Click each image below to access detailed concert descriptions.
All performances are at the Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium, 307 Church Street, Downtown Santa Cruz.
In recognition of the important commitment made by our donors of $250 or more, and all those who have made the Three Steps to the Future pledge, we are thrilled to reprise our very special Donors Concert this season. The event begins at 4:45pm in the lobby of the Civic …read more »
You’ll find yourself at the very center of contemporary music-making with a special free concert featuring new works by three young composers—Natalie Dietterich, Charles Peck and Carlos Simon—conducted in rotation by six emerging conductors, the culmination of the prestigious Conductors/Composers …read more »
Cristi Măcelaru and the Cabrillo Festival Orchestra kick off the Festival’s 56th season with a musical journey rich in storytelling and cultural histories. A fascinating expedition starts with Chinese-American composer Huang Ruo, whose vibrant and inventive musical voice draws equal inspiration from Chinese folk, Western avant-garde, rock, and jazz. His …read more »
A music-filled Saturday night out-on-the-town begins with Vivian Fung’s evocative Dust Devils, which the San Jose-based composer describes as “the journey of emotional swirls in my mind, sometimes calm, but more often than not, full of raw and intense energy.” Toronto Star wrote, “Dust Devils is like a good abstract …read more »
The Festival’s annual free and always engaging family concert features Tunisian-born, Canadian-American composer Karim Al-Zand’s Parizade and the Singing Tree, a work based upon a Middle Eastern folk tale and featuring a female protagonist. Originally written for narrator and small ensemble, Al-Zand was commissioned to re-orchestrate the work for its …read more »
The San Francisco-based, Grammy-winning Kronos Quartet – David Harrington, John Sherba (violins), Hank Dutt (viola) and Sunny Jungin Yang (cello) – returns to Cabrillo Festival for our annual In the Blue Room concert. For more than 40 years, this groundbreaking group has combined a spirit of fearless exploration with a …read more »
Cabrillo Festival and Music Director Cristi Măcelaru are opening the doors to our community in a whole new way! Newcomers and long-timers are invited to check out how much fun this “new music thing” can be. We’ve designed an appealing program of fan favorites performed here at the Festival in …read more »
The second weekend of the Festival takes us on a far-flung excursion to new musical places and spaces––through the imaginings of some familiar composers and some new. Măcelaru leads the Festival Orchestra in the US premiere of Liguria by Swedish composer Andrea Tarrodi, whose vivid, ten-minute tone poem was inspired …read more »
Hear the future of new music in this free concert of original works programmed, presented, produced and performed by the adventurous 16-24 year-old members of Cabrillo Festival’s 2018 Student Staff …read more »
This is a grand finale that turns our thoughts outward toward the universe––from the earth’s crust, to the solar system, to modern cosmology. Tonight Cristi Măcelaru and the Festival Orchestra present the West Coast premiere of Pierre Jalbert’s In Terra. Originally inspired by the idea of layers of history, it …read more »
Cabrillo Festival of Contemporary Music
147 South River Street, Suite 232
Santa Cruz, CA 95060
Phone: 831.426.6966
Fax: 831.426.6968
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