June 11: Joy of Painting in Healdsburg

-
0
June 11: Joy of Painting in Healdsburg

Santa Rosa artist Daniele Todaro creates vibrant works through printmaking, fabric collage and pastel paintings inspired by the sights and sounds of the North Bay. Her pieces explore sumptuous still lifes of local produce and collage pieces representing musical instruments and artists seen through various colorful textures swirled together. For her latest showing, ‘Pastels & Monotypes,’ on display now, Todaro recreated the sun-dappled landscapes and seascapes she encounters driving on the backroads of Sonoma County. Her solo show runs through June 26, and Todaro will be on hand for an artist’s reception on Saturday, June 11, at Upstairs Art gallery, 306 Center St., Healdsburg. 2pm. Free. 707.431.4214.

June 12: Dog Day in Sebastopol

-
0
June 12: Dog Day in Sebastopol

Singer and bandleader Chris Hudlow formed Lost Dog Found in 2010, playing a throwback mix of rock and roll, soul and New Orleans jazz to the delight of fans throughout the Bay Area and beyond. Last April, Hudlow suffered a major stroke and has been beset by medical expenses while he recovers. This weekend, friends and fans come together for a benefit show titled Can’t Keep a ‘Lost Dog Found’ Man Down. Several bands, including Stax City, Lungs and Limbs, Burrows and Dilbeck Trio, and the Lost Dog Found members perform, with food and drinks, raffle, silent auction and more. The benefit happens on Sunday, June 12, at the Sebastopol Community Center, 390 Morris St., Sebastopol. Noon to 6pm. By donation. 707.874.3176.

June 15: Girls Rule in Rohnert Park

-
0
June 15: Girls Rule in Rohnert Park

Rising San Francisco comedian Kate Willett and San Francisco cult musician Rachel Lark are powerfully funny voices in the Bay Area and this month they join forces for a one-two punch of empowering comedy in the Dude Bra Tour. Willett has been seen on Comedy Central, Viceland and Fusion TV and is a regular opener for the magnificent Margaret Cho. Lark is often called the musical muse of the sex-positive movement, a multi-instrumental talent who encourages proud and psychologically healthy discussions of adult topics. Join the Dude Bras when they share the stage on Wednesday, June 15, at Sally Tomatoes, 1100 Valley House Drive, Rohnert Park. 7pm. $13. 707.665.0260.

Scottish Tragedy

-
0
Scottish Tragedy

Terence Davies is a clear-eyed nostalgia artist specializing in the retrieval of the mood and the color of the past. Sunset Song, an adaptation of the Lewis Grassic Gibbon novel set a century ago in Scotland’s Kincardineshire, seems like the culmination of Davies’ work. It functions both as a dreamy eclogue about farm living and as a war memorial.

The lean, tall Agyness Deyn stars as Chris Guthrie, the daughter of a viciously dour father (Peter Mullan, excellent). Though the ardors of childbearing send Chris’ mother to her grave at an early age, the farm is a kind of paradise. There is dialogue about the struggle with the soil, but the soil doesn’t look like it’s putting up much of a fight. It’s almost always golden harvest time, and, given the Scottish locale, the weather is surprisingly cooperative.

There is hard work in this movie, but little in the way of squalor. Later, Chris enters into a romance of absolute picture-book bliss with a neighboring farmer, Ewan Tavendale (Kevin Guthrie), who comes back soured and violent from the trenches of WWI.

Davies favors a theatrical approach that goes along with the stateliness of his composition: characters enter, stand and state their business as they would in a play. And the singing of a chorus walking their way to church is too beautiful to believe, though Davies, as in his 1988 masterpiece Distant Voices, Still Lives, with its sparing and canny use of music, uses the singing of the hymn to contrast with what follows when the congregation gets to church. There, they hear a saber-rattling war sermon by the preacher about how the nation deserves a “chastisement of blood and fire” for its sins.

Davies is sharp with dualities—the difference between the world of women and men, for example; he favors the former over patriarchal tyranny and the military.

Trusting our abilities to understand, Davies suffuses Sunset Song with compassion toward all. There’s a great deal of feeling behind a toast to life: “Sing it. Cherish it. ‘Twill never come again.”

‘Sunset Song’ opens June 24 at Summerfield Cinemas, 551 Summerfield Road, Santa Rosa. 707.522.0719.

Let Them Be

-
0
Let Them Be

The Sonoma Coast is as beautiful as it is abundant, with breathtaking vistas that are home to many forms of wild animals. Depending on the time of year, visitors to the coastline can observe a great marine mammal migration, particularly that of the California gray whale. Many marine mammals, including seals and sea lions, whales and dolphins, can be seen at different times of the year right from shore.

When visiting the coast, you may come across a live seal or sea lion on a beach or someplace that may not seem safe for you or the animal. Marine mammals will often land themselves on a beach for warmth. These haul outs, as they are called, are normal behavior and crucial for their survival.

Beach strandings, however, can occur during pupping seasons or high surf and rough ocean conditions. Sometimes, stranded pups can be malnourished because they haven’t learned to feed themselves. Strandings can also be caused by illness (leptospirosis, domoic acid poisoning and pneumonia), a parasitic issue, or perhaps the animal has been injured (boat props, netting wounds or entanglement, shark bites, bullet wounds).

It’s very important to report any perceived stranding so that professionals can make an assessment. After receiving a call and locating the stranded animal, Sausalito’s Marine Mammal Center staff and park rangers place signs out at a safe distance from healthy animals so that they can return to the water on their own while people keep a distance of 50 to 100 feet. Sick or injured animals are taken to the Marin Mammal Center for further treatment, rehabilitation and ultimately released back into the ocean.

Sonoma County’s most visible species are the California sea lion, the northern elephant seal and the Pacific harbor seal. Male elephant seals can weigh as much as 4,500 pounds, and a male California sea lion, as much as 850 pounds. This is why it is important to keep your distance. Remember, too, that these are federally protected species, and it is illegal to harass, touch or injure them.

Brandon Brédo is supervising park ranger for Sonoma County Regional Parks. SonomaCountyParks.org.

Open Mic is a weekly feature in the ‘Bohemian.’ We welcome your contribution. To have your topical essay of 350 words considered for publication, write op*****@******an.com.

Full Bloom

-
0
Full Bloom

Even though multi-instrumentalist Jason Crosby has been playing music with prodigious skill since he was two years old, he still calls himself a late bloomer.

Classically trained in violin, piano, guitar and other instruments, the Long Island native, living in Marin County since 2013, plays regularly around the North Bay and beyond with Phil Lesh, Doobie Decibel System and others.

On June 11, Crosby joins an all-star lineup at the Blue Rose Foundation’s massive fundraising concert at the Mystic Theatre in Petaluma. Crosby will hit the stage alongside songwriter Jackie Greene, Nicki Bluhm & the Gramblers and Nicole Atkins.

“I had a different kind of childhood growing up, listening to classical and jazz, so a lot of [rock and folk] music that l learned, like James Brown and the Grateful Dead, I learned by playing with bands rather than hearing from the source,” Crosby says.

The first time Crosby ever played music without having it written in front of him, he says, was at age 16. “It was nerve-wracking.”

After high school, Crosby started playing in rock ‘n’ roll bands. That’s when he says his excitement for contemporary music caught fire. He toured regularly with Robert Randolph & the Family Band, the Susan Tedeschi Band and others.

Crosby lived in Manhattan for 10 years before moving to Marin. “I came out in 2012 with God Street Wine and played at Bob Weir’s TRI Studios as well as Sweetwater and Terrapin—the loop of magic going on here in Marin,” he says. Things clicked so much that Crosby decided to move to California full-time.

“I love it here,” Crosby says of the North Bay. “Musicians get well taken care of here. It’s a great community. It’s amazing, because I was once just that kid discovering this music like the Dead. I was a little bit of a late bloomer, but to be around them now and be considered a peer is gratifying.

“Through Bob [Weir] and Phil [Lesh], I’ve met so many other people who have taken me on the road or into the studio,” Crosby continues. “I’ve been unbelievably busy ever since I moved here.”

When not on the road, Crosby is a staple of the North Bay scene. On June 2, he celebrated his 42nd birthday with a massive concert party at Terrapin Crossroads, and his upcoming schedule includes several dates throughout California with Doobie Decibel System, his duo with Moonalice’s Roger McNamee.

“I’m humbled by it,” Crosby says. “It’s just been an adventure here.”

Amateur Ale

-
0
Amateur Ale

Checking in at Petaluma’s Sonoma-Marin Fairgrounds to see what the home brewers have cooked up for the second annual Sonoma County Home Brewers Competition, I found the event was a veritable fair itself—or “faire,” as there was a contingent of merry, costumed Ren-faire types wandering the grounds.

Hosted by the Petaluma Downtown Association, the event on May 28 offered home brewers the chance to have their winning recipe brewed and distributed by 101 North Brewing Company. Hoping to survey the hobbyists on their ambitions to enter the burgeoning craft-brew business, I encountered good brew at my first stop. Nico Silva, who hopes to open a brewpub someday, has been home-brewing for just three years, but he had the esters dialed in with his fruity-scented Highway 116 doppel weizen. “I was going for Bananas Foster,” Silva said.

The creator of Insidious Six just wanted to keep it fun. “I don’t want to make it work,” Carl Downing said. It was no work at all sampling his nutty, chocolatey altbier, inspired by a German style brewed before technical developments made lagered beer more popular.

Curiously, there were no lagers, save for Cody Kay’s Corntastic American pilsner, which was made with popcorn and sported its own slogan: “Make yellow fizzy beer great again.” The only difference between this wholesome, crisp and light brew and the mass-market beers of this style is that it was 10 times better.

While some brewers lamented that, between work and kids, the dream of going pro was pie in the sky, others explained that it’s the kids that got them into brewing—they might not go out much anymore, but they can still brew at home.

Despite being a full-time firefighter and paramedic, Kevin Larson is lining up investments to launch Coastal Acres Brewing into the sea of craft beer. Look for Trapezoid IPA, if you like it fresh and resinous.

Hoping to stand out in the crowd, brewers got creative with the fruit and herbal adjuncts. “This puts me on the beach!” one taster exclaimed over a coconut-scented chocolate stout.

But there was no time to linger, because there were 62 beers to sample before casting an informed vote at the awkwardly located polling place. The task was nearly impossible—after sampling a dozen or two, I was getting ready to exercise my franchise, if you know what I mean.

The only non-IPA among the finalists, Powpow’s Nitro Coff-Nilla stout, took the prize. But the real surprise was that, whether they dream of going pro or not, these brewers aren’t just making tolerable “efforts.” I’d gladly drink most of those I sampled over an equal number of nationally distributed products.

Show Goes On

-
0
Show Goes On

“This show can go everywhere, and for as long as you want it to.” That’s what actor Jim Jarrett was told moments after debuting Leonard Nimoy’s beautifully written one-man-show Vincent, in Sun Valley, Iowa, 20 years ago.

As it so happens, the agent who approached Jarrett about Vincent—which relates the amazing story of Vincent van Gogh, as told by his brother, Theo—was not exaggerating. Jarrett has indeed toured the planet with the show ever since, snapping up awards at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Scotland and beyond, performing the multi-character tour de force to critical acclaim at theaters, museums, universities and art festivals all over the world. Jarrett has appeared in Vincent over a thousand times, but never in his hometown of Sonoma—until now. “I’ve been wanting to do this for a long time,” he says.

A benefit for Sonoma Arts Live, the three-performance run includes a gala opening night on Friday, June 10, at 6pm, with gourmet wines and snacks, followed by shows on Saturday, June 11, at 7:30pm and Sunday, June 12, at noon. For full details, visit sonomaartslive.org.

Hot Damn

-
0
Hot Damn

When it comes to food, everyone has a bit of the Southerner in them. That’s because the food of the South—barbecue, fried chicken, biscuits and gravy, grits, dry-cured ham—is so darn good and it elicits memories of meals gone by and strong opinions about how to cook it right.

I’m a Southerner by birth, but raised in California. My parents moved west from Virginia when I was two. I also spent two formative years in Austin, Texas.

My mom used to live in Walnut Creek, but recently moved to Granite Bay near Sacramento, so I don’t see her as much anymore. We’ve taken to meeting for lunch once a month or so. She’s retired and willing to drive a bit, so we meet at the Fremont Diner, a superb outpost of Southern cooking on the outskirts of Sonoma.

Food is a big topic between us, and the Fremont Diner allows us to catch up while critiquing the quality of the beans, the smokiness of the barbecue, the strength of the iced tea and other important details. But now all I want to talk about is the Nashville chicken.

I’ve been going to the Fremont Diner for years, but somehow I just ordered the chicken for the first time last week and, hot damn, it’s my new favorite thing. We’re not talking fried chicken. The skin is crisp, but it’s not battered. It doesn’t start out overly spicy, but it builds over time. Hot chicken juices commingle with chile pepper heat to create an explosion of fiery flavor. Cold beer is an essential accompaniment.

Fremont Diner owner Chad Harris won’t reveal the recipe, but he gave me a few hints. The chicken is brined, not marinated in buttermilk. And it’s very light on the breading. “It’s more of a dredge,” Harris says.

The chicken is rolled in a spiced flour mixture and then fried. After frying, it’s dunked in a chile oil bath. That accounts for its beautiful deep, dark-red color.

Harris got his inspiration from the “hot chicken” at Prince’s Chicken Shack in Nashville. the much-imitated originator of the minimally battered but maximally flavored fried bird.

The story behind the celebrated dish, as described in a great article in the online journal Bitter Southerner, began in the 1930s with a ladies’ man by the name of Thornton Prince and one of his lady friends who served him a spicy plate of chicken as a form of revenge for his cheating ways. It backfired. Prince loved the chicken and in time opened a restaurant featuring the spicy bird, and it became a regional hit.

While the chicken was confined to Nashville’s black community for decades, white folks like Harris discovered it, and now the word is it out.

“It’s a thing now,” he says.

In a nod to the chicken’s philandering roots, Fremont Diner’s menu descriptions says it’s “so hot it’ll set a cheatin’ man straight.” The restaurant serves theirs on a single slice of white bread in an ode to tradition. The bread gets stained a ruddy red from the chicken drippings. Of course you should eat it.

The housemade pickles on the side help temper the heat. The dish is served with a choice of mac ‘n’ cheese or a waffle. Go for the waffle and celebrate your inner Southerner.

Fremont Diner, 2698 Fremont Drive (Highway 12/121), Sonoma. 707.938.7370.

Letters to the Editor: June 8, 2016

-
0
Letters to the Editor: June 8, 2016

On Strike

Healthcare workers at Santa Rosa Memorial and Petaluma Valley hospitals are going on strike Thursday, June 9, and we’re asking for your support. No one wants a strike, but St. Joseph Health’s profit-driven approach to healthcare has left us no choice.

Since 2009, St. Joseph has reaped more than $242 million in profits from our local hospitals. These profits have come at a steep cost to our community. St. Joseph keeps staffing levels low in order to keep its profits high, and this has harmful effects on the quality of care we provide. St. Joseph cut its local nursing staffing levels by 15.5 percent between 2011 and 2014. According to the California Department of Public Health, these cuts have contributed to patient falls and increased risk of bedsores, infection and errors in patient care. The two hospitals recorded twice as many regulatory incidents per occupied bed than Sutter or Kaiser, and 10 times as many violations of state standards for quality care.

The staffing issues, combined with drastic benefit cuts and low wages, have sent morale plummeting and have made it difficult to recruit and retain experienced caregivers. On average, Petaluma Valley and Memorial caregivers make 25 percent less than Kaiser caregivers and 9 percent less than those at Sutter. And while
St. Joseph has been posting huge profits, the corporation implemented severe cuts to retirement benefits for Petaluma caregivers and has threatened to do the same to Memorial workers.

We’ve proposed three simple solutions: (1) establish staff-to-patient ratios and an acuity-based staffing system to ensure that we can deliver timely, quality care; (2) establish patient-care committees composed of caregivers and hospital managers to solve staffing problems; and (3) make pay and benefits competitive with Sutter and Kaiser in order to recruit and retain experienced caregivers.

These hospitals are part of our community, and many of us have devoted our working lives to them. We need to make sure they remain worthy of that devotion. Please support us on the picket line June 9.

—Patricia Barnett

Petaluma

From the Ed.

In an abundance of caution, we are removing stories by freelance writer Joseph Mayton from Bohemian.com. Because he cannot provide notes for his stories or details about his interviewees, and in light of questions about his credibility in another publication, we are removing the material.

Last week’s news story, “Mountain Top,” had a couple of errors. Susan Gorin is not the current president of the Sonoma Board of Supervisors; she was the president in 2015. Also, Gorin did not pay expenses for a fundraiser at Chateau Sonoma; she received an in-kind contribution from its owner, Susan Anderson, to cover food and venue expenses. The online version of the article has been updated to correct these errors, which we regret.

Write to us at le*****@******an.com.

June 11: Joy of Painting in Healdsburg

Santa Rosa artist Daniele Todaro creates vibrant works through printmaking, fabric collage and pastel paintings inspired by the sights and sounds of the North Bay. Her pieces explore sumptuous still lifes of local produce and collage pieces representing musical instruments and artists seen through various colorful textures swirled together. For her latest showing, ‘Pastels & Monotypes,’ on display now,...
Read more

June 12: Dog Day in Sebastopol

Singer and bandleader Chris Hudlow formed Lost Dog Found in 2010, playing a throwback mix of rock and roll, soul and New Orleans jazz to the delight of fans throughout the Bay Area and beyond. Last April, Hudlow suffered a major stroke and has been beset by medical expenses while he recovers. This weekend, friends and fans come together...
Read more

June 15: Girls Rule in Rohnert Park

Rising San Francisco comedian Kate Willett and San Francisco cult musician Rachel Lark are powerfully funny voices in the Bay Area and this month they join forces for a one-two punch of empowering comedy in the Dude Bra Tour. Willett has been seen on Comedy Central, Viceland and Fusion TV and is a regular opener for the magnificent Margaret...
Read more

Scottish Tragedy

Terence Davies is a clear-eyed nostalgia artist specializing in the retrieval of the mood and the color of the past. Sunset Song, an adaptation of the Lewis Grassic Gibbon novel set a century ago in Scotland's Kincardineshire, seems like the culmination of Davies' work. It functions both as a dreamy eclogue about farm living and as a war memorial. The...
Read more

Let Them Be

The Sonoma Coast is as beautiful as it is abundant, with breathtaking vistas that are home to many forms of wild animals. Depending on the time of year, visitors to the coastline can observe a great marine mammal migration, particularly that of the California gray whale. Many marine mammals, including seals and sea lions, whales and dolphins, can be...
Read more

Full Bloom

Even though multi-instrumentalist Jason Crosby has been playing music with prodigious skill since he was two years old, he still calls himself a late bloomer. Classically trained in violin, piano, guitar and other instruments, the Long Island native, living in Marin County since 2013, plays regularly around the North Bay and beyond with Phil Lesh, Doobie Decibel System and others. On...
Read more

Amateur Ale

Checking in at Petaluma's Sonoma-Marin Fairgrounds to see what the home brewers have cooked up for the second annual Sonoma County Home Brewers Competition, I found the event was a veritable fair itself—or "faire," as there was a contingent of merry, costumed Ren-faire types wandering the grounds. Hosted by the Petaluma Downtown Association, the event on May 28 offered home...
Read more

Show Goes On

"This show can go everywhere, and for as long as you want it to." That's what actor Jim Jarrett was told moments after debuting Leonard Nimoy's beautifully written one-man-show Vincent, in Sun Valley, Iowa, 20 years ago. As it so happens, the agent who approached Jarrett about Vincent—which relates the amazing story of Vincent van Gogh, as told by his...
Read more

Hot Damn

When it comes to food, everyone has a bit of the Southerner in them. That's because the food of the South—barbecue, fried chicken, biscuits and gravy, grits, dry-cured ham—is so darn good and it elicits memories of meals gone by and strong opinions about how to cook it right. I'm a Southerner by birth, but raised in California. My parents...
Read more

Letters to the Editor: June 8, 2016

On Strike Healthcare workers at Santa Rosa Memorial and Petaluma Valley hospitals are going on strike Thursday, June 9, and we're asking for your support. No one wants a strike, but St. Joseph Health's profit-driven approach to healthcare has left us no choice. Since 2009, St. Joseph has reaped more than $242 million in profits from our local hospitals. These profits...
Read more
1...655656657...1,000Page 656 of 1,000
11,084FansLike
4,606FollowersFollow
6,928FollowersFollow
north bay bohemian newspaper sonoma napa county logo
CURRENT ISSUE & ARCHIVES
East Bay Express cover
East Bay Express cover
CURRENT ISSUE & ARCHIVES
Newsletters Subscribe Advertise About Us Contact Us Letter to the Editor Press Release Obituaries Writing an Obituary Archives Find a Paper Distribute Bohemian Vote for Best Of Plaques & Banners
win free stuff
Features Local News News
Arts Books & Literature Crush Culture Movies Music Spotlight Theater
Astrology Look Media Opinion Letters To The Editor Open Mic Press Pass Rolling Papers
Dining Restaurants Small Bites
Readers' Picks 2025 Arts & Culture Beer, Wine & Spirits Beauty, Health & Wellness Cannabis Everyday Services Family & Pets Home Improvement Recreation Restaurants Romance Shopping
All Upcoming Events Today's Events Submit an Event Promote Your Event
weeklys california local media group logo

FOLLOW US

Copyright © Weeklys All rights reserved.

Our Publications

ADVERTISING Advertise Legal Submit an Obituary Legal NoticesFictitious Business Name (FBN) StatementsDoing Business As (DBA) NoticesTrustee Sale Notices

COMPANY INFO Job Opportunities Journalism Awards Privacy Policy Terms of Service

Support Local Journalism