UCSB Arts & Lectures - Spring Program 2026

Spring Program 2026

Yuja Wang & Mahler Chamber Orchestra

Apr 23 / Granada Theatre

Dear Friends,

We’re still floating after an inspired winter capped by the thrilling Ballet Festival: Jerome Robbins curated and performed by Tiler Peck. April and May now bring a superbloom of performances and conversations to Arts & Lectures, ushering in a spring season rooted in collaboration, curiosity, and deep engagement with the world around us.

On April 10, one of our most beloved ensembles, the Danish String Quartet, returns with the 50-voice Danish National Girls’ Choir. Their program culminates with in wildness, an Arts & Lectures co-commission and U.S. premiere by David Lang. Later that month, Yuja Wang (Apr 23) takes the Granada stage, leading the Mahler Chamber Orchestra from the piano in what promises to be an unforgettable evening.

On the lecture side, we’ll host a newly-added event with International Rescue Committee President David Miliband (Apr 22) in conversation with Ben Rhodes, former White House staffer and co-host of Pod Save the World. Earth Day holds special resonance in Santa Barbara, and we’ll mark the occasion with environmentalist Bill McKibben (Apr 21), followed by science journalist Ed Yong (May 6) and conservationist Terry Tempest Williams (May 13) in the final Speaking with Pico event of the season.

We’re also looking forward to our gala event, An Evening of Song and Conversation with Jonathan Gro (Apr 27). This special night with Broadway’s sensational leading man will benefit A&L’s education and community outreach programs.

May brings the return of dance world favorites A.I.M by Kyle Abraham (May 12), the boundary-defying Kronos Quartet with pipa virtuoso Wu Man (May 2), and a celebratory 90th birthday tribute, Philip Glass and The Poets (May 17), featuring artists including Timo Andres, Lucinda Childs and Taylor Mac.

Spring is in full bloom, and we hope you will gather with us.

Warmly,

Meghan Bush

Miller McCune Executive Director

Season Sponsor

Community Partners

photos from left:

Mélanie Lhôte, BBC Studios

Meghan Bush with New York City Ballet Principal Tiler Peck

photo: Isaac Hernández de Lipa

Illuminating a wide spectrum of systemic injustice, the Justice for All programming initiative looks to today’s great minds and creators and to the courageous leaders across the globe who are forging a new path forward. Join us as we learn from those confronting uncomfortable questions, solving difficult problems, and guiding us all toward a more equitable world.

Ibram X. Kendi, Apr 7

Challenging racist ideologies

David Miliband, Apr 22

Championing humanitarian action and dignity

Masha Gessen, Apr 14

Identifying authoritarian patterns across borders

Martín Espada, Apr 29

Countering injustice through poetic action

JUSTICE FOR ALL Lead Sponsors: Marcy Carsey, Eva & Yoel* Haller, Dick Wolf, and Zegar Family Foundation

JUSTICE FOR ALL UCSB Faculty Advisory Committee: Daina Ramey Berry, D. Inés Casillas, Charles Hale, Beth Pruitt, Susannah Scott, Je rey Stewart, Sharon Tettegah

Arts & Lectures’ Thematic Learning Initiative (TLI) extends the conversation from the stage into the community, enriching lifelong learning and initiating dialogue and empowerment through special events, book giveaways and more.

2025-2026 Theme: Paradigms at Play

Paradigms shift when we begin to experience the world around us in new ways. This season’s theme highlights artists and thinkers who play with our perceptions and expand how we feel, see, hear and imagine. Through shared experiences, we will play with paradigms to explore how we learn, connect and imagine what’s possible.

Spring Book Giveaway

The Glorians: Visitations from the Holy Ordinary by Terry Tempest Williams

The Glorians is a lyrical meditation on the quiet presences that surround us – animals, landscapes, memories and fleeting moments – that gently shape our sense of belonging in a fragile world. Moving from the red rock desert of Utah to the classroom, Terry Tempest Williams offers a reflective exploration of attention, connection and how subtle changes in perspective can transform the way we understand our lives and our shared future.

FREE copies of The Glorians will be available starting Tue, Mar 24 at Arts & Lectures’ Campbell Hall Box Office at UCSB and the Santa Barbara Public Library (40 E. Anapamu St.). Books available while supplies last.

(p. 45)

With thanks to our visionary partners, Lynda Weinman and Bruce Heavin, for their support of the Thematic Learning Initiative

RELATED EVENT Terry Tempest Williams in Conversation with Pico Iyer, May 13

Paradigms at Play - Free Events

Pre-concert Talk: Danish String Quartet and Danish National Girls' Choir

Fri, Apr 10 / 5:30 PM / The Hub at CEC, 1219 State St

FREE (registration recommended)

Join UCSB musicology professor Derek Katz for a lively pre-concert talk on the thrill of hearing new music come to life. With a U.S. premiere by David Lang on the program, Katz explores what makes the Danish String Quartet so compelling, and how performers, composers and audiences together shape new musical worlds.

RELATED EVENT Danish String Quartet and Danish National Girls’ Choir, Apr 10 (p.11)

Bird Walk with Santa Barbara Audubon Society

Wed, Apr 29 / 8 AM, 10 AM & 12 PM / Lake Los Carneros

FREE (registration required; space is limited)

Watch for water birds, song birds and more in one of three special guided bird walks led by SBAS bird walk coordinator Karl Weis. Lake Los Carneros is one of Goleta’s premier birding hot spots due to its 25 acre lake and varied wooded and grassland habitats. Binoculars and comfortable shoes are encouraged!

EVENT Ed Yong, The Amazing Nature of Animal Senses , May 6 (p. 39)

UCSB Natural Reserve Guided Hike/Walk

Sat, May 9 / 9 AM / Sedgwick Reserve

3566 Brinkerhoff Ave, Santa Ynez

FREE (registration required; space is limited)

Kick off the morning with a brief introduction from UCSB Natural Reserve System (NRS) Executive Director Dr. Conner Philson about the NRS’ role as a hub for environmental research and the special part Sedgwick Reserve plays. Then set out in small groups for guided walks or hikes of varying intensity, exploring the landscape, ecology and research of this remarkable site. Fun and sunscreen encouraged! Transportation to Santa Ynez not provided.

RELATED EVENT Terry Tempest Williams in Conversation with Pico Iyer, May 13 (p. 45)

RELATED

photo: David Levasheff

photo: University of California Santa Barbara

Ibram X. Kendi Chain of Ideas: The Origins of Our Authoritarian Age

Tue, Apr 7 / 7:30 PM / Campbell Hall

Justice for All Lead Sponsors:

Marcy Carsey, Eva & Yoel* Haller, Dick Wolf, and Zegar Family Foundation

Additional support from the Harold & Hester Schoen Arts & Lectures Endowment

Ibram X. Kendi is the director of the Howard University Institute for Advanced Study. He is an acclaimed historian whose powerful insights are reshaping our understanding of racism and antiracism.

Kendi is the author of acclaimed books including Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America, which won the National Book Award for Nonfiction, making him the youngest-ever winner of that award. The book traces the development and dissemination of racist ideologies throughout American history, and was made into a Netflix documentary that was shortlisted for Academy and Emmy awards.

In his most recent book, Chain of Ideas: The Origins of Our Authoritarian Age, Kendi outlines how “great replacement theory” has moved from the margins to become the most dominant political theory of our time – and what citizens can do to safeguard democracy from this insidious threat.

Kendi also authored the No. 1 New York Times bestsellers How to Be an Antiracist, Antiracist Baby, and Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You, co-authored by Jason Reynolds. He co-edited Four Hundred Souls: A Community History of African America, 1619-2019, a choral history of African Americans, covering 400 years in the voices of 90 writers. His bestselling monograph, How to Raise an Antiracist, combines vital research with a compelling personal narrative of his own journey as a parent. Kendi’s recent release, Malcolm Lives!: The Official Biography of Malcolm X for Young Readers, was an instant bestseller.

In 2021, Kendi was awarded a MacArthur Fellowship. He is also a contributing writer at The Atlantic and a CBS News racial justice contributor. Kendi has published numerous essays in The New York Times, The Washington Post, Time, The Huffington Post and The Root. The Black Campus Movement, his first book on Black student activism on college campuses in the late 1960s and early 1970s, won the W.E.B. Du Bois Book Prize.

He has received research fellowships, grants and visiting appointments from the American Historical Association, Library of Congress, National Academy of Education, Lyndon B. Johnson Library and Museum, Rutgers Center for Historical Analysis, Brown University, Princeton University, Duke University, University of Chicago and UCLA. Previously, he was the Andrew W. Mellon Professor in the Humanities at Boston University and the founding director of the Boston University Center for Antiracist Research. Recently, Kendi was elected to the Society of American Historians and named a 2021 Young Global Leader, the World Economic Forum’s annual class of the most promising leaders around the globe under the age of 40.

Books are available for purchase in the lobby and a signing follows the event

Special Thanks

photo: Stephen Voss

Terence Blanchard, trumpet, synthesizers

Ravi Coltrane, saxophones

Charles Altura, guitars

Julian Pollack, piano, keyboards

David Ginyard, Jr., bass

Oscar Seaton, drums

Terence Blanchard

Terence Blanchard has been a consistent artistic force for making powerful musical statements concerning painful American tragedies both past and present. A true Renaissance man, Blanchard stands tall as one of jazz’s most esteemed trumpeters and defies expectations by creating a spectrum of artistic pursuits. Boundarybreaking and genre-defying, Blanchard is recognized globally as a dazzling soloist and a prolific composer for film, television, opera, Broadway, orchestras and for his own ensembles. Leading theater magazine TheaterMania has cited Blanchard as “the most exciting American composer working in opera today.”

An eight-time Grammy winner and twice Oscarnominated film composer, Blanchard became only the second African-American composer to be nominated twice in the original score category at the 2022 Academy Awards, duplicating Quincy Jones’ feat from 1967’s In Cold Blood and 1985’s The Color Purple.

Terence Blanchard and Ravi Coltrane

Miles Davis and John Coltrane Centennial Wed, Apr 8 (new date) / 7:30 PM / Granada Theatre

Event Sponsors:

Jody & John Arnhold and Susan & Bruce Worster Jazz Series Lead Sponsor: The Nora McNeely Hurley Foundation

Blanchard’s work has placed him at the forefront of giving voice to human rights, civil rights and racial injustice, including the 2016 album Breathless, an elegy for Eric Garner, who was killed by police and whose words, “I can’t breathe,” became a civil rights rallying cry.

Blanchard is also heralded as the composer of two operas. His Fire Shut Up in My Bones is based on the memoir of celebrated writer and New York Times columnist Charles Blow. The Metropolitan Opera premiered Fire Shut Up in My Bones on September 27, 2021, to open its 2021-2022 season in New York, making it the first opera composed by an African-American composer to premiere at the Met in its 138-year history. The recording of those performances received a Grammy Award for Best Opera Recording, and The New York Times heralded Fire as “inspiring,” “subtly powerful” and “a bold and affecting adaptation of Charles Blow’s memoir.” Of the historical moment, Blanchard said, “I don’t want to be a token, but a turnkey.” Fire has been widely recognized as one of our nation’s most important cultural milestones and returned to the Met for a second run in April 2024.

Blanchard’s first opera, Champion, about the troubled life of boxer Emile Griffith, premiered in 2013 and starred Denyce Graves with a libretto from Pulitzer Prize winner Michael Cristofer. Champion premiered at the Met in 2023 to widespread critical acclaim. It too received a 2024 Grammy for Best Opera Recording.

photo: Erin O’Brian

photo: Cedric Angeles

But there is a center of gravity. It’s Blanchard’s beautiful, provocative, inspiring jazz recordings that undergird all these projects. The same holds true now as it did early in his career in 1994 when he told DownBeat: “Writing for film is fun, but nothing can beat being a jazz musician, playing a club, playing a concert.”

From his expansive work composing the scores for more than 20 Spike Lee projects over three decades – ranging from the documentary When the Levees Broke to the recent Lee films, BlacKkKlansman and Da 5 Bloods (both of which garnered Blanchard Oscar nominations) –Blanchard has interwoven beautiful melodies that create strong backdrops to human stories like Regina King’s One Night in Miami; Kasi Lemmons’ Eve’s Bayou; George Lucas’ Red Tails; the HBO drama series Perry Mason; Apple TV’s docuseries They Call Me Magic (for which Blanchard received an Emmy nomination) and Gina Prince Bythewood and Viola Davis’ critically acclaimed film The Woman King.

Born in New Orleans in 1962, Blanchard is a musical polymath who launched his solo career as a bandleader in the 1990s. Since then, he has released 20 solo albums, garnered 15 Grammy nominations, composed for the stage and for more than 60 films and received 10 major commissions. He has been named an official 2024 NEA Jazz Master as well as a member of the 2024 class of awardees for the esteemed American Academy of Arts and Letters, and he currently serves as the executive artistic director for SFJAZZ, the largest nonprofit jazz presenter in the world.

Regarding his consistent attachment to artistic works of conscience, Blanchard confesses, “You get to a certain age when you ask, ‘Who’s going to stand up and speak out for us?’ Then you look around and realize that the James Baldwins, Muhammad Alis and Dr. Kings are no longer here… and begin to understand that it falls on you. I’m not trying to say I’m here to try to correct the whole thing, I’m just trying to speak the truth.” In that regard, he cites unimpeachable inspirations: “John Coltrane playing Alabama, even Louis Armstrong talking about what was going on with his people any time he was interviewed. Herbie Hancock and Wayne Shorter who live by their Buddhist philosophy and try to expand the conscience of their communities. I’m standing on all their shoulders. How dare I come through this life having had the blessing of meeting those men and not take away any of that? Like anybody else, I’d like to play feel-good party music but sometimes my music is about the reality of where we are.”

Ravi Coltrane

Ravi Coltrane is a critically-acclaimed, Grammynominated saxophonist, bandleader and composer. In the course of a more than 20-year career, Coltrane has worked as a sideman to many leading artists, recorded noteworthy albums for himself and others and founded a prominent independent record label, RKM.

Born in Long Island, the second son of John Coltrane and Alice Coltrane, Coltrane was named after Indian sitar legend Ravi Shankar. He was raised in Los Angeles where his family moved after his father’s death in 1967. His mother, Alice Coltrane, was a significant influence on Coltrane and it was Ravi who encouraged her to return to performance and the recording studio after a long absence. Subsequently, Coltrane produced and played on Alice Coltrane’s powerful Translinear Light, which was released in 2004.

Coltrane has released six albums as a leader, including Spirit Fiction released in 2012 for the Blue Note label. Additional credits include performances as well as recordings with Elvin Jones, Terence Blanchard, Kenny Barron, Steve Coleman, McCoy Tyner, Jack DeJohnette, Matt Garrison, Jeff “Tain” Watts, Geri Allen, Joanne Brackeen and The Blue Note 7, among others. He is a co-leader of the Saxophone Summit with Joe Lovano and Dave Liebman.

Coltrane lives in Brooklyn, New York, and maintains a fastpaced touring, recording, composing and performance schedule. He leads the effort to restore the John Coltrane Home in Dix Hills, Long Island, and presides over important reissues of his parents’ recordings.

Special Thanks

Danish String Quartet

Frederik Øland, violin

Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen, violin

Asbjørn Nørgaard, viola

Fredrik Schøyen Sjölin, cello

Program

Caroline Shaw: Allemande from Partita for 8 Voices

Lotta Wennäkoski: Vorüber, ach, vorüber! from Pige*

Franz Schubert:

Andante con moto (theme) from String Quartet No. 14 in D Minor, D. 810 (“Death and the Maiden”)

Anna Thorvaldsdóttir (arr. Thomas Bryla): Þann heilaga kross

Swedish Traditional (arr. Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen): Kisti du kom

Danish Traditional (arr. Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen):

Dronning Dagmar ligger udi Ribe syg

Danish String Quartet and Danish National Girls’ Choir

Charlotte Rowan, Conductor

Fri, Apr 10 / 7 PM / Granada Theatre

Event Sponsors:

Dorothy Largay & Wayne Rosing and Anonymous

Additional support from the A&L Fund for the Commission of New Works

Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen: Once a Shoemb er

Astrid Sonne: How Far

Caroline Shaw, (arr. Charlotte Rowan): And So

Turlough O’Carolan (arr. Fredrik Schøyen Sjölin): Captain O’Kane

Carl Nielsen/B.S. Ingemann, Danish Traditional (arr. Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen):

Tit er jeg glad og et brudestykke

- Intermission -

David Lang: in wildness (U.S. Premiere)*

After texts by Henry David Thoreau and Hans Christian Andersen

Introduction to wildness

We wish to speak

No wealth can buy

We will talk

Nowadays

Old tree

The preservation of the world

We took a walk

*A&L co-commission

photo: Caroline Bittencourt

A Note From the Artists

Over the past decade, our two ensembles have built a musical friendship that has opened new perspectives. Throughout our collaboration, we have been driven by curiosity – about the distinct qualities of our ensembles, about the musical expression that arises between us and about what happens when 1000 years of music history, 50 young voices and a string quartet merge into one.

On paper, a girls’ choir and a string quartet may seem refined, even traditional. But we have never been interested in refinement for its own sake. We have pursued a tangible and raw power, insisting on presenting the fragile and uncompromising side by side – as well as the intimate and the fierce.

This concert has evolved from this shared curiosity, harnessing the power of a string quartet and a girls’ choir – and the collective force that emerges when multiple voices meet – creating movement and transformation.

In the first half, you will encounter strong female voices through Nordic folk melodies and new music by Icelandic composer Anna Thorvaldsdóttir, Finnish Lotta Wennäkoski, American Caroline Shaw and Danish electronic composer Astrid Sonne. Different musical languages and different sonic landscapes are united by the same impulse: to open a space and allow something new to unfold. You will also meet an early Danish power lady, Queen Dagmar from the 12th century, and hear the crackling voice of Marie Tang Kristensen, a Danish housewife whose songs were captured on wax cylinders in 1907.

In the second half, we present in wildness by Pulitzer Prize-winning composer David Lang. The piece is written especially for our two ensembles, and it is an extraordinary honor to present new music by one of the most significant composers of our time. in wildness draws inspiration from the writings of Henry David Thoreau and Hans Christian Andersen, two writers who, each in their own way and language, describe a movement away from established society and into nature, into the unknown. Not as an escape, but as a possibility. As a way of imagining a different world and a different future.

in wildness is a co-commission between the Danish National Girls’ Choir, UCSB Arts & Lectures, Carnegie

Hall, La Jolla Music Society, Philharmonic Society of Orange County, Stanford Live and Washington Performing Arts.

To present this today feels like an invitation: to listen. To stay curious. To believe that new beginnings can emerge when we dare to step into the wild – together.

The journey begins tonight with you. Thank you for stepping into the wild with us.

Program Note: in wildness

“In Wildness is the preservation of the World”

This quotation is from the 1851 essay “Walking” by the American philosopher Henry David Thoreau. I read this essay in high school and it has stayed with me ever since. It is a rambling, mostly sunny but sometimes prickly text about the lessons we can learn, about society and ourselves, by walking through the natural world. In some places, the essay is more about what we should be walking away from than what we should be walking toward.

A large part of this essay is about walking West, toward the setting sun, which in 1851 was still a less tamed section of the United States. When Thoreau walks westward he is turning his back on “civilized” Massachusetts, with its cities and laws and politics and decorum, and walking toward the wilderness. Although his descriptions of walking are light and joyful they are given in the same spirit of rejection of the rules of society as found in his book Walden, or in his essay “Civil Disobedience.”

Thoreau’s text has been heavily amended and reworked by me, and I apologize for the variances between my text and the original. I took out the historical examples, the digressions and the archaic references to various nations and peoples that we now might find embarrassing or dated or offensive. Most of all, I took out the direct references to American exceptionalism. The society Thoreau is walking away from is, of course, American society, and the world he is walking toward is his imagined, potentially golden American future. One has to admire his optimism. As an ardent abolitionist, Thoreau was well aware that the wilderness he was so passionate about might soon be fought over, as politicians argued about how to divide the wilderness into free states and slave states. The “wildness” that

Thoreau writes about in “Walking” is as much a political wildness as it is a personal or metaphoric one.

Thoreau’s essay is often interrupted by lyrics to old songs and poems. I took this as an invitation to interrupt my text with two poems by the Danish author Hans Christian Andersen, written roughly at the same time as Thoreau’s essay. Both of these poems are about walking in the woods, but I rewrote both significantly, in order to keep the woods front and center. I apologize for the variances between my text and the originals here too.

The biggest change I made to these texts is in who the narrators are, and how they speak to us. The original texts are messages to us from two notoriously cranky men from the 19th century. I hoped that converting these texts into a hopeful, direct address, from a group of modern, committed young women, might make these messages easier for us to hear, to pay attention to and to believe.

Program notes by David Lang

Danish String Quartet

The Grammy-nominated Danish String Quartet continue to assert their preeminence among the world’s finest string quartets. Celebrated for their “intense blend, extreme dynamic variation (in which they seem glued together), perfect intonation even on harmonics, and constant vitality and flow” (Gramophone) and renowned for the palpable joy they exude in music-making, the Danish String Quartet have become one of today’s most in-demand classical quartets, performing to sold-out concert halls around the world.

The Quartet’s inventive and intriguing programming and repertoire choices have produced critically acclaimed original projects and commissions as well as sophisticated arrangements of traditional folk tunes. In August 2024, the Quartet released their long-awaited third album of folk-inspired traditional and original tunes, Keel Road, on ECM. Comprising 14 tracks, all arranged by the Danish String Quartet, Keel Road is a retracing of musical pathways across the North Sea, from Denmark and Norway to the Faroe Islands, England and Ireland. The release of Keel Road marked the Quartet’s 10th anniversary of exploring Scandinavian folk traditions, beginning with the 2014 album Wood Works and followed by Last Leaf (ECM

2017); both Last Leaf and Keel Road were chosen as two of the top classical albums of the year by NPR and The New York Times.

With a growing audience in North America, they embark on three tours this season that bring them to 22 cities in the U.S. and Canada. They perform at prestigious series including Washington Performing Arts, San Francisco Performances and UC Santa Barbara Arts & Lectures in California as well as Carnegie Hall in New York, The University Musical Society in Ann Arbor, Celebrity Series of Boston and the Schubert Club in St. Paul Minnesota. Outside the U.S., they perform this season in Denmark, Norway, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, Switzerland, Italy and Brazil.

The Danish Quartet’s April U.S. tour in 2026 features a longtime collaborator, the Danish National Girls’ Choir, in their first coast-to-coast tour together. Violist Asbjørn Nørgaard describes the choir as highly original, with “an almost tangible power” that makes them the perfect partner for the bold visions of the Quartet. The wideranging program includes a new co-commissioned work by David Lang, in wildness, to receive its U.S. premiere on April 10 at The Granada Theatre in a performance presented by UCSB Arts & Lectures and its New York premiere at Carnegie Hall on April 17. The program also includes music by Caroline Shaw, Lotta Wennäkoski and Schubert as well as traditional and original tunes arranged by the Quartet. The Danish String Quartet also undertook two more tours in November 2025 and February 2026. Showcasing their dynamic artistry and inventive programming, the Quartet present a rich mix of classical masterworks – including pieces by Beethoven, Ravel and Stravinsky, among others – paired with their own original compositions and arrangements (from Keel Road and elsewhere).

The final disc in the Quartet’s five-disc PRISM series on ECM was released to great acclaim in April 2023, and The New York Times dubbed the collection “essential listening.” PRISM explores the symbiotic musical and contextual relationships between Bach fugues, Beethoven string quartets and works by Shostakovich, Schnittke, Bartók, Mendelssohn and Webern. The Quartet’s discography also reflects the ensemble’s special affinity for Scandinavian composers, with the complete quartets of Carl Nielsen (Dacapo, 2007 and 2008) and Adès, Nørgård and Abrahamsen (their debut on ECM in 2016).

The Quartet takes an active role in reaching new

audiences through special projects. In 2007, they established the DSQ Festival, which takes place in intimate and informal settings in Copenhagen. In 2016, they inaugurated a concert series, Series of Four, in which they both perform and invite colleagues to appear. They have been the recipients of many awards and appointments, including Musical America’s 2020 Ensemble of the Year, the Borletti-Buitoni Trust, BBC Radio 3 New Generation Artist and the Bowers Program (formerly CMS Two). In 2011, the Quartet were awarded the Carl Nielsen Prize, the highest cultural honor in Denmark, and in June 2025, the Léonie Sonning Music Prize – they were the first ensemble to receive what is one of the most prestigious awards in classical music (including a gift equivalent to approximately $150,000 USD).

The Danish Quartet recently celebrated their 20th anniversary in 2024, having formed when violinists Frederik Øland and Rune Tonsgaard Sørensen and violist Asbjørn Nørgaard were teenagers under the mentorship of Tim Frederiksen of Copenhagen’s Royal Danish Academy of Music. In 2008, the three Danes were joined by Norwegian cellist Fredrik Schøyen Sjölin.

www.danishquartet.com

Exclusive Representation: Kirshbaum Associates Inc. 307 Seventh Avenue, Suite 506 New York, NY 10001 www.kirshbaumassociates.com

The Danish String Quartet is currently exclusive with ECM Records and has previously recorded for DaCapo and Cavi-Music/BR Klassik.

Danish National Girls’ Choir (DR Pigekoret)

The Danish National Girls’ Choir is one of Denmark’s strongest musical brands: 50 young singers aged 16-22 together create one of the finest girls’ choirs in the world. The choir aims to renew the Danish song tradition with authenticity, ambition and passion through strong and original musical power and modern visual formats. The contemporary approach makes the choir a strong player in many different musical contexts, giving more than 40 concerts a year both in Denmark and internationally. The choir’s

home is in DR Koncerthuset (Danish Radio Concert Hall) in Copenhagen.

The Danish National Girls’ Choir is part of, and was established by, the Danish Broadcasting Corporation (DR) in 1938. Since its inception, the choir has interpreted the Danish songbook every day on radio and television. The choir continues to fill concert halls – whether singing a cappella or in concerts with the country’s most acclaimed musicians and artists – with an audience that is loyal and ever-growing. While the founding DNA of the choir is the Danish songs, their repertoire ranges from traditional hymns to pop songs and contemporary classical works, often commissioned by the choir itself.

The Danish National Girls’ Choir often shares its voice at official Danish events both in Denmark and internationally. The choir was a Danish cultural ambassador at the Olympics in Rio in 2016, Tokyo in 2020 and Paris in 2024 as well as at the Parliamentary Assembly at the Council of Europe when Denmark held the chairmanship in 2018. The choir is under the patronage of H.M. Queen Mary of Denmark.

The collaboration between Danish National Girls’ Choir and Danish String Quartet started back in 2014 in Copenhagen and the two ensembles have created many personal, playful and spectacular concert performances together. These concerts involve strong programming based on the two ensembles’ distinctive musical DNA; united in mutual Nordic roots, they celebrate the collective musicianship and vibrational interrelation between voices and strings. In addition to audio releases and numerous concerts in Denmark, the two ensembles have thrilled audiences in the U.S. in 2019 and at a large music festival in Germany in 2024.

Facebook: drpigekoret

Instagram: dr.pigekoret

YouTube: @Koncerthuset www.drpigekoret.dk

Artistic Director/Executive Producer: Anne Karine Prip, akp@dr.dk, tel. +4523336810

Charlotte Rowan, Conductor

The founding conductor of the Danish National Girls’ Choir (DR Pigekoret) was Lis Jacobsen. She headed the ensemble from 1938 right up to 1961. As of August 2023, English choral conductor Charlotte Rowan took over the baton, becoming the eighth conductor in the choir’s history. Born and raised in Liverpool, Rowan grew up singing in the choir of Liverpool Metropolitan Cathedral, where she later became Organ Scholar (2012-2014). During this time, Rowan also studied as a singer and conductor at the Junior Royal Northern College of Music in Manchester, where her passion for conducting blossomed. She went on to study music at the University of Cambridge, Mass. (Hons), where she continued her training as a Choral Scholar with The Chapel Choir of Sidney Sussex College (2014-2017).

Since 2018, Rowan has lived in Denmark, where she has furthered her education as a choral conductor at the Royal Academy of Music in Aarhus (2018-2020) and held the position of director of music of Herning Boys’ Choir for three years (2020-2023) before becoming the conductor of DR Pigekoret. She is delighted to work with the young singers: “DR Pigekoret is both an invaluable communicator of the Danish song tradition and one of the world’s leading girls’ choirs. But above all, the choir is a beautiful symbol of how powerful a community of talented young people can be.”

Special Thanks

photo: Emilia Therese

About the Program

In celebration of the centennial of Miles Davis and John Coltrane, pianist Emmet Cohen brings together an allstar quintet to explore the fundamental questions that shaped their artistry: why are we here? What are we reaching for? Where does the music take us?

A dynamic ensemble led by pianist Emmet Cohen, featuring saxophonist Tivon Pennicott and trumpeter Jeremy Pelt, will celebrate these geniuses in Miles and Coltrane at 100.

Guided by the spirit of the infinite, Cohen continues the journey set forth by the architects of jazz – seeking deeper truths through sound. A dedicated champion of musical community, Cohen believes in jazz as a living, evolving conversation – one that unites people across time and place.

Emmet Cohen

The multifaceted American jazz pianist and composer Emmet Cohen is one of his generation’s pivotal figures in music and the related arts.

Leader of the Emmet Cohen Trio and creator of the Masters Legacy Series, Cohen is an internationally acclaimed jazz artist, a dedicated educator, the winner of the 2019 American Piano Awards and a finalist in the 2011 Thelonious Monk International Piano Competition.

Emmet Cohen Quintet

Miles and Coltrane at 100 Sun, Apr 12 / 7 PM / Campbell Hall

Emmet Cohen, piano

Jeremy Pelt, trumpet

Tivon Pennicott, tenor saxophone

Reuben Rogers, bass

Joe Farnsworth, drums

Jazz Series Lead Sponsor: The Nora McNeely Hurley Foundation

Cohen headlines regularly at Jazz at Lincoln Center, the Village Vanguard and Birdland, and he has appeared at the Newport Jazz Festival, Monterey Jazz Festival and North Sea Jazz Festival, among other renowned festivals.

His artistry has taken him to venues and festivals in more than 30 countries. Cohen’s entrepreneurial energies led to his developing “Live From Emmet’s Place,” a livestreamed Harlem rent party that unites a worldwide audience via tens of millions of internet views.

Besides leading the Emmet Cohen Trio, Cohen has appeared regularly with Ron Carter, Benny Golson, Jimmy Cobb, George Coleman, Jimmy Heath, Tootie Heath, Houston Person, Kurt Elling, Billy Hart and Brian Lynch, among others.

Cohen is a Yamaha Artist. Cohen is managed by Bandstand Artists and represented by Epstein Fox Performances. www.emmetcohen.com

Special Thanks

photo: Gabriela Gabrielaa

Masha Gessen

Politics of the Past, Politics of the

Tue, Apr 14 / 7:30 PM / Campbell Hall

Future

Justice for All Lead Sponsors:

Marcy Carsey, Eva & Yoel* Haller, Dick Wolf, and Zegar Family Foundation

Additional support from the Beth Chamberlin Endowment for Cultural Understanding

One of our most trenchant observers of democracy, M. Gessen is the author of 11 books, including the National Book Award-winning The Future Is History: How Totalitarianism Reclaimed Russia and The Man Without a Face: The Unlikely Rise of Vladimir Putin. An opinion writer at The New York Times, they have covered political subjects including Russia, LGBT rights, Vladimir Putin, Donald Trump and the rise of autocracy.

Gessen’s essential book Surviving Autocracy is a bracing overview of the calamitous trajectory of American democracy under the Trump administration. In the run-up to the 2016 election, they stood out from other journalists in their ability to convey the significance of Donald Trump’s behavior, unprecedented in a national candidate. Within 48 hours of his victory, the essay “Autocracy: Rules for Survival” had gone viral, and Gessen’s coverage of his norm-smashing presidency became essential reading for a citizenry struggling to wrap their heads around the unimaginable. Highlighting not only the corrosion of the media, the judiciary and the cultural norms that were supposed to be a salvation, they also illuminate how a short few years have changed Americans from a people who saw themselves as a nation of immigrants to a populace haggling over a border wall, heirs to a degraded sense of truth, meaning and possibility. The book garnered starred reviews from Publishers Weekly, Kirkus and Booklist, with The New York Review of Books raving, “Gessen’s credentials as an observer of autocracy are impeccable… Surviving Autocracy sharpens an edge of disgust lately blunted by relentless use.”

Gessen’s understanding of the events and forces that have wracked Russia in recent times is unparalleled. In the National Book Award-winning The Future Is History, they follow the lives of four people born at what promised to be the dawn of democracy, charting their paths against the machinations of the regime that would crush them and the unobstructed reemergence of the old Soviet order in the form of today’s terrifying and seemingly unstoppable mafia state. Noted by The Washington Post as “ambitious, timely, insightful and unsparing,” The Future Is History won the National Book Award for Nonfiction, the New York Public Library Helen Bernstein Book Award for Excellence in Journalism and was a finalist for the National Book Critics Circle Award.

In the New York Times bestselling The Man Without a Face, Gessen delivers a chilling account of how a low-level, small-minded KGB operative ascended to the Russian presidency and, in an astonishingly short time, destroyed years of progress and made his country once more a threat to his own people and to the world. As a journalist living in Moscow during Putin’s ascendancy, Gessen experienced this history firsthand, even famously being dismissed as editor of the Russian popular-science magazine Vokrug Sveta for refusing to send a reporter to observe Putin hang-gliding with Siberian cranes. 2014’s Words Will Break Cement investigates the activism of the artists known as Pussy Riot, who resurrected the power of truth in a society built on lies.

photo: Damon Winter

Gessen spent many years as a staff writer for The New Yorker and has contributed to The Washington Post, Harper’s, The New York Review of Books and Vanity Fair. They were recognized with the George Polk Award for opinion writing in 2024 and are currently an opinion columnist at The New York Times. Gessen is a founder of the Russian Independent Media Archive, a digital archive focused on preserving the last two decades of independent Russian journalism. They are the first Distinguished Professor at Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at City University of New York, and have taught at Amherst, Oberlin and Bard Colleges.

The recipient of a Guggenheim Fellowship, an Andrew Carnegie Fellowship, a Nieman Fellowship, the Hitchens Prize and the Overseas Press Club Award for Best Commentary, Gessen has lived in New York since 2013 after more than 20 years as a journalist and editor in Moscow.

Books are available for purchase in the lobby and a signing follows the event

Special Thanks

Sierra Hull

with special guest Mason Via Thu, Apr 16 / 8 PM / Campbell Hall

Sierra Hull, mandolin, vocals

Shaun Richardson, guitar, vocals

Erik Coveney, bass

Mark Raudabaugh, drums

Sierra Hull

Sierra Hull is a seven-time International Bluegrass Music Association Mandolin Player of the Year, six-time Grammy nominee and one of the most dynamic voices in bluegrass and Americana. Her latest album, A Tip Toe High Wire, marks a bold new chapter – her first independent release, showcasing her songwriting and instrumental prowess. With guest appearances by Béla Fleck, Tim O’Brien and Aoife O’Donovan, the album balances tradition with innovation. The project has been met with widespread acclaim and was nominated for four Grammy Awards, including Best Bluegrass Album, underscoring Hull’s continued evolution as one of acoustic music’s most visionary artists.

Hull has shared stages with legends like Alison Krauss, Eric Clapton, Sturgill Simpson, Slash and Robert Randolph, blending technical mastery with heartfelt storytelling. In 2025, Hull performed on NPR’s Tiny Desk Concerts and The Kelly Clarkson Show in support of the album. Building on an already accomplished year, Hull became the first female artist honored with a Gibson signature mandolin and was also awarded the Tennessee Governor’s Distinguished Artist Award.

Mason Via

Mason Via is an Appalachian troubadour who was born and bred in the Blue Ridge Mountains but now makes his home in gator country: Gainesville, Florida. An alumnus of Old Crow Medicine Show, he earned a Grammy nomination for his work on the band’s chart-topping folk album, Jubilee. His new self-titled album came out in April 2025 and debuted at No. 12 on Billboard’s Bluegrass Album chart. The song “Melt in the Sun” has gone to No. 1 on the SiriusXM channel Bluegrass Junction.

Via toured in 2025 with bluegrass stars like Sierra Hull, I’m With Her and The Wood Brothers. His songwriting can also be heard on Grammy-winning and Grammy-nominated albums by bluegrass icons Molly Tuttle and Del McCoury. During his time in Nashville, he was praised by NPR as one of the top 10 artists thriving in bluegrass music. He is known for high-octane bluegrass energy paired with emotionally gripping lyrics that will have you dancing and singing along.

Special Thanks

Of all the challenges the planet faces, none is as large as its fast-heating climate – and no one has worked longer or harder than Bill McKibben to document and fight the ever-growing crisis. Author of the first book about global warming – 1989’s The End of Nature – McKibben went on to found 350.org, the biggest grassroots climate campaign in the world, and Third Act, a progressive organizing movement for people over the age of 60. In his latest book, Here Comes the Sun, he offers a call to action: to harness the power of the sun and reclaim our scientific, economic and political future.

McKibben was awarded the Right Livelihood Prize, sometimes called the “alternative Nobel.” His book The End of Nature is regarded as the first book for a general audience about climate change, and has been translated into 24 languages. Time magazine called him “perhaps the planet’s best green journalist” and he has lectured and organized on every continent, including Antarctica. His recent books include The Flag, the Cross, and the Station Wagon, an investigation of our tumultuous past and a roadmap towards a better future, and the New York Times bestseller Falter, which offers a piercing look not only at our environmental challenges, but at the existential questions that come with new technologies like artificial intelligence. The LA Review of Books says, “McKibben in Falter once more explains nature’s workings, asks profound questions and tells wonderful stories,” calling it “a humane and wise book, even a beautiful one.”

Bill McKibben

Here Comes the Sun: A Last Chance for the Climate and a Fresh Chance for Civilization

Tue, Apr 21 / 7:30 PM / Campbell Hall

Event Sponsor: Patricia Bragg Foundation

McKibben’s writing has earned him numerous awards, including membership in the Literature section of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences and the John Steinbeck Award. The author of 15 books, he’s written authoritative pieces on renewable energy in Africa for The New Yorker and on the fossil fuel industry for Rolling Stone. The Schumann Distinguished Scholar in Environmental Studies at Middlebury College and a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, McKibben was the 2013 winner of the Gandhi Prize and the Thomas Merton Prize, and he holds honorary degrees from 18 colleges and universities. Foreign Policy named him to its inaugural list of the world’s 100 most important global thinkers. In 2014, biologists named a new species of woodland gnat – Megophthalmidia mckibbeni – in his honor.

Books are available for purchase in the lobby and a signing follows the event

Special Thanks

photo: Paul Richardson

David Miliband

David Miliband

New World Disorder: A Humanitarian Perspective in Conversation with Ben Rhodes

Wed, Apr 22 / 7:30 PM / Campbell Hall

Event Sponsor: Jillian & Pete Muller

Justice for All Lead Sponsors: Marcy Carsey, Eva & Yoel* Haller, Dick Wolf, and Zegar Family Foundation

David Miliband is the president and CEO of the International Rescue Committee (IRC). He oversees the agency’s operations in more than 40 crisis-affected countries and its refugee resettlement and assistance programs throughout Europe and the Americas. The IRC’s mission is to help the world’s most vulnerable people, whose lives and livelihoods have been shattered by conflict and disaster – including the climate crisis – to survive, recover and regain control of their futures. In 2024, the IRC served more than 36 million people in countries affected by crisis.

Prior to joining the IRC, Miliband had a distinguished political career in the United Kingdom. From 2007 to 2010, he served as the 74th Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs, representing the United Kingdom throughout the world. His accomplishments have earned him a reputation, in former President Bill Clinton’s words, as “one of the ablest, most creative public servants of our time.” In 2016, Miliband was named one of the World’s Greatest Leaders by Fortune and in 2018, he was inducted into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. In 2016, he was one of the guest readers on the Grammy Awardwinning recording of Presidential Suite: Eight Variations on Freedom by the Ted Nash Big Band.

Miliband is also the author of the book Rescue: Refugees and the Political Crisis of Our Time. As the son of refugees, Miliband brings a personal commitment to the IRC’s work and to the premise of the book: the idea that we can rescue the dignity and hopes of refugees and displaced people, and in doing so, we will rescue our own values.

Ben Rhodes

Ben Rhodes is a contributing opinion writer for The New York Times, co-host of Pod Save the World, a contributor to MSNBC and the author of two New York Times bestsellers – After the Fall: The Rise of Authoritarianism in the World We Made and The World As It Is: A Memoir of the Obama White House – as well as the upcoming book All We Say: The Battle for American Identity (May 2026). From 2009 to 2017, he served as Deputy National Security Advisor and speechwriter to President Barack Obama, participating in all of the president’s key foreign policy decisions. His work has also been published in The New York Review of Books, The Atlantic and Foreign Affairs.

Program

Sergei Prokofiev:

Symphony No. 1 in D Major, op. 25 (“Classical”)

Allegro

Intermezzo. Larghetto

Gavotte. Non troppo allegro Finale. Molto vivace

Frédéric Chopin:

Piano Concerto No. 1 in E minor, op. 11

Allegro maestoso

Romance. Larghetto

Rondo. Vivace

- Intermission -

Sergei Prokofiev:

Piano Concerto No. 2 in G minor, op. 16

Andantino

Scherzo. Vivace

Intermezzo. Allegro moderato Finale. Allegro tempestoso

Yuja Wang & Mahler Chamber Orchestra

Matthew Truscott, Concertmaster and Leader

Thu, Apr 23 / 7 PM / Granada Theatre

Major Sponsor: The Shanbrom Family Foundation

Yuja Wang

Pianist Yuja Wang is celebrated for her charismatic artistry, emotional honesty and captivating stage presence. She has performed with the world’s most venerated conductors, musicians and ensembles and is renowned not only for her virtuosity but also for her spontaneous and lively performances, famously telling The New York Times, “I firmly believe every program should have its own life and be a representation of how I feel at the moment.”

Wang was born into a musical family and began studying the piano at age 6. She received advanced training in Canada and at the Curtis Institute of Music under Gary Graffman. Her international breakthrough came in 2007, when she replaced Martha Argerich as soloist with the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Two years later, she signed an exclusive contract with Deutsche Grammophon and has since established her place among the world’s leading artists, with a succession of critically acclaimed performances and albums. Her recordings have garnered multiple awards, including five Grammy nominations and her first Grammy win for Best Classical Instrumental Solo with her 2023 release of The American Project. For this album, she also won an Opus Klassik award in the Concerto category.

Recent projects include a collaboration with David Hockney at London’s Lightroom, play-direct tours with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra to Europe and South

photo: BBC Studios

America, an international duo recital tour with pianist Víkingur Ólafsson and a residency with the New York Philharmonic Orchestra.

The 2025-2026 season saw Wang open the seasons of many major U.S. orchestras including the San Francisco Symphony, The Philadelphia Orchestra and Carnegie Hall, where she played and directed the Tchaikovsky Piano Concerto No. 1 in October 2025. Her orchestral performances included a major European tour with the Swedish Radio Orchestra and appearances with the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra, the New York Philharmonic, The Cleveland Orchestra and the Rotterdam Philharmonic. Her playing and directing continues with the Mahler Chamber Orchestra in Spain and the U.S. She will give a recital tour throughout Asia in June 2026. In November 2025, Playing with Fire: An Immersive Odyssey with Yuja Wang opened at the Paris Philharmonie. This groundbreaking, multi-sensory installation takes visitors behind the scenes and offers a rare perspective on the emotion and artistry behind Wang’s performances.

Mahler Chamber Orchestra

Since its founding in 1997 by the musicians of the orchestra, the Mahler Chamber Orchestra (MCO) has established itself as one of the world’s leading chamber orchestras. Working as a global collective, the MCO is led by its members in collaboration with its Berlin-based management office. The musicians, who come from around 25 different countries, unite for each tour or project. The chamber music dialogue and unanimous act of listening shape the orchestra’s sound; it’s a philosophy inspired by the orchestra’s founding mentor and longtime partner Claudio Abbado that the MCO calls “the sound of listening.”

In the past season, the MCO performed with conductors and soloists such as Antonello Manacorda, Riccardo Chailly, Leif Ove Andsnes and many others. The MCO is also known for its performances without a conductor. Artistic partners Yuja Wang and Mitsuko Uchida, with whom the orchestra went on several tours, often lead the MCO from the piano. In 2025-2026, the MCO takes the stage with Maxim Emelyanychev, Gianandrea Noseda, Augustin Hadelich, Kian Soltani, Adam Fischer, Igor Levit, Yuja Wang, Joana Mallwitz, Piotr Beczala, Hélène Grimaud, Víkingur Ólafsson, Thomas Adès, Daniel Harding, Daniil Trifonov and many others.

The Orchestra maintains residencies in Berlin and Lucerne. From March 2026 to 2028, it will succeed the Berlin Philharmonic at the Baden-Baden Easter Festival. In 2024, the MCO assumed the role of artistic director of Musikwoche Hitzacker.

The MCO continually explores new musical and social initiatives. Its program Feel the Music introduces music to deaf and hard-of-hearing individuals, while the MCO Academy allows orchestra members to share their expertise with the next generation of musicians. Additionally, the MCO’s school concerts foster introspection through the power of music. The MCO has also co-developed a series of XR concert formats. Since July 2024, some of the chamber music pieces produced in XR have been available in the Mahler Chamber Orchestra app for Apple Vision Pro.

Matthew Truscott, Concertmaster and Leader

Matthew Truscott is a versatile violinist who shares his time between period instrument and “modern” performance, appearing with some of the finest musicians in both fields. He is concertmaster of the Mahler Chamber Orchestra, and also one of the leaders of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment.

In demand as a guest leader, engagements in this capacity have included projects with English National Opera, Dutch National Opera, the Netherlands Chamber Orchestra, Budapest Festival Orchestra, The English Concert, Le Concert d’Astrée, The King’s Consort and Arcangelo. He is also leader of Classical Opera, St James’s Baroque and the Magdalena Consort.

A keen chamber musician, recordings have included a set of Purcell Trio Sonatas with Retrospect Trio, a disc of Bach chamber music with Trevor Pinnock, Emmanuel Pahud and Jonathan Manson, and one of Haydn Piano Trios with Richard Lester and Simon Crawford-Phillips.

Truscott teaches baroque violin at the Royal Academy of Music in London.

Special Thanks

An Evening with Martín Espada

Wed, Apr 29 (new date) / 7:30 PM / Campbell Hall

Co-presented with the Walter H. Capps Center for the Study of Ethics, Religion, and Public Life; and the UCSB Department of Religious Studies

Justice for All Lead Sponsors: Marcy Carsey, Eva & Yoel* Haller, Dick Wolf, and Zegar Family Foundation

Martín Espada has published more than 20 books as a poet, editor, essayist and translator. His new book of poems is called Jailbreak of Sparrows. His previous book, Floaters, won the National Book Award for Poetry in 2021. Other poetry collections include Vivas to Those Who Have Failed (2016), The Trouble Ball (2011), The Republic of Poetry (2006), Alabanza (2003) and Imagine the Angels of Bread (1996). He is the editor of What Saves Us: Poems of Empathy and Outrage in the Age of Trump (2019).

Espada has received the Ruth Lilly Poetry Prize, the Shelley Memorial Award, the Robert Creeley Award, an Academy of American Poets Fellowship, the PEN/Revson Fellowship, a Letras Boricuas Fellowship and a Guggenheim Fellowship. The title poem of his collection Alabanza, about 9/11, has been widely anthologized and performed. His book of essays and poems, Zapata’s Disciple (1998), was banned in Tucson as part of the Mexican-American Studies Program outlawed by the state of Arizona. A former tenant lawyer with Su Clínica Legal in Greater Boston, Espada is a professor of English at the University of Massachusetts-Amherst.

Books are available for purchase in the lobby and a signing follows the event

Special Thanks

photo: Lauren Marie Schmidt

¡Viva el Arte de Santa Bárbara! brings people together to share the rich cultural heritage of Latin America, serving more than 15,000 students and community members each year throughout Santa Barbara County.

Created in 2006 out of a commitment to arts access for all, Viva works with dozens of local partners to present high-quality artists who share their knowledge and passion. Schools, neighborhood spaces and community centers come alive in these free programs for youth and families.

¡Viva el Arte de Santa Bárbara! is a collaboration between The Marjorie Luke Theatre, Guadalupe Visual & Performing Arts Center, Isla Vista School Parent Teacher Association and UCSB Arts & Lectures, serving Carpinteria, Santa Barbara, Goleta, Lompoc, Santa Maria, Guadalupe and New Cuyama.

Coming in Spring of 2026

Las Cafeteras

March 19-22

Ballet Folklórico del Rio Grande

April 16-19

Performances are FREE (no registration required)

For nearly two decades, Viva has brought vibrant cultural performance and educational opportunities to the most underserved in Santa Barbara County.

Join us in securing the future of this vital partnership with a gift to ¡Viva el Arte de Santa Bárbara!

For more information about supporting Viva, contact Elise Erb, Senior Director of Development, at (805) 893-5679.

photo: Isaac Hernández de Lipa

Ballet Nepantla performs a free concert

Access for ALL | Arts & Lectures Learning

Through Access for ALL, inspirational, dynamic learning experiences are possible for students and lifelong learners across classrooms, our community and the UCSB campus.

UCSB Students

• Classroom visits

• Master classes

• Panel discussions

• Lecture-demonstrations

• Discounted and free admission to A&L mainstage events

K-12

• Matinee fi eld trips for students from across the county

• Assemblies

• Workshops

• Q&As

Lifelong Learners

• Thematic Learning Initiative (TLI): Extending the conversation through fi lm screenings, special events and book giveaways

• Author signings

• Pre-show talks and post-show Q&As

• Community workshops

Access for ALL serves more than 30,000 students and community members annually.

Please consider a contribution to A&L’s award-winning educational outreach programs. Call Elise Erb, Senior Director of Development, at (805) 893-5679 to learn more.

Jake Shimabukuro performs for 2,000 K-12 students at the Arlington Theatre as part of A&L’s Arts Adventures program

Political commentator Ezra Klein meets with UCSB Yardi Scholars for Environmental Justice

Bass-baritone Davóne Tines teaches a master class for UCSB students

Thank You to our Access for ALL and ¡Viva el Arte de Santa Bárbara! Sponsors

Arnhold A&L Education Initiative

Nancy Barasch

Linda Stafford Burrows

Marcy Carsey

La Centra-Sumerlin Foundation

Audrey & Timothy O. Fisher

Martha Gabbert

Eva & Yoel* Haller

Robin & Roger Himovitz

Hutton Parker Foundation

Dorothy Largay & Wayne Rosing

In Memory of Margaret Zwigard Lavidge

Little One Foundation and Belle Hahn

Lucky One Foundation and Hahn Shining Family

Sara Miller McCune

The Otis Booth Foundation

The Roddick Foundation

Stone Family Foundation

Towbes Fund for Performing Arts, an interest area of the Santa Barbara Foundation

William H. Kearns Foundation

Dick Wolf

Crystal & Cliff Wyatt

The Zegar Family Foundation

* In Memoriam

University Support:

Office of the Chancellor

Office of the Executive

Vice Chancellor and Provost

photo 1: Isaac Hernández de Lipa; photos 2&3: David Bazemore

The Benefits of Giving

Become a donor and join a community of arts advocates that enable us to deliver remarkable programming on and off stage.

The Benefi ts of Giving

Bespoke A&L experiences

CircleofFriendsProducersCircleExecutiveProducersCircleLeadershipCirclePartners

Invitations to dinners with artists or lecturers and other A&L members

Opportunity to host reception with an artist or lecturer

Event sponsorship opportunities

Complimentary reserved parking for all ticketed Campbell Hall events

A pair of complimentary guest tickets to an A&L public event

Reserved VIP seating at A&L Summer Cinema Series

VIP Ticketing Concierge Service and Priority Seating

Complimentary ticket exchange when your plans change

Invitations to Producers Circle Receptions

Access to Intermission Lounge at A&L events at The Granada Theatre

Invitation to A&L’s exclusive Season Announcement Party

Opportunity to attend master classes and other educational activities

Invitation to a member appreciation event

Recognition in A&L impact reports or digital media

To learn more about membership, contact Annual Giving & Membership Manager Austin Janisch at Membership@ArtsAndLectures.UCSB.edu or (805) 893-2174.

Thank You Arts & Lectures Supporters!

Arts & Lectures Council

Arts & Lectures is privileged to acknowledge our Council, a group of insightful community leaders and visionaries who help us meet the challenge to educate, entertain and inspire.

Marcy Carsey

Timothy O. Fisher

Rich Janssen

Dorothy Largay, Co-Chair

Kath Lavidge

Patricia MacFarlane, Co-Chair

Susan McCaw

Sara Miller McCune

Arts & Lectures Ambassadors

Jillian Muller

Natalie Orfalea

Tom Sturgess

Anne Smith Towbes

Arts & Lectures is proud to acknowledge our Ambassadors, volunteers who help ensure the sustainability of our program by cultivating new supporters and assisting with fundraising activities.

Winnie Dunbar

Donna Fellows

Belle Hahn

Eva Haller

Robin Himovitz

Luci Janssen

Sheraton Kalouria

Andrew Primack

Arts & Lectures Program Advisor

Bruce Heavin

Leadership Circle

Maxine Prisyon

Lily Hahn Shining

Heather Sturgess

Anne Smith Towbes

Lynda Weinman

Cliff Wyatt

Merryl Snow Zegar

Sherry Villanueva

Crystal Wyatt

Our Leadership Circle members, a group of key visionaries giving $10,000 to $100,000 or more each year, make a significant, tangible difference in the community and help bring A&L’s roster of premier artists and global thinkers to Santa Barbara. We are proud to recognize their philanthropy.

$100,000+

Jody & John Arnhold

Marcy Carsey

Audrey & Timothy O. Fisher ◊

G.A. Fowler Family Foundation

Martha Gabbert

Eva & Yoel* Haller ◊

$50,000+

Patricia Bragg Foundation

Cancer Foundation of Santa Barbara

Justin Brooks Fisher Foundation

Gainey Foundation

$25,000+

Betsy Atwater

Mary Becker

Otis Booth Foundation

Gary Bradhering & Sheraton Kalouria

Jordana Brewster & Mason Morfit

Linda Stafford Burrows

Marcia & John Mike Cohen

Margo Cohen-Feinberg

Cottage Children’s Medical Center

The Nora McNeely Hurley Foundation

La Centra-Sumerlin Foundation

Sara Miller McCune ◊

Peter and Jillian Muller

Natalie Orfalea & Lou Buglioli

Stone Family Foundation

William H. Kearns Foundation

Dorothy Largay & Wayne Rosing ◊

The Roddick Foundation

Shanbrom Family Foundation

Robin & Roger Himovitz

Luci & Rich Janssen

Julie Kellner

Little One Foundation

Lucky One Foundation

and Hahn Shining Family

Siri & Bob Marshall

Marilyn & Dick Mazess

Susan McCaw

The John C. Mithun Foundation

Dick Wolf

Crystal & Clifford Wyatt

Laura & Geofrey Wyatt

The Zegar Family Foundation

Anonymous (2)

Heather & Tom Sturgess ◊

Lynda Weinman & Bruce Heavin ◊

Montecito Bank & Trust

Eva & Bryan Schreier

Merrill Sherman

Barbara Stupay

Towbes Fund for Performing Arts, a field of interest fund of the Santa Barbara Foundation

Sheila Wald

Susan & Bruce Worster

Monica Wyatt & Mark Horowitz

Anonymous

$10,000+

Allyson & Todd Aldrich

Nancy Barasch

Susie Bechtel

Gay-Lynn & Robert Blanding

Jennifer & Jonathan Blum

Christine Bruce & John Hilliard

Elizabeth & Andrew Butcher

Ellen McDermott Charney & Scott Charney

Producers Circle

Sarah & Roger Chrisman

NancyBell Coe & William Burke

Jane Eagleton

Donna M. Fellows & Dave Johnson

Robyn & Larry Gottesdiener

Lisa & Mitchell Green

Jacquie & Harry McMahon

Holliday McManigal

Hutton Parker Foundation

Nanette & Kenneth Pigaga

Adam & Sophie Pritzker

Sharon & Bill Rich

Julie Ringler & Richard Powell

Susan J. Rose

George and Beth Wood Foundation

Arts & Lectures gratefully recognizes the commitment and generosity of our Producers Circle members, who have made gifts between $2,500 and $9,999. Recognition is based upon a donor’s cumulative giving/pledges within a 12-month period.

$5,000+ Executive Producers Circle

Jill & Arnie Bellowe

Susan D. Bowey

Annette & Dr. Richard Caleel

David & Debby Cohn

Winnie & Hod Dunbar

Olivia Erschen & Steve Starkey

Christine & Bill Fletcher

Andrea & Mark Gabbay

Pamela Gann & David Hardee

$2,500+ Producers Circle

Roxana Anson

Dan Berendsen & Kevin Brockman

Donna & Brad Beutter

Deirdre & Fraser Black

Sherri Bryan & Tim Dewar

Lilyan Cuttler & Ned Seder

Deva & Gabe Dalporto

Dorothy Daniels

Deborah David & Norman Kurland

Gamble Parks Douville & Gary Douville

Jen & Max Drucker

Richard Flacks

Tisha Ford

Charlie Franciscus & Dr. Herb Rogove

Bunny Freidus

Priscilla & Jason* Gaines

John J. Galvin

Gail & Harry* Gelles ‡

Michael Millhollan & Linda Hedgepeth

Ruth & Alan Heeger

Shari & George Isaac

Ann Jackson Family Foundation

Maia Kikerpill & Daniel Nash

Zachary Krasman & Nikolas Primack

Steve Lyons

Linda Gorin - In Memory of Arnold B. Gorin, M.D.

Grafskoy Hindeloopen Limited, LLC

Tricia & Don Green

Paul Guido & Stephen Blain

Daniel Halsted

Rosie Hart

Lauren Hobratsch & Charles Chang

Carolyn Holmquist

Donna & Daniel Hone

Sandra Howard

Andrea & Richard Hutton

Carolyn Jabs & David Zamichow

Lauren Katz

Michelle & Dr. John Kelly

Dr. Tamir Keshen & Dr. Roberta Sengelmann

Susan Kudo Lieff

Jaqueline* & Robert Laskoff

Arlyn & Michael Latin

Karen Lehrer & Steve Sherwin

Carole Macelhenny

Nancy McGrath

Suzanne & Duncan Mellichamp

Elizabeth & Charles Newman

Jan Oetinger

Liisa & Andrew Primack

Kyra & Tony Rogers

Laurie Seigel & Joseph Nosofsky

Melissa & Todd Lemein

Janice & David Levasheff

Chris & Mark Levine

Denise & George Lilly

Peggy Lubchenco & Steve Gaines

Nancy & Mike McConnell

Amanda McIntyre

Peter R. Melnick

Dale & Michael Nissenson

Joan Pascal & Ted Rhodes

Lynn & Mel* Pearl

Ann & Dante Pieramici

Jean Rogers

Gayle* & Charles Rosenberg

Karen Shapiro

& Richard Appelbaum

Holly & Lanny Sherwin

Maureen & Robert Siegel

Rebecca Sokol Smith

Roxanna & Randall Solakian

Anita & Eric Sonquist

David Spector & Robert Trachtenberg

Joan Speirs Towbes Foundation

Judy Wainwright Mitchell & Jim Mitchell

Nicole & Kirt Woodhouse Anonymous (3)

Lynne Sprecher

Carol Spungen

Dale & Gregory Stamos

Debra & Stephen Stewart

Sheila Stone

Mary Jo Swalley ◊

Amy & George Tharakan

David Tufts & Cris Dovich

Sandra & Sam Tyler

Christine Van Gieson & John Benson

Kathryn & Alan Van Vliet

Dianne & Daniel Vapnek

Sherry & Jim Villanueva

Karen & Peter Warshaw

Dr. Richard Watts

Alexis & Mike Weaver

Kathy Weber

Anonymous (2)

Circle of Friends

$1,000+

Michael & Marilyn Avenali

B&B Foundation

Jim & Trudy Chiddix

Janet & Robert Kates

$500+

Martha Blackwell

Linda & Peter Beuret

Janice Burnham

Anonymous

$250+

David Auston

Anne & Jeffrey Donahue

Ellen Durham

Ann & David Dwelley

Pamela Elliott

$100+

Ronald Abeles

Catherine Albanese

Benjamin Allen

Aileen Appe

Mickey Babcock

Elizabeth Bachman

Andria Bargiel

Jocelyn Belloni

Mary & John Blair

Emily Blass

Rochelle & Mark Bookspan

Suzanne Braswell

Dorothy & William Brokken

Norman Brooks Smith

Kathleen Carmel

Vikki Cavalletto

Michael Chabinyc

Jim Chiddix

Whitney Chiu

Melissa Colborn

Kathleen Copeland

Margaret Crocco

Danson Kiplagat

Irving Levin

Susan Matsumoto & Mel Kennedy

Carol & Stephen Newman

Dennis Doordan

Paul Finkel

Niedre Heckman

Elinor & James Langer

Deborah & Jay James

Steven Karbank

Antonia LaRocca

& Christopher Johnson

Rochelle Mackey

Jeanette Curci

Lila Deeds

Michael Degenring

Jane Delahoyde

Cristine Demaio

Joan & Thomas Dent

Gail Elnicky

Cid & Thomas* Frank

Ashley Goodson

Margaret Gordon

Amanda Greene

Kenneth Hasegawa

Karen Conway

Dr. Betty Helton & Dr. Alex Weinstein

Kirsten Hilleman

Page Hiller-Adams

& Alexander Adams

Judith L. Hopkinson ‡

Melinda Horwitz

Susan Jordan & Pedro Nava

Patricia Kane

Niall Kelly

Ann Pless

Robin Rickershauser

Jo & Ken Saxon

Stephen Simons

Irene Marsi

Richard Mirin

Priscilla & Forrest Mori

Almeda & J. Roger Morrison

Kurt Meyer

William Montgomery

Jeanne & Larry Murdock

Jennifer O’Toole

Elisabeth Ogle

Carole Kennedy

Julie & John Kennedy

Anna & Peter Kokotovic

Kelly Lake

Pat Lambert & Rick Dahlquist

Andrew Le

Catherine & Wayne Lewis

Ray Mathiasen

Bruce McDonald

Sue Miller

Harvey Molotch

Chris Moore

Marcie Musser

Barbara Nagle-Statler

Anita Pajon

Betty Pierskalla

Minie & Hjalmer

Pompe van Meerdervoort

Dr. Gaines Post

Karen Poythress

Loretta Redd Ph.D

Deborah Rogers

Judith & Michael Rothschild

Delia Smith - In Memory of Paul A. Smith

Claire & Glenn Van Blaricum

Anonymous

Martha Smolen

Lisa Stratton & Peter Schuyler

Carol Vernon & Robert Turbin

Richard Wimbish

Kathy & Mark Rick

Beverly & Michael Steinfeld

Pam & Russ Strobel Anonymous (3)

Anne Santorelli

Dr Suzanne M. Savoy

Christiane Schlumberger

Steven and Stacia Sickle

Joan & Steven Siegel

Heather & Paul Silva

Brian Smith

DaAnne Smith

Norman Smith

Susan & Barry Spector

Joan Szkutak

Gail & David Teton-Landis

Ann Tullo

Vickie Ascolese & Richard Vincent

Rick Wallace

Dorothy & John Warnock

Carole Wasserman

Keith Wenal

Geoffrey Winterowd

Gary Yencich

Anonymous

List current as of March 1, 2026. Every effort has been made to ensure accuracy. Please notify our office of any errors or omissions at (805) 893-3382.

* In Memoriam

◊ Indicates those who have made plans to support UCSB Arts & Lectures through their estate

Legacy Circle

Legacy Circle members listed below have made provisions in their estate plans to support A&L and ensure our exciting programs continue for future generations. We are pleased to acknowledge these thoughtful commitments.

Judy & Bruce Anticouni

Helen Borges*

Ralph H. Fertig*

Audrey & Timothy O. Fisher

Georgia Funsten*

Eva & Yoel* Haller

Dorothy Largay & Wayne Rosing

Susan Matsumoto & Mel Kennedy

Sara Miller McCune

Lisa A. Reich

Hester Schoen*

Heather & Tom Sturgess

Mary Jo Swalley

Lynda Weinman & Bruce Heavin

Arts & Lectures Endowments

Roman Baratiak Endowed Lecture Fund for A&L Fund for Programmatic Excellence

Beth Chamberlin Endowment for Cultural Understanding Commission of New Work Fund

Education and Outreach Fund

Sara Miller McCune Executive Director of Arts & Lectures

Harold & Hester Schoen Arts & Lectures Endowment

Sonquist Family Endowment

¡Viva el Arte de Santa Bárbara! Endowment

Lynda Weinman & Bruce Heavin Arts & Lectures Endowment for Programmatic Excellence

Government & Regional Funders

California Arts Council

City of Santa Barbara

National Endowment for the Arts

UCSB Summer Culture and Community Grant Program

University Support

Arts & Lectures is especially grateful to UCSB students for their support through registration and activity fees. These funds directly support lower student ticket prices and educational outreach by A&L artists and writers who visit classes.

Arts & Lectures Staff

Meghan Bush, Miller McCune Executive Director

Ashley Aquino, Contracts Administrator

Marisa Balter, Financial Analyst

Michele Bynum, Senior Artist

Shiloh Cinquemani, Assistant Ticket Office Manager

Charles Donelan, Senior Writer/Publicist

Elise Erb, Senior Director of Development

Michael Figueroa, Show Runner

Krystalin Giles-Bullicer, Prospect Management & Donor Research Specialist

Kevin Grant, Senior Business System Analyst

Jenna Hamilton-Rolle, Director of Education & Community Engagement

Ashley Hill, Arnhold Education Associate

Austin Janisch, Annual Giving & Membership Manager

Nina Johnson, Marketing Manager

Rachel Leslie, Manager of Ticketing Operations & Patron Services

Mari Levasheff, Marketing Manager

Roshan Nair, Interim Education Associate

Caitlin O’Hara, Associate Executive Director

Dominic Padero, Interim Marketing Specialist

Jennifer Ramos, Programming Manager

Mike Rojas, Production Coordinator

Heather Silva, Managing Director of Development

Laura Wallace, Finance & HR Manager

Eliot Winder, Production Manager

Lucía

Thu, Apr 30 / 7 PM / Hahn Hall

Supporting Sponsor: Jody & John Arnhold

Lucía, vocals

Hamish Smith, bass

Gabriel Chakarji, piano

Mark Ferber, drums

Four years ago, singer Lucía won the prestigious Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition, becoming the first Mexican artist ever to claim the prize. When it came time to select the song that she would perform in the final round, she picked a standard that reflected her musical sensibility, colored in equal parts by the beauty of jazz and the Latin American songbook.

“We played ‘What a Difference a Day Makes,’ which was popularized by Dinah Washington, but in its initial incarnation was a bolero written in Spanish by María Grever,” she says. “We started it as a jazz ballad in English, then switched to Spanish and added some zapateado dancing. My mother arrived with a contingent of fellow Mexicans to cheer me on. She told me that being able to sing in Spanish while dancing was what made me different from everyone else.”

Lucía won the competition, and the fact that she did it with such a soulful, multicultural rendition of a jazz standard marked her arrival on the international music scene. “What a Difference a Day Makes” is now the opening cut of Lucía, her exquisite debut album, which

showcases the luminous qualities of her voice, along with her superb technique and versatility.

From her velvety reading of McCoy Tyner and Sammy Cahn’s “You Taught My Heart to Sing” and an achingly vulnerable cover of Olivia Rodrigo’s “Lacy” to a mournful “Alfonsina y el Mar” and a version of “Veracruz” that brims with Lucía’s Mexican pride, the album finds the singer surrounded by a cadre of jazz virtuosos: Venezuelan pianist Edward Simon, American double bassist Larry Grenadier, Mexican drummer Antonio Sánchez and Puerto Rican saxophonist David Sánchez. The session was helmed by visionary producer Matt Pierson, known for his work with legends such as Brad Mehldau, Milton Nascimento and Samara Joy.

“There was a moment in the studio when we were recording ‘Veracruz’ and I just started to cry,” Lucía recalls. “It was that line about Veracruz shimmering in my soul, and the need to return to its distant beaches. I had sung that beautiful Agustín Lara song in choir during elementary school, and suddenly here I was, making a record with Antonio Sánchez and Larry Grenadier standing next to me. Matt asked me if I was OK, and I explained that I was crying out of sheer happiness.”

Her innate talent was nurtured from a very young age. Born in Veracruz, Lucía Gutiérrez Rebolloso began performing at age 2 together with her parents, Laura Rebolloso and Ramón Gutiérrez, and their acclaimed

photo: Shervin Lainez

son jarocho ensemble Son de Madera. She grew up surrounded by fandangos and the son jarocho community, and is also the niece of Quetzal Flores, founder of the Los Angeles-based Chicano rock band Quetzal. Most importantly, Lucía’s parents played many records at home – from the salsa nuggets of El Gran Combo de Puerto Rico to the Latin folk of Mercedes Sosa and the soul sides of Aretha Franklin.

“I never had a Justin Bieber phase,” she laughs. “I was 8 years old and was already obsessed with The Beatles, Nina Simone and Sarah Vaughan. I wasn’t allowed to watch TV, which resulted in a few tantrums, but now I’m grateful for that because those choices expanded my horizons.”

After earning a degree in Jazz Studies from the Universidad Veracruzana, Lucía contributed vocals to Mexican singer-songwriter Natalia Lafourcade’s De Todas Las Flores – one of the key Latin albums of the 21st century. She also performed with Lafourcade at Carnegie Hall and spent two years touring as a backup singer, an experience that had a massive effect on her carving out her own path.

“I got really nervous minutes before going onstage,” she admits. “Our performance involved zapateado, and I was scared of falling down. This was uncharted territory for me, and anything could go wrong. But when I saw Natalia singing alone with her guitar in front of thousands of people, any signs of nervousness faded away. At that moment, I decided to invest everything I had into my performance.”

Since the release of her debut album, Lucía has begun presenting her unique approach to jazz and Latin American song to audiences across the United States and internationally. The combination of traditional American jazz with the warmth of Latin folk remains at the core of her identity – both as a person and a vocalist.

“If sticking to jazz standards is your thing, then that’s incredibly cool,” she says with the relentless positivity that defines her in conversation. “I love all that stuff so much, but there is also another side of me that resonates deeply whenever I go to a fandango party or a son jarocho concert. I wouldn’t be true to myself if I just did an album of songs in English. Fortunately, Matt (Pierson) appeared and connected with my vision immediately.”

She pauses for a minute and smiles. “I was in love with jazz and doing big band recitals, but on my debut album I managed to fuse that sound with my own roots in a very organic way,” she says. “I wanted to create a musical project that would paint an accurate picture of who I really am.”

Lucía’s future looks bright indeed with her sparkling onstage presence and a debut album that represents the global evolution of jazz, where cultures from all over the world can dance together in harmony.

Special Thanks

Kronos Quartet

David Harrington, violin

Gabriela Díaz, violin

Ayane Kozasa, viola

Paul Wiancko, cello

With special guests

Kronos Quartet

Three Bones

Sat, May 2 / 6 PM (note special time) / Campbell Hall

Additional support from the A&L Fund for the Commission of New Works

Program: Three Bones

West Coast Premiere

I. Ground

with special guest Laura Ortman, Apache violin, amplified violin, voice Program to include:

Laura Ortman, Apache violin, amplifi ed violin, voice

Quentin Baxter, percussion

Wu Man, pipa

Traditional: Passamaquoddy Song of Salutation (wax cylinder recording of Noel Joseph)

Traditional (Ojibwe), Elisa Harkins (arr. Gabriela Díaz): Eagle Song+ (featuring the recorded voice of Elisa Harkins)

Charley Patton (arr. Jacob Garchik): Down the Dirt Road Blues+

Raven Chacon: The Journey of the Horizontal People**

Link Wray (arr. Jacob Garchik): Rumble+

Tanya Tagaq (arr. Tanya Tagaq, Kronos Quartet, and Joel Tarman): Colonizer (Remix)+

photo: Danica Taylor

Laura Ortman (arr. Jacob Garchik):

Waves Carve the Sound*

With contributions from:

Layli Long Soldier, poetry

Jeffrey Gibson, visuals

Zach Reich, graphic design

Floyd Massey, orator

I. Butterfly Joy Rides

II. Sending On Over (Hi Lo Hi)

III. Waves Carve the Sound

IV. I’ll Go With You

V. Prisms Ever Wild Ready

- Intermission -

II. At the Sea Islands

with special guest Quentin Baxter, percussion

Featuring the recorded voice of Queen Quet, orator

Featuring the recorded voice of Bobby Seale, orator

Program to include:

Traditional:

Kumbaya (Come By Here) (wax cylinder recording of H. Wylie)

Traditional (arr. Jacob Garchik):

A Shout (from Trinidad)+

Babatunde Olatunji (arr. Jacob Garchik):

Zungo (inspired by Nina Simone)+

Trevor Weston: Juba

Stacy Garrop:

Glorious Mahalia: IV. Sometime I feel like a motherless child*

Traditional (arr. Trevor Weston): Kumbaya+

Charlton Singleton: Mende Funeral Suite*

I. Funeral Song

II. Fellowship

- Intermission -

III. Beyond the Golden Gate

with special guest Wu Man, pipa Featuring the recorded voice of David Lei, orator

Program to include:

Dai Wei: Through the Paper Gate: I. Recipe for Forgetting*

Tan Dun: selections from Ghost Opera*

Traditional (arr. Jack Body): Long Ge+

Dai Wei: Through the Narrow Gate*: II. A Wise Man in the Snow (wax cylinder recording featuring unknown performer)

Dai Wei: Through the Paper Gate: II. Fortune Cookie Factory*

Wu Man: Silk and Bamboo*

Program subject to change

* Written for Kronos

** Written for Kronos Fifty for the Future

+ Arranged for Kronos

About the Program

We experience a world of sound thanks to the three smallest bones in our bodies.

These three tiny bones in our ears – the malleus (“hammer”), incus (“anvil”) and stapes (“stirrup”) – amplify faint vibrations from the outside world, enabling our minds to transform these signals into the aural landscape we know. The sounds of laughter, arguments, raindrops, thunder and, of course, music are born from the perfect alignment of these three bones –nature’s own amplifier.

Three Bones is a multimedia presentation whose purpose is also to amplify. As we ease well into 2026 and the 250th anniversary of the United States, Kronos marks the occasion by sharing and celebrating three American stories that deserve to be heard more widely. Realized on stage through music, storytelling, vintage recordings, video elements and visual arts, Three Bones expands on what a concert is through its dynamic narrative structure.

Kronos Quartet

For over 50 years, San Francisco’s Kronos Quartet has reimagined what the string quartet experience can be. Founded at a time when the form was largely centered on long-established, Western European traditions, Kronos has been at the forefront of revolutionizing the string quartet into a living art form that responds to the people and issues of our time. In the process, Kronos has become one of the most celebrated and influential groups of our era, giving thousands of concerts worldwide, releasing more than 70 recordings and collaborating with many of the world’s most accomplished composers and performers. Through its nonprofit organization, Kronos Performing Arts Association (KPAA), Kronos has commissioned more than 1,100 works and arrangements for quartet, including the recently completed Kronos Fifty for the Future library of educational repertoire. Kronos has received more than 40 awards, including three Grammy Awards and the Polar Music, Avery Fisher and Edison Klassiek Oeuvre prizes. In 2024, the Library of Congress announced its acquisition of the Archive of Kronos Quartet/Kronos Performing Arts Association, an invaluable collection that includes 50 years’ worth of manuscripts, instruments, costumes, video and audio recordings, photographs and more.

Integral to Kronos’ work is a series of long-running commissioning collaborations with many of the world’s foremost composers. One of the quartet’s most longstanding collaborators is Terry Riley, whose work with Kronos includes Salome Dances for Peace (1985-86) and Sun Rings (2002). Aleksandra Vrebalov has written more than 20 pieces for Kronos, including Pannonia Boundless (1998) and Beyond Zero (2014), a multimedia collaboration with filmmaker Bill Morrison. Inuit throat singer Tanya Tagaq has performed and collaborated with Kronos regularly over the last 20 years, including on her works Nunavut (2006) and Sivunittinni (2015). The quartet has also worked extensively with Philip Glass, recording an album of his quartets in 1995 and premiering String Quartets No. 6 (2013) and No. 7 (2014); with Fodé Lassana Diabaté, as heard on Ladilikan (2017); and with Steve Reich, whose string quartets Different Trains (1989), Triple Quartet (2001) and WTC 9/11 (2011) were written for and recorded by Kronos.

In its most ambitious commissioning effort to date, KPAA has recently completed a monumental education project that will be a cornerstone of Kronos’ legacy: Kronos Fifty for the Future. Through this initiative, Kronos has commissioned – and distributed online for free – 50

new string quartet works written by composers from around the world. Scores and parts, recordings and other materials are available on kronosquartet.org. Lead partner Carnegie Hall and an adventurous group of presenters, academic institutions, foundations and individuals have provided key support for this program.

In recordings, Kronos has collaborated with artists including Chinese pipa virtuoso Wu Man, Indian tabla virtuoso Zakir Hussain, legendary Bollywood playback singer Asha Bhosle, Iranian vocalist Mahsa Vahdat and Malian group Trio Da Kali. Kronos has performed live with the likes of Paul McCartney, Allen Ginsberg, Rokia Traoré, David Bowie, Rhiannon Giddens, Caetano Veloso and The National, and has appeared on recordings by artists such as Nine Inch Nails, Dan Zanes and Angélique Kidjo. In dance, the famed choreographers Merce Cunningham, Twyla Tharp, Alonzo King and many others have set work to Kronos’ music.

Keenly attuned to the issues of our time, Kronos has commissioned, premiered, performed and recorded works that engage with topics such as war and violence (Jonathan Berger and Harriet Scott Chessman’s Mỹ Lai, Mary Kouyoumdjian’s Bombs of Beirut and Silent Cranes) and the climate crisis (Laurie Anderson’s Landfall).

The quartet tours for several months each year, appearing in celebrated venues and festivals, including Carnegie Hall, BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! and BAM Next Wave Festival in New York; Big Ears in Knoxville, Tennessee; Palacio de Bellas Artes in Mexico City; the Barbican in London; the Muziekgebouw in Amsterdam; Shanghai Concert Hall; Suntory Hall in Tokyo; and the Sydney Opera House. Most recently, Kronos Quartet has been selected as the Doomsday Clock Artists in Residence for The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists.

Kronos’ expansive discography on Nonesuch includes three Grammy-winning albums: Terry Riley’s Sun Rings (2019), Landfall with Laurie Anderson (2018) and Alban Berg’s Lyric Suite (2003); the 40th-anniversary boxed set Kronos Explorer Series (2014); and Pieces of Africa (1992), a Billboard chart-topping showcase of African-born composers that was inducted into the National Recording Registry in 2024. Recent albums include Songs and Symphoniques: The Music of Moondog (2023); Mỹ Lai (2022), an opera with Vietnamese multiinstrumentalist Vân-Ánh Vanessa Võ and vocalist Rinde Eckert; and Long Time Passing (2020), a tribute to Pete Seeger.

Kronos’ work has featured prominently in many films, including A Thousand Thoughts, a “live documentary” that tells the story of Kronos’ career through live music, narration and film. Written and directed by Sam Green and Joe Bini, the work premiered at the Sundance Film Festival in 2018. Most recently, the quartet performed on the soundtrack for Users (2021) and is both seen and heard in the documentary Zappa (2020). Kronos has also recorded complete film scores, including by Clint Mansell for Darren Aronofsky’s Requiem for a Dream (2000) and Philip Glass for Dracula (1999) – a restored edition of the 1931 Bela Lugosi classic.

The quartet is committed to mentoring emerging musicians and has led workshops and master classes with Carnegie Hall’s Weill Music Institute (New York), the Royal Conservatory of Music (Toronto) and San Francisco Conservatory of Music, among other institutions worldwide. Kronos has undertaken educational residencies at institutions such as UC Berkeley’s Cal Performances, Holland Festival and New York University Abu Dhabi.

Based in San Francisco, the nonprofit KPAA staff manages all aspects of Kronos’ work, including commissioning, concert tours and local performances, recordings and education programs, and an annual self-produced Kronos Festival in San Francisco.

Kronos Quartet

P. O. Box 225340

San Francisco, CA 94122-5340

Tel: 415 731-3533

Fax: 415 664-7590 www.kronosquartet.org www.facebook.com/kronosquartet

Visuals created by Xuan Films

Windy Chien

Jeffrey Gibson (1st Panel)

Zach Reich (1st Panel)

Special Thanks

Ed Yong is a Pulitzer Prize-winning science reporter whose fascinating presentations on animals and the natural world are infused with humor, joy, wonder and infectious enthusiasm. His New York Times-bestselling book, An Immense World, is an astounding tour of the radically different ways that animals perceive the world. Yong dives into each animal’s umwelt – their specific “sensory bubble” – with curiosity and awe, exploring how different senses like heat, sound, smell and echolocation inform how animals interact with their surroundings.

After years of pandemic reporting left him burned out and struggling with his mental health, Yong turned to a new hobby – birdwatching – to help him heal and reconnect with his original beat of nature writing. In birdwatching, Yong found a much deeper connection to the natural world. Now, Yong speaks about how exploring your environment can be restorative as well as informative.

An Immense World won the Andrew Carnegie Medal, was a finalist for the Kirkus Prize and National Book Critics Circle Award, and was longlisted for the PEN America 2023 Literary Award, as well as appearing on many best books of the year lists. In 2025, the book was a recipient of the Science + Literature award from the National Book Foundation and the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation. A beautiful, full-color adaptation of An Immense World for young readers was published in 2025.

Ed Yong The Amazing Nature of Animal Senses

Wed, May 6 / 7:30 PM / Campbell Hall

Event Sponsor: Patricia Bragg Foundation

Word of Mouth Series Sponsor: Laura & Geof Wyatt

Presented in association with Santa Barbara Audubon Society

Yong is also the bestselling author of I Contain Multitudes: The Microbes Within Us, a groundbreaking, informative and entertaining examination of the relationship between animals and microbes. He won the 2021 Pulitzer Prize for Exemplary Reporting for his coverage of the pandemic, as well as the George Polk Award for science reporting; the Victor Cohn Prize for medical-science reporting; the Neil and Susan Sheehan Award for investigative journalism; the John P. McGovern Award from the American Medical Writers Association and the Kavli Science Journalism Award for in-depth reporting from the American Association for the Advancement of Science. In 2024, Yong was awarded a Guggenheim Fellowship for his trailblazing science writing. A longtime science reporter for The Atlantic, his work has also appeared in National Geographic, The New Yorker, Wired, Nature, New Scientist and Scientific American, among others.

Books are available for purchase in the lobby and a signing follows the event

Special Thanks

photo: Deanne Fitzmaurice

Michelle Zauner is the acclaimed author of the bestselling Crying in H Mart, an unflinching, powerful memoir about growing up Korean American, losing her mother and forging her own identity. With humor and heart, Zauner describes her adolescence in Oregon, discovering her love of music, and her complex relationship with her mother –from struggling to meet her high expectations to bonding with her over plates of steaming food on trips to Seoul.

When Zauner was 25, her mother was diagnosed with terminal cancer. Zauner moved home to become her mother’s caretaker, embarking on a journey that would force a reckoning with her identity and eventually a reclamation of the gifts of taste, language and history her mother had given her.

Crying in H Mart instantly rocketed to the New York Times bestseller list, where it remained for over a year. It was named one of the year’s best books by The New York Times, Time magazine, NPR, The Washington Post, Vogue, Entertainment Weekly, Good Morning America and more. Former President Barack Obama also included Crying in H Mart among his favorite books of 2021.

In 2022, Time magazine named Michelle Zauner one of its 100 Most Influential People. For the occasion, comedian Bowen Yang wrote, “While she intertwines the threads of her art into perfect plaits, she lets us find something in our own lives, a new strand with which to adorn ourselves. It doesn’t get better than that. Everybody wants to love her.”

UCSB Reads Author Event

Michelle Zauner

Crying

in H Mart

Thu, May 7 / 7:30 PM / Campbell Hall

Co-presented with UCSB Library as part of UCSB Reads 2026, with support from the Office of the Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost

Zauner initially achieved fame as the frontwoman for Japanese Breakfast, a Grammy-nominated indie pop band that has toured internationally and appeared on Saturday Night Live. The band has released three studio albums: Psychopomp (2016), Soft Sounds from Another Planet (2017) and Jubilee (2021). In addition to writing, singing and performing, Zauner has also directed many of Japanese Breakfast’s music videos.

Zauner is currently adapting Crying in H Mart into a feature film through Orion Pictures. When she is not on tour or working on new music in Seoul and Los Angeles, she lives in Brooklyn with her husband, Japanese Breakfast guitarist Peter Bradley.

UCSB Reads

An award-winning program of the UCSB Library, UCSB Reads – now entering its milestone 20th year – brings the campus and Santa Barbara communities together each year by reading a common book that explores compelling issues of our time.

Books are available for purchase in the lobby and a signing follows the event

Artistic Director: Kyle Abraham (he/him) **

Executive Director: Emily Waters (she/her)

Director of Touring and Artistic Operations: Ben Pryor (he/him)

Director of Development:

Lesedi Ntsele Stofsky (she/her)

Rehearsal Director: Jessica Tong (she/her)

Production Stage Manager: Meredith Belis (she/her)

Lighting Supervisor: Dan Stearns (he/him)

Touring Logistics Lead: Micaelina Carter (she/her)

Sound Engineer: Sam Crawford (he/him)

Performers:

Mykiah Goree, Gianna Theodore, Alysia Johnson*, Faith Joy Mondesire, Destin Morisset, William Okajima*,

Niya Smith, Keturah Stephen, Gianna Theodore, Olivia Wang, Jayden Williams (swing)

*Princess Grace Award Recipient

**Princess Grace Statue Award

A.I.M by Kyle Abraham

Kyle Abraham, Artistic Director

Tue, May 12 / 7:30 PM / Granada Theatre

Lead Sponsor: Jody & John Arnhold

Dance Series Sponsors: Margo Cohen-Feinberg, Barbara Stupay, Sheila Wald, and Anonymous

Program

2x4 (2025)

Choreography:

Kyle Abraham in collaboration with A.I.M

Music: Shelley Washington

Music Performed by:

Thomas Giles (soloist) and Guy Dellecave

Lighting Design: Dan Scully

Costume Design: Reid Bartelme and Harriet Jung

Visual Art: Devin B. Johnson

Performers:

Mykiah Goree, Alysia Johnson, William Okajima, Niya Smith

Music:

“Big Talk” courtesy of PSNY

“Black Mary” courtesy of People Places Records

2x4 is co-commissioned in part by Gagosian for Social Abstraction, The Joyce Theater’s Stephen and Cathy Weinroth Fund for New Work, The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts and the Moss Arts Center at Virginia Tech. 2x4 was created in part during a residency at the Weitz Center for Creativity at Carleton College in Northfield, Minnesota. Live music for 2x4 is made possible by a grant from Omomuki Live Music for Dance.

photo: photo: Tatiana Wills

If We Were a Love Song (2021)

Choreography: Kyle Abraham in collaboration with A.I.M

Music performed and arranged by:

Otis Brown III featuring Luther Allison and Liany Mateo

Vocals: Crystal Monee Hall

Lighting Design: Dan Scully

Costume Design: Kyle Abraham and Karen Young

Performers:

Black Is the Color of My True Love’s Hair

Mykiah Goree, Alysia Johnson, Faith Joy Mondesire, Destin Morisset, William Okajima, Niya Smith, Gianna Theodore

Keeper of the Flame

Keturah Stephen

Little Girl Blue

Gianna Theodore

Don’t Explain

Alysia Johnson, Niya Smith

Wild Is the Wind

Destin Morisset

Images

Faith Joy Mondesire

Music:

“Black Is the Color of My True Love’s Hair” (traditional)

“Keeper Of The Flame” written by Charles Derringer EMI Grove Park Music Inc. and Ninandy Music. All rights reserved.

“Little Girl Blue” written by Lorenz Hart and Richard Rodgers. Courtesy Universal Music Enterprises

“Don’t Explain” written by Arthur Herzog Jr. and Billie Holiday, © Songs of Universal, Inc. (BMI)

“Wild Is the Wind” written by Ned Washington and Dimitri Tiomkin

© 1957 Chappell & Co., Inc. WC Music Corp. (ASCAP and unknown publisher) All rights reserved.

“Images” written by Nina Simone © 1964 WC Music Corp. (ASCAP) All rights reserved.

If We Were a Love Song was made possible by the National Endowment for the Arts. The work was created in part through a residency at the Pillow Lab at Jacob’s Pillow and during a residency at Kaatsbaan Cultural Park and LUMBERYARD, made possible by the Mellon Foundation. The work was commissioned by American Dance Festival with support from the Doris Duke/SHS Foundations Award for New Works.

- Intermission -

The Gettin’ (2014)

Choreography: Kyle Abraham in collaboration with A.I.M

Music: Robert Glasper’s interpretation of We Insist! Max Roach’s Freedom Now Suite

Music performed by:

Otis Brown III featuring Luther Allison and Liany Mateo

Vocals: Charenee Wade

Arrangements and Original Compositions by: Robert Glasper

Set Design: Glenn Ligon

Lighting and Video Design: Dan Scully

Costume Design: Karen Young

Performers:

Mykiah Goree, Destin Morisset, William Okajima, Niya Smith, Keturah Stephen, Olivia Wang, Jayden Williams

The Gettin’ was commissioned and produced by New York Live Arts through its Resident Commissioned Artist Program, with lead support from the Mellon Foundation. The Gettin’ is supported, in part, by the New England Foundation for the Arts’ National Dance Project, with lead funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation and the Mellon Foundation. The Gettin’ was developed, in part, through a production residency at On the Boards with support from the National Dance Project, with funding from the Mellon Foundation. Support for The Gettin’ was also provided to New York Live Arts for the commissioning of this work by MAP Fund.

A Note From the Artistic Director

There’s so much to say when reflecting on 20 years of having a dance company in this complicated day and age.

I’m humbled by the hardships, and honored that the company is still on an upwards trajectory of something much larger and more impactful than I ever imagined. This live music program is meant to encapsulate A.I.M’s shared journey, and love for collaborative artistic expression.

The works on this evening’s program are made above all things from love, pride and history. From our most recent work on this evening’s program, 2x4 (2025), to our 2021 work, If We Were a Love Song, set to the music of Nina Simone, to 2014’s The Gettin’, there is a journey of strife and support.

Created during my tenure as a Resident Commissioned Artist at New York Live Arts from 2012-2014, The Gettin’ draws inspiration from jazz legend Max Roach’s seminal album, We Insist! Freedom Now Suite . This album, originally intended to be released in 1963 to mark the centennial of the Emancipation Proclamation, was released in the fall of 1960 due to the severity sparked by the sit-ins in Greensboro, N.C. and the urgency of the growing civil rights movement in the U.S. and South Africa.

I keep going back to Roach’s response when asked about the song “Freedom Day”: “Freedom itself was so hard to grasp… we don’t really understand what it really is to be free.”

In 2025, the questioning of universal freedom is omnipresent. It is as layered and nuanced as the ways in which our personal perception of privilege is unpacked and processed.

As we look back on the murder of Eric Garner referenced in The Gettin’, it lands as a haunting reminder of an ongoing struggle for racial equality and continued police violence towards Black and Brown lives. The conversations and calls to action in 2020 spoke of the horrific murders of George Floyd and Breonna Taylor.

Bringing The Gettin’ back into our repertoire hopefully reminds people that these struggles have in no way disappeared. In response, I created If We Were a Love Song to acknowledge and highlight a necessary narrative of Black Love and self-love in hopes of uplifting so many

who’ve felt silenced and discouraged. The most recent work on this program, 2x4, is in some ways an ode to form and a hopeful call for unity and support.

I thank you for your support and encouragement over the years. Thank you to all of our collaborators, audiences, administrators and donors past and present. Thank you for helping me bring my dreams to life.

–

Kyle Abraham

About the Company

A.I.M by Kyle Abraham has, for nearly two decades, been at the forefront of contemporary dance, becoming one of the most acclaimed touring companies in the world. Celebrating its 20th anniversary throughout 2026, the company exemplifies “lush movement, infectious music and magnetic dancers,” as noted by The New York Times

A.I.M has been featured in Vogue and Essence, among many other publications, and was on the April 2025 cover of Harper’s Bazaar. The company is described by Abraham as a “postmodern gumbo” with an ardent voice and artistic process informed by robust conversations with people from diverse perspectives. A.I.M performs works by Abraham as well as new and existing works by choreographers who have influenced Abraham’s artistry. A.I.M is based in New York City.

For more information, to get involved, or to purchase your A.I.M merchandise, please visit http://aimbykyleabraham.org. Follow A.I.M on Instagram @aimbykyleabraham and Kyle Abraham on Instagram @kyle_abraham_original_recipe

Kyle Abraham, Founder and Artistic Director

Kyle Abraham has premiered his work to international audiences and acclaim since 2006. Abraham has been profiled in CERO, Document Journal, Ebony, Harper’s Bazaar, Kinfolk, O Magazine, Paper, Surface, Vanity Fair, Vogue, British Vogue and W Magazine, among many other publications. He was recently nominated for an Olivier Award for Best New Dance Production and the Rose Prize for International Dance for An Untitled Love (2025) at Sadler’s Wells. He is the proud recipient of

numerous honors including the National Dance Critics Award for Choreography in 2024 for Are You in Your Feelings? created for the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, the Dance Magazine Award in 2022, Princess Grace Statue Award in 2018, Doris Duke Award in 2016 and the MacArthur Fellowship in 2013.

In addition to performing and developing new works for his company, Abraham has been commissioned by a wide variety of dance companies, including American Ballet Theatre (ABT), Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, The National Ballet of Cuba, New York City Ballet, Paul Taylor American Modern Dance and The Royal Ballet. In 2024, Abraham premiered three new works to much acclaim – Cassette Vol. 1 in Hamburg, Germany; Mercurial Son for American Ballet Theatre in October; and in December, Dear Lord, Make Me Beautiful at the Park Avenue Armory, which Jennifer Homans of The New Yorker called an “extraordinary dance memoir.” In 2025, Abraham premiered new works to acclaim including 2x4 and Wrecka Stow for ABT as part of Misty Copeland’s farewell performance. He is also the choreographer for the new Xtravaganza musical. Abraham also choreographed Copeland in the Cynthia Erivo short-form film No Good Deed as part of the Wicked: For Good promotion.

Abraham has led and curated several performance series including the Danspace Project (2024/50th anniversary season) and Lincoln Center’s Summer for the City in 2022 and 2023, among others. In 2020, Abraham was the first ever guest editor for Dance Magazine.

He has served as the Claude and Alfred Mann Endowed Professor in Dance at the University of Southern California Glorya Kaufman School of Dance since 2021. Abraham sits on the advisory board for Dance Magazine and Hubbard Street Dance Chicago. He is a member of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the inaugural Black Genius Brain Trust and the inaugural cohort of the Dorchester Industries Experimental Design Lab, a partnership between the Prada Group, Theaster Gates Studio, Dorchester Industries and Rebuild Foundation.

Company Credits

Artistic Director: Kyle Abraham (he/him)

Executive Director: Emily Waters (she/her)

A.I.M Board of Directors

Kyle Abraham

Suzanne Hall, Chair

Cheryl Bergenfeld

Adrienne Edwards

Karen Hogan

Mark A. Leavitt

Glenn Ligon

Jennifer Mandelson

Wendy McCain

Gary Mezzatesta

Bebe Neuwirth

Carrie Schneider

Stephen Simcock

Gilda Squire

Julia Strickland

Mickalene Thomas

Martin Wechsler

A.I.M Staff

Director of Touring and Artistic Operations:

Ben Pryor (he/him)

Director of Development:

Lesedi Ntsele Stofsky (she/her)

Production Stage Manager: Meredith Belis (she/her)

Rehearsal Director: Jessica Tong (she/her)

Logistics Manager: Matthew Baker (he/him)

Touring Logistics Lead: Micaelina Carter (she/her)

Senior Development Lead: Danielle LeBron (she/her)

Marketing Lead: Alexander Diaz (he/they)

Lighting Supervisor: Dan Stearns (he/him)

Press Agent: Chris Constable (he/him)

Financial Services: Lucy Mallett (she/her) and Julia Corrigan (she/ her), Arts FMS

Special Thanks

Terry Tempest Williams

Terry Tempest Williams in Conversation

with Pico Iyer

Wed, May 13 / 7:30 PM / Campbell Hall

Event Sponsor: Betsy Atwater

Speaking with Pico Series Sponsors: Martha Gabbert, Robin & Roger Himovitz, and Siri & Bob Marshall

Terry Tempest Williams has been called “a citizen writer,” a writer who speaks and speaks out eloquently on behalf of an ethical stance toward life. A naturalist and fierce advocate for freedom of speech, she has consistently shown us how environmental issues are social issues that ultimately become matters of justice. “So here is my question,” she asks, “what might a different kind of power look like, feel like, and can power be redistributed equitably even beyond our own species?”

Williams, like her writing, cannot be categorized. She has testified before Congress on women’s health issues, been a guest at the White House, camped in the remote regions of Utah and Alaska and worked as “a barefoot artist” in Rwanda.

Known for her impassioned and lyrical prose, Williams is the author of the environmental literature classics Refuge: An Unnatural History of Family and Place; An Unspoken Hunger: Stories from the Field; Desert Quartet; Leap; Red: Passion and Patience in the Desert; The Open Space of Democracy; Finding Beauty in a Broken World; When Women Were Birds; Erosion: Essays of Undoing and The Hour of Land: A Personal Topography of America’s National Parks. Together with Brooke Williams, she rediscovered the 1883 book The Story of My Heart by English nature writer Richard Jefferies. She has collaborated with photographer Fazal Sheikh on The Moon Is Behind Us and Thirst: Great Salt Lake (Fazal

Sheikh Archive, November 5, 2024) as well as with artist Mary Franklin on Trilogy, which is comprised of the individual volumes: A Burning Testament, What My Body Knows and We Are Not Alone. She wrote the introductory essay for A Wild Promise by Allen Crawford and also wrote text to accompany woodblock prints by Gaylord Schanilec for the fine press book Oracle Bones

In 2006, Williams received the Robert Marshall Award from The Wilderness Society, the highest honor the group gives to an American citizen. She also received the Distinguished Achievement Award from the Western American Literature Association and the Wallace Stegner Award given by The Center for the American West. She is the recipient of a Lannan Literary Fellowship and a John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship in creative nonfiction. In 2014, on the 50th anniversary of the Wilderness Act, Williams received the Sierra Club’s John Muir Award honoring a distinguished record of leadership in American conservation. Williams has also been awarded the Audubon New York Award for Environmental Writing, the Robert Kirsch Award for lifetime achievement and the Thoreau Prize for Literary Excellence in Nature Writing. She is an Emerson Collective Fellow for 2025-2026 and a member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters. In 2025, she received an honorary degree from the University of Southern California.

Additionally, Williams has served as the Annie Clark Tanner Fellow in the University of Utah’s Environmental

photo: Zoe Rodriguez

Humanities Graduate Program, which she co-founded in 2004, and she was the Provostial Scholar at Dartmouth College, serving as a Montgomery Fellow twice. Currently, Williams is writer-in-residence at the Harvard Divinity School. She is co-founder of the Constellation Project, which seeks to create a community of practice to promote the importance of imagination, creativity and spirituality in planetary health. She was also featured in Ken Burns’ PBS series on the national parks. Her writing has appeared in The New Yorker, The New York Times, Orion Magazine, The Progressive and numerous anthologies worldwide, offering a crucial voice for ecological consciousness and social change. She divides her time between Castle Valley, Utah and Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Pico Iyer

Pico Iyer is the author of 17 books, translated into 23 languages, and dealing with subjects ranging from Graham Greene to Islamic mysticism and from globalism to the Cuban Revolution. They include such national bestsellers as The Open Road (a meditation on his first 34 years of talks with the XIVth Dalai Lama), The Art of Stillness, The Half Known Life and Aflame. He has also written the introductions to more than 90 other books, the liner notes for many Leonard Cohen albums and a screenplay for Miramax. For 40 years, he has been a constant essayist for Time, The New York Times, Harper’s, The New York Review of Books and many others.

His five TED talks have received more than 11 million views, and he has been featured in program-length interviews with Oprah, Krista Tippett and Larry King. Born in Oxford, England in 1957, Iyer was a King’s Scholar at Eton and was awarded a Congratulatory Double First at Oxford University, where he received the highest marks of any student of English Literature. He earned a second master’s degree at Harvard and later served as a Ferris Professor at Princeton.

Dividing his time between Japan and Santa Barbara, he has led events for Arts & Lectures for more than a quarter of a century, interviewing such visionaries as Zadie Smith, Philip Glass, Salman Rushdie, Isabella Rossellini and Marina Abramović.

Special Thanks

Program

Joseph Haydn:

String Quartet in B-flat Major, op. 76, no. 4 (“Sunrise”)

Allegro con spirito

Adagio

Menuetto (Allegro)

Finale (Allegro ma non troppo)

György Ligeti: String Quartet No. 2

Allegro nervoso

Sostenuto, molto calmo

Come un meccanismo di precisione

Presto furioso, brutale, tumultuoso

Allegro con delicatezza

- Intermission -

Franz Schubert: String Quintet in C Major, D. 956

Allegro ma non troppo

Adagio

Scherzo. Presto - Trio. Andante sostenuto

Allegretto

Isidore String Quartet

with Sterling Elliott, cello Thu, May 14 / 7 PM / Hahn Hall

Isidore String Quartet

Adrian Steele, violin

Phoenix Avalon, violin

Devin Moore, viola

Joshua McClendon, cello

The New York City-based Isidore String Quartet, winner of the 14th Banff International String Quartet Competition in 2022 and an Avery Fisher Career Grant in 2023, is committed to rediscovering and reinvigorating the repertory. Formed at The Juilliard School in 2019 and coached by the Juilliard String Quartet, they follow Juilliard’s lineage by “approaching the established as if it were brand new, and the new as if it were firmly established.”

The Isidore String Quartet is distinguished by a refined and balanced ensemble sound, anchored by supreme technical proficiency. After their victory at Banff, the group was catapulted into the international scene with live performances in over 90 cities each season, including New York, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, Amsterdam, Pittsburgh, Seattle, Toronto, Cologne and Vancouver. They have collaborated with eminent artists such as violinist James Ehnes and pianist Jeremy Denk.

photo: Jiyang Chen

Highlights of the quartet’s 2025-2026 season include debuts at the Philharmonie de Paris, London’s Wigmore Hall, and the Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. Building on their close relationship with composer Billy Childs, they premiere his String Quartet No. 4, written for them, at Middlebury College. The group also gives the world premiere of James Lee III’s Humanity’s Essential Gems at Peoples’ Symphony Concerts in New York, joined by clarinetist Anthony McGill; collaborates with cellist Sterling Elliott in Santa Barbara; and performs at Philadelphia Chamber Music Society, Baltimore’s Shriver Hall Concert Series and the 92nd Street Y in New York.

This season, the Isidore String Quartet releases their debut recording, Adorations, featuring works by Joseph Haydn, Felix Mendelssohn, Samuel Barber and Florence Price. It was released in March 2026 on the Delos label.

The Isidore String Quartet is deeply invested in connecting with youth and elderly populations, and with marginalized communities who otherwise have limited access to high-quality live music performance. The quartet was the inaugural Arts Leadership Ensemble for Project: Music Heals Us, a nonprofit that brings music to people in hospitals, prisons, centers for people with disabilities, and homeless shelters.

The name “Isidore” pays homage to one of the Juilliard Quartet’s early members, the legendary violinist Isidore Cohen. The Isidore String Quartet was coached by current and former members of the Juilliard Quartet, including Joseph Lin, Astrid Schween and the late Joel Krosnick and Roger Tapping. They also trained with Joseph Kalichstein, Laurie Smukler and Misha Amory, among other distinguished musicians.

Sterling Elliott, cello

Acclaimed for his stellar stage presence and joyous musicianship, cellist Sterling Elliott is a 2021 Avery Fisher Career Grant recipient and winner of the 2019 National Sphinx Competition. Still in his mid-20s, Elliott has appeared with major orchestras including the Philadelphia and Cleveland orchestras; the New York and Los Angeles philharmonics and the Boston, Dallas and Detroit symphonies, working with noted conductors such as Yannick Nézet-Séguin, Thomas Wilkins, Louis Langrée and Mei-Ann Chen.

In the 2025-2026 season, Elliott appeared with the Phoenix Symphony, the Buffalo Philharmonic and at the BBC Proms. As featured soloist with the Sphinx Virtuosi, he performed on a multi-city Visions of Peace tour at Carnegie Hall, the Shriver Concert Series and the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society. He also continued his residency in the Bowers Program at the Chamber Music Society of Lincoln Center, performing at Alice Tully Hall and on tour throughout the U.S. as well as in trio performances with Anthony McGill and Gloria Chien. As the Robey Artist with the London-based Young Classical Artists Trust (YCAT) in partnership with Music Masters, Elliott regularly performs throughout the U.K. and Europe including at Wigmore Hall, Hamburg’s Elbphilharmonie, the Concertgebouw in Amsterdam, as well as on tour in New Zealand. In 2024, Elliott was named a BBC New Generation Artist.

He performs with a 1741 Gennaro Gagliano cello on loan through the Robert F. Smith Fine String Patron Program, in partnership with the Sphinx Organization.

Special Thanks

photo:

Titilayo Ayangade

Philip Glass

Philip Glass and The Poets

Featuring Music by Philip Glass

Performed by Timo Andres, piano

Taylor Mac, spoken word with special guest appearances by Lucinda Childs

San Francisco Girls Chorus Sun, May 17 / 7 PM / Campbell Hall

Through his operas, his symphonies, his compositions for his own ensemble and his collaborations with artists ranging from Allen Ginsberg to Doris Lessing and Leonard Cohen to David Bowie, Philip Glass has had an extraordinary and unprecedented impact upon the musical and intellectual life of his times.

His operas – including Einstein on the Beach, Satyagraha, Akhnaten and The Voyage – play throughout the world’s leading houses, and rarely to an empty seat. Glass has written music for experimental theater and for Academy Award-winning motion pictures such as The Hours and Martin Scorsese’s Kundun, while Koyaanisqatsi, his initial filmic landscape with Godfrey Reggio and the Philip Glass Ensemble, may be the most radical and influential mating of sound and vision since Fantasia. His associations, personal and professional, with leading rock, pop and world music artists date back to the 1960s, including the beginning of his collaborative relationship with artist Robert Wilson. Indeed, Glass is the first composer to win a wide, multi-generational audience in the opera house, the concert hall, the dance world, in film and in popular music simultaneously.

Glass was born in 1937 and grew up in Baltimore. He studied at the University of Chicago, The Juilliard School and in Aspen with Darius Milhaud. Finding himself dissatisfied with much of what then passed for modern music, he moved to Europe, where he studied with the legendary pedagogue Nadia Boulanger (who also taught

Aaron Copland, Virgil Thomson and Quincy Jones) and worked closely with the sitar virtuoso and composer Ravi Shankar. He returned to New York in 1967 and formed the Philip Glass Ensemble – seven musicians playing keyboards and a variety of woodwinds, amplified and fed through a mixer.

The new musical style that Glass was evolving was eventually dubbed “minimalism.” Glass himself never liked the term and preferred to speak of himself as a composer of “music with repetitive structures.” Much of his early work was based on the extended reiteration of brief, elegant melodic fragments that wove in and out of an aural tapestry. Or, to put it another way, his music immerses the listener in a sort of sonic weather that twists, turns, surrounds and develops.

There has been nothing minimalist about his output. Glass has composed more than 30 operas, large and small; 14 symphonies and 13 concertos; soundtracks to films ranging from new scores for the stylized classics of Jean Cocteau to Errol Morris’ documentary about former defense secretary Robert McNamara; nine string quartets and a growing body of work for solo piano and organ. He has collaborated with Paul Simon, Linda Ronstadt and Yo-Yo Ma, among many others.

Special Thanks

Philip Glass, Kiev Restaurant, New York City, 1993 (photo: Allen Ginsberg)

A Benefit for Arts Education

Tony Award Winner

Jonathan Groff

Moderated by Jane Lynch

Mon, Apr 27 / 5 PM (Limited Tables Available)

“Few stars today transmit and receive such unadulterated joy in live performance.” The New York Times Broadway star Jonathan Groff brings his remarkable versatility and warmth to an intimate evening of song and conversation. Fresh from his “dazzling and immersive love letter to live performance” (The Washington Post) as Bobby Darin in Just in Time and his Tony-winning turn in Merrily We Roll Along, Groff continues to enthrall audiences on stage and screen. Known to millions as the royally hilarious, scene-stealing King George III in Hamilton, as well as for standout work in Spring Awakening, Mindhunter, Frozen and more, he is a performer whose presence lights up every room. Join us for an evening that reveals the heart, humor and artistry behind one of the most captivating performers of our time.

Call Heather Silva, Managing Director of Development, to reserve your table today! (805) 893-3755