kept musical secrets, plays Saturday at the Berkeley Art Festival. Photo: Sylvia Ettinger Despite releasing three acclaimed CDs over the past decade featuring some of jazz’s most accomplished improvisers, John […]
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Birds of a feather: Freight Fiddle Summit and Skronkathon
Claudio Rabeca, will be playing his namesake rabeca fiddle at Alasdair Fraser’s Freight Fiddle Summit in Berkeley on Thursday You can tell a lot about a musical scene by looking at the settings in which it thrives. Two very different events in the coming days embody the way that the demands and practices of a particular tradition can […]
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Fine musicians pop up at Berkeley Arts Festival
In Agnès Varda’s quietly enthralling documentary The Gleaners and I the groundbreaking French filmmaker investigates various ways in which people sift through and appropriate society’s leftovers. Berkeley cultural activist Bonnie Hughes would have made a fine Varda subject, as she’s spent the past two decades gleaning shuttered and neglected downtown storefronts and transforming them into […]
