Steven Libowitz

By the time Peruvian-born Conductor Miguel Harth-Bedoya finishes his residency at the Music Academy of the West early next month, he will have

M ichael Werner 's 2026 Music Academy of the West experience began well before the majority of his percussion fellows even arrived on the Miraflores campus. That's because Werner, a 1990 MAW alum and longtime faculty percussionist who is principal at the Seattle Symphony during the rest of the year, was a faculty member for MAW's inaugural High School Intensive. He appeared in the first public concert in the Teaching Artist Showcase, performing sections of Jeff Scott 's chamber piece “Silenced Angels Speak” with Kenneth Thompkins on the slide brass.

Between the inaugural Santa Barbara Literary Festival and the 52nd annual Santa Barbara Writers Conference, an almost incalculable number of authors were in town speaking about their works over the last two months. Now things slow down a bit for the summer, especially with UCSB Arts & Lectures on hiatus until late September. But there are still author signings and bookstores around town as well as speaker series, poetry readings and more for our warmer weather months.

Anything Goes dates back to 1934, the beginning of the Golden Era of American theater, hitting the stage via a collaboration with composer Cole Porter and script co-written by legendary wit P. G. Wodehouse. But while the classic has been around for nearly a century, local audiences will see a lot that's new when SBCC Theatre Group presents Anything Goes as its big summer musical show at the Garvin Theatre.

F riday, July 10: After a stirring introduction to the Lehrer Vocal Institute singers for 2026 last week, the vocal season shifts into full swing as the season's major events rapidly approach.

France is still favored to win the World Cup – at least as of this writing – but the boys in blue are going to have to compete with output from their country even more artisanal than a sizzling Mbappé strike. Which is to say, the annual SBIFF French Wave Film Festival invades Santa Barbara over the next two weeks. With the move to SBIFF's new five-screen Film Center on State Street, the fest has both doubled its duration and vastly increased the number of movies, many making their local debuts.

Exactly one week ago, all three co-hosts of the World Cup prevailed in their first games of the knockout phases and were happily about to play their round of 16 matches. And Austria – who made Santa Barbara their home base for the World Cup after having qualified to the tournament for the first time in 28 years – had yet to lose later that day.

By no means are the Environmental Defense Center's tgif! events purely about entertainment.

If you've never heard – or even heard of – Jimmie Dale Gilmore , all you need to know is what one journalist wrote about the West Texas singer-songwriter many years ago: “His voice would make even Hank Williams cry.”

Vanessa Decker didn't know what to do with herself when her 13-year-old daughter Ava passed away on May 9, 2024, just 18 months after being diagnosed with osteosarcoma, a rare and very aggressive bone cancer, devastating the family already exhausted from a battle with the disease.