They’re like totally crankin’ up the Tears for Fears and celebrating one of the most decadent decades of music – the ’80s! Relive rock, R & B, and new wave hits from icons like George Michael, Phil Collins, Blondie, Huey Lewis & The News, Robert Palmer, Cyndi Lauper, Journey, Michael Jackson, Mr. Mister, Cher, Kool & The Gang, Tommy Tutone and more with Stuart Chafetz and the San Diego Symphony Orchestra. It’s the perfect reason to break out your Swatch watch, tease up your hair, and enjoy some bodacious music!
SDMusic
Acclaimed for his stellar stage presence and joyous musicianship, cellist Sterling Elliott is a 2021 Avery Fisher Career Grant recipient and the winner of the Senior Division of the 2019 National Sphinx Competition.
Already in his young career, he has appeared with many major orchestras and is fast becoming a favorite on the summer festival circuit.
This season, he received a Sphinx Medal of Excellence, the highest honor bestowed by the Sphinx Organization, awarded to artists who early in their careers demonstrate artistic excellence, outstanding work ethic, a spirit of determination, and an ongoing commitment to leadership and their communities.
Open your mind and ear with former New York Times contributing critic Corinna da Fonseca-Wollheim in a workshop that brings together science, mindfulness and live music.
At a time of digital overstimulation and political overwhelm, listening can feel like an endangered skill. In fact, humans are biologically hard-wired to be bad listeners. Find out how music can help turn a cognitive quirk to our advantage and develop the focus, patience and generosity needed to become better listeners beyond the concert hall.
One of today’s most intriguing artists on the British music scene, it would be wrong to describe Liverpool-born Mark Simpson as either clarinetist or composer. His musical life is a symbiosis of his performing on the concert platform and poring over his manuscripts.
Hailed as a “revelation” (Bachtrack) and “standout” (Guardian), he has now established himself as a major new voice on the international stage.
ARTIST LOUNGES
The spark of creativity is unique for every individual. Drawing on the theme “Inside Stories,” the Artist Lounge is an intimate, in-depth conversation hosted by Artistic Director Leah Rosenthal. Come discover more about these great artists in a warm, intimate setting.
J2B2 is an all-star bluegrass supergroup featuring four legendary, award-winning musicians – John Jorgenson on acoustic guitar, mandolin and vocals; Herb Pedersen on banjo, acoustic guitar and vocals; Mark Fain on bass; and Patrick Sauber on acoustic guitar and vocals – delivering bluegrass like no one has ever heard it before. The band’s undeniable live shows have received stellar reviews and have the bluegrass world buzzing. The four combine forces to form a spot-on union of impeccable musicianship, incomparable songwriting, incredible harmony vocals (a fresh twist combining bluegrass with elements of West Coast folk rock) and seasoned showmanship. This is the “high lonesome sound” of American roots music at its finest.
Yes! The Greensboro Weekly in NC noted that J2B2 “Expect fireworks and amazing playing from some of the best string players in the world.”
Harmony has been at the center of our musical experience and expression from the very beginning,” says mandolinist/singer Lincoln Mick. “Often, when we’re unsure of what to do next, we’ll say, ‘Let’s just all sing together.’ We’ve changed a lot as a band over the years, but harmony has always been the backbone of what we do, which has led us to create all thesebackground vocals that not only support the lead, but have a life and character of their own.”
This sense of harmony and hospitality has been central to The Arcadian Wild’s story from its earliest days.
Named for a utopian landscape in Greek mythology, the group got its start roughly a decade ago, when Isaac Horn and Lincoln Mick met as choir students at Nashville’s Lipscomb University. While both had grown up on alt-rock and punk, they quickly bonded over a shared love for American roots music and the endless possibilities that lay beyond the boundaries of tradition and expectation.
The band cut their teeth playing house shows, where they learned to treat their audience like family, and released their self-titled debut to widespread praise in 2015, racking up nearly 50 million streams on Spotify alone. Heavy touring followed with what Horn and Mick have described as a revolving door of supporting players, and the group returned in 2019 with a second full-length LP, Finch In The Pantry, which debuted in the Top 10 on the Billboard Bluegrass Chart.
In January 2020, Horn and Mick welcomed fiddler Bailey Warren into the band full-time, but when the pandemic forced the trio off the road shortly after, they shifted their focus to composing and recording a multi-movement song cycle that resulted in the 2021 EP Principum, which reached #3 on the Billboard Bluegrass Chart and helped earn the band performances everywhere from the Woody Guthrie Center to the Ryman Auditorium.
“We could have all gone in one at a time and tracked each instrument separately and made it all technically ‘perfect,’” says Horn, “but I don’t think that’s why people listen to us. They want to hear the human element, the sound of people making music in a room together, the energy you can only get from artists collaborating and feeding off of each other in real time.”
“After our shows, we’ll meet these people who come from totally different worlds and likely wouldn’t agree on some pretty fundamental things,” says Horn. “But for a couple hours, they shared an experience together, and we want our music to invite people to do that, to be a little gentler with each other, to see that they may have more in common than they realize and that the things that make them different are gifts. When you approach the world with an open heart like that, anything’s possible.”
It’s a notion the band likes to remind their audience of every night when they take the stage, step up to the microphone, and say that magical word: Welcome.