Podcasts about Spreckels

Historian Sandra Bonura shares the fascinating story of Claus Spreckels, a German immigrant who became one of the wealthiest men in America during the Gilded Age. Discover how Spreckels built a sugar empire in California and Hawaii in her captivating biography "The Sugar King of California," which Blaine DeSantis calls "the best biography I've read in over 20 years." Links: "The Sugar King of California" Book: https://amzn.to/47YF0kT Dr. Sandra Bonura Website: https://www.sandrabonura.com/ Watch on YouTube: https://youtu.be/RiIqHiJBLR8 _ Produced by Podcast Studio X. Find my book reviews on ViewsOnBooks.com.

Raul Pietro Ramirez, the Artistic Director of the Spreckels Organ Society, talks about formation of the the Society's Rock Band, comprised of Rameriz and some of the area's top rock musicians.  Ramirez is joined by three of the six Rock Band members -- Harley Magsino (bass guitar), William Fleming (lead singer and trombone) and Chloe Lou (lead singer) --to chat about the group's concerts and the goals of the band.

Nicole and Drew are at Spreckels Lake where they chat with San Francisco Model Yacht Club Commodore Rob Weaver and dive into the origins of a favorite Golden Gate Park feature.

Ever wonder where the term "Sugar Daddy" came from? We have Mrs. Alma Spreckels to thank for that. She was married to a man 24 years older than her and he actually owned Spreckels Sugar Company.  Born into modest beginnings in 1881, Alma de Bretteville aka Alma Spreckels emerged from the shadows to become a prominent figure in the social and cultural landscape of early 20th-century America. She was known as a risque model because she we pose partially nude. Men would chase her, including Charlie Anderson, a successful miner. After a very brief courtship, she sued him for $50,000 for “breach of promise” to marry her. She won the case and was awarded $1,250. Alma went from small-town girl to the queen of society, exploring her unbridled passion for art, philanthropy, and social justice. As the wife of sugar magnate Adolph Spreckels, Alma played a pivotal role in shaping the cultural identity of San Francisco and beyond. She held legendary gatherings at the Spreckels Mansion, where artists, intellectuals, and influencers of the time converged to celebrate creativity and challenge the status quo.    Get your Homance apparel: nicolebonneville.etsy.com Follow us on IG: @homance_chronicles Connect with us: linktr.ee/homance Send us a Hoe of History request: homancepodcast@gmail.com

In this engaging oral history episode, we have a visit from Frank Wolden, a prominent figure in the realm of urban design and architecture. Frank shares his journey from his upbringing in San Diego to his deep involvement in shaping the vision of downtown redevelopment. He discusses the fascinating gap between the planning and execution of urban spaces and the art of selling the concept of responsible design with thoughtful thinking.   Frank takes us through his extensive involvement in creating the vision for downtown and its redevelopment through his work as a city planner and with the Centre City Development Corporation. He provides valuable insights into academic and higher-level professional viewpoints of urban planning, highlighting the similarities between how it shouldn't be done and the way it is done today.   Frank explores the significance of articulating one's vision and embracing change, as well as the accessibility of design and the importance of passing down our value system to the next generation.   Timestamps: [1:50] Frank gives a brief background on his professional education and upbringing in San Diego. [3:24] How Frank found his way into urban design and architecture. [6:26] Centre City Development Corporation and how they set up the planning and visionary process for redevelopment in the late '70s with the centerpiece being Horton Plaza. [7:25] How Frank's interest in art and sculpture evolved into city building. [11:00] The concept of growth management and how it was evolving. [14:50] The Centre City program was the heart of growth management. [15:35] Background on Centre City Development Coordination. [18:21] Building out a space in the Spreckels building and how they got the funding. [19:33] Hallmarks of downtown redevelopment and what it did for the downtown community. [20:55] Horton Plaza was the central project that was supposed to be the heart of how redevelopment would occur and would actually catalyze all the other redevelopment. [25:44] The biggest two things that influenced the Horton. [27:47] Gaslamp and how it came to be revitalized. [31:07] Creating the gateway Gaslamp to serve the convention center and ballpark. [36:00] The urban experience of downtown during the '90, and how it compares to today. [43:45] Why was it timely and necessary to revisit Temporary Paradise in a contemporary framework? [47:04] Why it's important to have a qualitative voice in the planning perspective rather than focusing on policy and regulation. [49:15] Urban Treasure. [58:55] The Sports Arena submittal and the vision that it started with. [1:00:53] Frank's association with C-3. [1:05:07] The need for proactive action and how we can get better at the visioning process. [1:11:03] What issues should the next generation be focused on? [1:22:06] The power of community process.   About C-3   Even before the California Coastal Commission or Environmental Protection Agency existed, Citizens Coordinate for Century 3 (C-3) was the environmental conscience of San Diego. Since that time, in part due to C-3's leadership in education, advocacy, and empowerment, a plethora of organizations have developed throughout San Diego County. These organizations specifically focus on promoting progressive values in architecture, urban design, land-use governance, natural resource management, sustainable economic development, climate change resilience, and social justice. As the field of allies has grown, C-3's role has evolved to provide a platform that promotes creating civic community.   Opportunities for Advocacy and Engagement: C3sandiego.org Frank Wolden LinkedIn Centre City Development Coordination  

"The Summer of Non-Profits" comes to a close, but sadly so does "Across The County" radio and podcast! It's onward and upwards. What a great way to close it all up, then by highlighting "The Spreckels Organ Society". It's the 501 (c)(3) that was founded in 1988 to preserve, program, and promote the Spreckels Organ as a world (not just San Diego) treasure! And WITH THAT, Noah welcomes for a long discussion (2 parts) the organ's San Diego Civic Organist - Raul Prieto Ramirez. It's time for part 2 of the discussion. In this final portion of the interview find out about Raul's love of types and genres of music (does it change?), what people think of when the organ comes to mind, educational aspects, and musical heritage! This is a truly an educational 2-part show, that will stir your soul and bring you insight into The Spreckels Organ here in San Diego! http://www.SpreckelsOrgan.org http://www.RaulPR.com #TheSpreckelsOrganSociety#TheBrothersSpreckels#RaulPrietoRamirez#CivicOrganist#TheSummerOfNonProfits#LEGACYUPDATE#SpreckelsConcerts#SanDiego#MusicEducation#MusicalArts#TheOrgan#PartTwo

"The Summer of Non-Profits" comes to a close, but sadly so does "Across The County" radio and podcast! It's onward and upwards. What a great way to close it all up, then by highlighting "The Spreckels Organ Society". It's the 501 (c)(3) that was founded in 1988 to preserve, program, and promote the Spreckels Organ as a world (not just San Diego) treasure! And WITH THAT, Noah welcomes for a long discussion (2 parts) the organ's San Diego Civic Organist - Raul Prieto Ramirez. Find out about his love of music, the organ, and the mechanics behind one of the world's true musical wonders! This is a truly an educational 2-part show, that will stir your soul and bring you insight into The Spreckels Organ here in San Diego! http://www.SpreckelsOrgan.org http://www.RaulPR.com #TheSpreckelsOrganSociety#TheBrothersSpreckels#RaulPrietoRamirez#CivicOrganist#TheSummerOfNonProfits#LEGACYUPDATE#SpreckelsConcerts#SanDiego#MusicEducation#MusicalArts#TheOrgan#PartOne

Bunker Spreckels became famous as a surfer, but he was born into the wealthy Spreckles family, a dynasty built on the sugar trade that gave us the term ‘sugar daddy.' At five, Bunker's mother remarried, and he suddenly had a new stepfather, Hollywood icon Clark Gable, who treated him as his own son. When Clark died, Bunker fled to Hawaii, where surfing took over his life. At 21 years old, Bunker unexpectedly inherited $50 million, leading to his life becoming an ongoing international surfing trip, with a coterie of writers, artists, photographers and filmmakers documenting his every move. Titus O'Reily and Mick Molloy examine the man who made popular the idea of the surfer as a rock and roll star and look at the family that produced him. If you'd like more Sports Bizarre, become a member of Bizarre Plus. As a member, you'll get: A weekly bonus podcast Exclusive behind-the-scenes access A fortnightly newsletter Access to the members-only chatroom Ability to vote on future episodes Early access to any live show tickets Click here to join today Follow Sports Bizarre on: Instagram Facebook Twitter TikTok YouTubeSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Today, we take a tour on our Golden Gate Parkcast. We begin by exploring a place of quiet, relaxation, and literature. Then, we head on over to one of the best-smelling gardens in San Francisco. And finally, we get the wind in our sails at Spreckels Lake. Plus, our featured local music today is Canyon from San Francisco. They're playing at Baltic Kiss in Richmond this Saturday.

We conclude our investigative journey through Palm Beach with dip into Dorothy Spreckels Munn and her home, Amado, both two true grand dames of Palm Beach. All sources can be found at doneanddone.com. Continue your investigation with ad-free and bonus episodes on Patreon!  To advertise on Done & Dunne, please reach out to sales@advertisecast.com or visit https://www.advertisecast.com/DoneDunne. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoices

Welcome to Case of the Sunday Scaries! Two tragic deaths occurred at the Spreckels mansion but who, if anyone is to blame? TW: This case goes into forensic details of suicide and mental health Join us for a new Case of The Sunday Scaries every Sunday! Elyse Dehlbom @elysemichelle_mua Annie Hochstein @anniehochstein Case Of The Sunday Scaries Podcast @acaseofthesundayscaries Resources for this case are listed below: https://www.chicagotribune.com/sd-me-zahau-day5-story.html  https://www.sandiegoreader.com/news/2011/sep/14/citylights2-rebecca-zahau/ https://timesofsandiego.com/crime/2021/07/12/10-years-ago-rebecca-zahau-saga-began-with-a-bound-body-beneath-a-balcony/ https://www.oxygen.com/death-at-the-mansion-rebecca-zahau/crime-time/who-was-rebecca-zahau  https://www.sportskeeda.com/pop-culture/dateline-secrets-uncovered-how-max-shacknai-die#:~:text=Max%20Shacknai%20reportedly%20suffered%20brain,his%20respiration%20and%20pulse%20rates.  https://www.cbs8.com/article/news/investigations/family-of-rebecca-zahau-petitioning-to-change-cause-of-death/509-4c2eaf04-692a-4daa-aa61-7af87c8aebf4 https://www.cbs8.com/article/news/crime/zahau-family-drops-suit-against-former-san-diego-county-sheriff-bill-gore/509-f9458acc-4764-469b-93db-ad88e3dc5baa#:~:text=The%20Zahau%20family%20dropped%20the,they%20believed%20he%20was%20hiding.  https://www.cbs8.com/article/news/local/zahau-family-to-file-lawsuit-against-sheriff-bill-gore-seeking-records/509-206bb665-7ebc-44ed-b8f7-aeed5fe6db5d  https://www.cbs8.com/article/news/crime/zahau-family-drops-suit-against-former-san-diego-county-sheriff-bill-gore/509-f9458acc-4764-469b-93db-ad88e3dc5baa#:~:text=The%20Zahau%20family%20dropped%20the,they%20believed%20he%20was%20hiding.

#MenschenbeiAnnette #AnnetteRadüg #ChristianSpreckels #Mentaltrainer #KopfsacheFußball #Sportpsychologe #EdelSports #WM #RADIO21 #RocklandRadio #AntenneSylt

Award-winning investigative journalist and bestselling author Caitlin Rother explores the mysterious death of 32-year-old Rebecca Zahau, who was found hanging from a second-story balcony of her multimillionaire boyfriend's San Diego mansion in 2011. She was naked and gagged, with her ankles tied and hands bound behind her. On the door to her bedroom, investigators found a hand-written message: "SHE SAVED HIM CAN YOU SAVE HER." The death was deemed a suicide, but Rother reveals there's more to the story... "I got a girl, hung herself in the guest house." The call came on the morning of July 13, 2011, from the historic Spreckels Mansion, a lavish beachfront property in Coronado, California, owned by pharmaceutical tycoon and multimillionaire Jonah Shacknai. When authorities arrived, they found the naked body of Jonah's girlfriend, Rebecca Zahau, gagged, her ankles tied and her wrists bound behind her. Jonah's brother, Adam, claimed to have found Rebecca hanging by a rope from the second-floor balcony. On a bedroom door in black paint were the cryptic words: SHE SAVED HIM CAN YOU SAVE HER. Was this scrawled message a suicide note or a killer's taunt? Rebecca's death came two days after Jonah's six-year-old son, Max, took a devastating fall while in Rebecca's care. Authorities deemed Rebecca's death a suicide resulting from her guilt. But who would stage either a suicide or a murder in such a bizarre, elaborate way? Award-winning investigative journalist Caitlin Rother weaves stunning new details into a personal yet objective examination of the sensational case. She explores its many layers--including the civil suit in which a jury found Adam Shacknai responsible for Rebecca's death, and the San Diego County Sheriff's Department bombshell decision to reconfirm its original findings. As compelling as it is troubling, this controversial real-life mystery is a classic American tragedy that evokes the same haunting fascination as the JonBenet Ramsey and O.J. Simpson cases.

In the early morning hours of July 13, 2011, Rebecca Zahau was found hanging from one of the balconies of her boyfriend's $12 million dollar home, less than 48 hours after Max, her boyfriend's son, was critically injured in an accident under her watch. In part 1 of this 2 part episode, Laura walks us through the mysterious circumstances surrounding 2 Grimm incidents that occurred days apart in the Spreckels mansion. Laura introduces the players and provides a taste of the evidence that casts doubt on the finding that Rebecca's death was a suicide.

Nein, wir holen nicht den guten alten Falk-Plan aus dem Handschuhfach. Die Methode, die uns Philipp heute vorstellt, hat allerdings wirklich Ähnlichkeit damit – erfahre heute, wie Karten helfen können, die Übersicht zu bekommen und behalten.Unsere allgemeinen Datenschutzrichtlinien finden Sie unter https://art19.com/privacy. Die Datenschutzrichtlinien für Kalifornien sind unter https://art19.com/privacy#do-not-sell-my-info abrufbar.

Le 13 juillet 2011, à Coronado, en Californie, le corps d'une jeune femme est retrouvé pendu, nu et attaché, au balcon d'un manoir luxueux de la ville. Cet événement bizarre survient seulement deux jours après un autre incident tragique, au même endroit. Etait-ce un suicide ou un meurtre ? C'est l'histoire des morts du manoir Spreckels. Merci à Evann Loget-Raymond et à Noémie Dournaud pour le générique. Musiques de fond :  - Myuu - Hold On https://soundcloud.com/myuu/hold-on - David Cherrière - Cringe Drone / Grimes  - www.soundcloud.com/thenameismonolith - Loik Bedrolese - All the regrets - https://soundcloud.com/blurturtle - Scott Buckley - Sleep

Aloha friends is Robert Stehlik. Thank you for tuning into another episode of the blue planet show.  on the blue planet show. I interview Wingfoil athletes, designers and thought leaders. And I asked them questions, not just about wing foil equipment and technique, but I'm also trying to get to know them a little bit better, their background, what inspires them and how they live their best life. You can watch this show on YouTube for visual content, or you can also listen to it as a podcast on the go to search for the blue planet show on your favorite podcast. I haven't come out with a new blue planet show for awhile. It's cause I've been super busy. You might've heard that. We took over a new shop in Haleiwa on Oahu's north shore, formerly known as tropical rush. We just opened there and I've been super busy, getting everything set up. It's really exciting, but it also, it takes a lot of time. So I haven't had as much time for the YouTube channel and the blue planet show, but I've been waiting for a long time for Alex  to come onto the show and he finally had some time to do it. So I got a great interview with him. Alex is nutty about wing foiling. He's coming out with GoFoil Wing foil boards and wings. And of course he plays such an important role in the development of the sport. He basically invented the foil that allowed Kai Lenny to do downwinders on a big long board. And basically kick-started this whole sport of foiling in the surf and now with wings. So thank you for that, Alex. And without further ado, this is the interview with Alex. All right, Alex Aguera. Thank you so much for joining me on the blue planet show. So how are you doing today? Doing great early in the morning, over here. How are you doing Robert? I'm good. Yeah. So I'm on here on a Oahu. You're on Maui, nine o'clock on a Wednesday. So yeah. So tell us, let's start a little bit with your background. Where did you grow up and how did he get into water sports and like early childhood to start from the very beginning? For getting into water sports, it started when I was let's see about 14. We went on a family vacation. I grew up in Clearwater, Florida, by the way. And. We went on a family vacation to the Virgin islands, British Virgin islands, and we're going to be on a sailboat and, do the bareboat charters where you travel around to each of the islands. And it's, it was just a fun, two week trip in the, in a place where we'd never been in places that were super clear water like that crazy, it was just fantastic. But anyway, the captain of our boat, we had hired a captain who would sail us around to the, for the first week. And then we were on our own. The second week, the the guy would put this wind surfer in the water at this one place where we first started called Soper Sol and Tortola. Any of, they would start sailing around with him and his other captain, buddy friend, on this funny looking sailing craft that, ended up being one of the original. Baja style windsurfers. So this would be for the original windsurfer was some of the first boards that oil swipes, or it may, and it looked like a big, giant, long board made out of a fiberglass. But anyway, when we got back to Florida after the chip, my dad wanted to check this out as a possible, get the kids doing this. Cause we were riding motorcycles and stuff at the time you wanted to get us off of motorcycles. So he calls up Hoyle Sweitzer, which was windsurfing international or whatever. They called themselves. At that time, this was really early. This is like 1975. And oil tells him, he goes, Hey, I'll sell you six of them and make you a dealer, so it was like, okay, we were the first dealer and in Florida and it all started from there. We started wind surfing right in 1975. And that's how I got into all these other sports that have evolved since then. Oh, that's so cool. Yeah. Foil Schweitzer is Zane Schweitzer's grandfather who basically invented the sport and had the patent and everything. Yeah. So your dad became the first either the first wind surf dealer in Florida. Yeah. Like district nine or whatever, what are they? I can't remember fleet nine or something, the, for the ninth, one in the United States. So that's when the books were still made out of wood and stuff like that. And the bowl we're still out of wood. There was a daggerboard was still out of wood. We hadn't progressed to, a composite looking white daggerboard yet. And we hadn't invented harnesses yet foot straps or anything. Okay. And then, okay. And then what happened next? After that, we Pursue to get better and better at wind surfing. And my dad started to be the distributor for the Southeast United States. And we were really in the winter and our whole life changed from, he was working at Honeywell, which is one of the firms down there in Florida. He was a engineer. And then he switched over to just going to be wind surfing. We're going to go all in, into this wind surfing thing. So from there, we add a whole bunch of people in Florida that we were the original Florida wind surfing crew. We called ourselves the fearless flying Floridians there for a couple of years. And it was a real close crew there in the Clearwater Sarasota area that we always raced against each other. And we just got better and better. And then pretty soon we were doing well in the national and world championships. Awesome. And then. How old were you when you did that kind of the racing and your first world championship? I guess? My first national championship was the following year. What Hoyle used to do back then was we would do these big district championships. There was like maybe five or six throughout United States and whoever had won their district championship would get a free trip to the nationals. So the nationals then following year in 76, I'm 15 years old, a win, a free airfare to Berkeley, California, where we're going to do the nationals. And I traded it in for money to buy a bus ticket and pay for my hotel when I'm over there. So just imagine you're 15 years old, you're traveling in a Greyhound bus, cross country. Get over there, you rent your own wind surfer back then they would have, rental packages where you just come in, rent your own gear and then raise. So at 15, that was quite an experience, to have my parents to be able to let me go, all the way across the country and do that all by yourself was, looking back at it now back then, seem oh, that's okay. I can do this. We'll look back at it. Now. I was like, God, I would never put my kids through that. But that was a fantastic Regata because. What happened was, so it was 76. We're at Berkeley. We had a lot of wind and stuff, but as first time I get to meet Mike waltz and Matt Sweitzer, who were like the gurus back then of windshield, because they had a thing called the windsurfing news, which was like a little paper back, like a magazine, the early wind surfing magazine was a paperback called wind surfing news. And it was always the swipe tours and like waltz and this and that. So we get over there, meet Matt and Mike can win or goes for his first championship with all the boys. And Robbie Nash does his first championship. All the boys, he, so little 12 year old blonde kid comes in from Kailua. So it was like, all of us got together for the first time at that time. And he was Robbie Nash is two years younger than you about, okay, so you were 14 and then there's someone even younger than you showing up. Yeah. Yeah, that was, how did you do in that? Oh, I got beat up. It was blowing really hard. And in Florida where I learned, I was just learning to race around and, barely get planing kind of conditions, which we have in Florida coming up to that summertime, you get to Berkeley, it's blowing 20 to 20 fives, sometimes gusting 30 and one of the races. And I don't think I got across the starting line. I got beat up. I was just rag dolling. Cause you only had one, one sail and it was pretty big. I probably weighed 125 pounds at the time. And I remember there was these divas, these sisters, the SWAT tech sisters. There was Susie and Martha and The girls just beat up on me. I was getting whooped up on by girls mad. It was like, oh, bad. It was, I was humbled when I went there, but watching some of the stuff that was just then evolving because Robbie had come over and he started doing this railroad thing, it's the first time any of us see a rail ride. And I was like, oh my God, what is that kid doing? Who is that kid? And then by the time, the week it ended max White's here. And I think Mike had picked it up and Ken were all doing railroads by the end of the week. They had figured it out. But when you first saw that, I was like, what the heck? That's something new. And then we did one of the, I think it was, could have been the very first freestyle event there. And. The guide who Dennis Davidson, who was one of the original Kailua windsurfers was putting a little teeny fin on his board. He was doing these super fast tax and stuff. And we were like, wow. And he ended up winning the very first freestyle. Oh. And then again, so that's awesome. And so then how did that progress it, you became a professional windsurfer, right? Yeah. That that was many years later in about 1980, started getting paid to do wind surfing races by wind surfing international and oil spikes or, and we would go over to Maui for the first time. We were going to do the Pan-Am world cup was a real big race. It was for high wind and it was in Kailua. And the first year I didn't go to, it was in 79. There wasn't any wind. So they had to race in Waikiki. The next year, oil flies us out. I spend six weeks on Maui practicing with Mike waltz. He had told me, Hey, you gotta come over here and see this place. If it blows all the time, he had just discovered Okinawa, within the last six months. And he goes, there's nobody around the wind's blowing all the time. There's waves. So my brother and I went over there and hung out with Mike for about six weeks. Then we went to Kailua to do the first real pan Emmerich's. It was blowing hard and it's like the windiest day you've ever been in Kailua now is what we experienced for a whole. And we were like, oh my God, this place is gnarly. We were scared to death coming from Florida and seeing that kind of stuff. And that was one of the very first, big, high wind regattas and wind surfing history. Wow. Cool. And you said your dad was an engineer at Honeywell. So did you ever get any like formal education as an engineer or any kind of like that kind of thing? Or is it, are you just all self-taught on the side? Yeah, on that side, it's been mostly self-taught. I went to, some business classes in community college after I got out of high school, but I moved over to Maui after that 1980 trip. I was like, oh, I'm selling everything. I'm moving to Maui. As soon as I can. It took me about a year and a half to be able to pull it off. Then I moved back in 1982 to become a professional. Nice. Yeah. And then, so how was that getting started on Maui in the eighties? That was something, it was great. We were, I don't know if Paya very well, but back then there was, it was hardly anybody in pyuria. There's no traffic light. We rented a place. It's right next to where mana foods is now, back then, there wasn't any model foods yet, but we rented a Quonset hut there. That is where they still store some of their, use it for storage of some of the stuff that the store. But anyway, there was at some time, six of us staying in this Quonset hut for 250 bucks a month rent. So we're all paying like 40 bucks a month rent and living in Maui, nobody around we're going to hokey every day and just having a blast, nobody around on the road, everybody you saw on the road was a windsurfer. You knew everybody. It's like now it's all tourist going by. Yeah. Molly has changed a lot. I lived there in the nineties or late eighties and early nineties. I lived in Peggy too, like really close over there. So I remember those days we lived in a basement apartment, which is super cheap, but yeah. And then driving old Molly cruisers rusted out cars, all that. And then, and then at that time, when surfing was developing really rapidly and changing and stuff. And did you start making equipment back then already? Or how did that, how did you get into business that business? I used to, I was sponsored by high-tech surf sports and Craig Masonville, who was the original guy for high-tech used to shape all of my boards. And we were riding the old asymmetrical, wind surfing boards that we used to ride at hook. I want a couple of the big contests that hook keep a riding those. And then I was always on the pro world tour for wind surfing. And eventually it was hard to get the boards that you wanted, because I had to start working for my French guys Tega and they were making me boards and then Craig was making me boards and it was hard to get boards on time sometimes through the high-tech factory. And I said, oh the heck with this, I'm going to try and start building boards myself. So in 1989 was probably the first time I was racing on one of my own boards. I remember racing in the Gorge and doing really well on that. And at the high-tech surf summer series I won a couple races on my own board and I was all proud. I was like, oh yeah, I might be able to do this. So that's how long ago I started. Yeah. Nice. So those are, slalom racing boards is, were your first boards you built? I got the first boys were slalom racing boards. The way boards is a little bit more technical cause it's easier to break those. So the first law and boards, I didn't have any sandwich on them. They were just covered with carbon and I had some elaborate process for stretching the cloth over it and wetting it all out and keeping the rock or shape, and then learn how to do vacuum bagging and sandwich construction after that. Yeah, I was working for hunt Hawaii in those days and he, we were, he was still building boards with using polyester as in, but then I guess at that time it would switched over to Potsie. So is that, what do you use the proxy or polio? My first boards from Masonville were always polyester. Then we started switching to a poxy in about 1985. I've got a slot onboard that Dave calling on, who was the laminator for high-tech back then we started experimenting with styrofoam and carbon fiber, and I raced the first one in 1985. I think it was. And that's where we're like, oh man, this is white, stiff and strong. And we're like, the lightness was just incredible compared to polyester. And I won the Gorge the second year in a row on that board. And I won the Japan world cup that year and in the spring on that court. But we learned a lot of things about, styrofoam construction goes back. We would just sink the boxes into the styrofoam. And then by the time I had finished the Japan race, my deck box had collapsed into the board. There was a big hollow spot inside. Okay. We were learning a whole new phone core and what to do with it. There was a lot of learning in that. Luckily the board stayed together until the race was over. Yeah. Classic. And then use like vacuum bagging and all that kind of stuff too, or just regular later. Yeah. When I started, I got my first vacuum bag bored by this guy, Gary efforting, who was a, you might remember him. He was the guy that made Hypertech in the Gorge and him and Keith notary would do these. They called it a clam sandwich or something where they were doing vacuum bagging. But Gary and I, he was a friend of mine because we all grew up in the same area in Clearwater, Florida. And he was showing, he made one of my original 12 foot long boards that we used to raise some world cup. And he was using this new aircraft technology called sandwich, construction. And he was the first guy that I saw doing sandwiches on boards. And slowly I learned how to do all of those process. A lot of it was trial and error, but eventually I was, I had retired from the pro wind surfing tour and started running the probe windsurfing tour. And then at the same time as being the race director, I started building boards for top guys like Kevin Pritchard and Mike abou Zionist. And those were all, they had to be super custom, super like sandwich boards. Wow. Okay. And then I guess when tiding came around, you got into kite surfing or yeah. W what happened there? The kite surfing, it was it was funny because we were sitting over here. We're all wind surfers. Layered was still a wind surfer. And he started playing with this kite and my other buddy maneuver Tom from France was starting to experiment with this kite thing and we'd see him at home Keepa. The guys were takeoff with these funny, real bars and all kinds of weird hiding stuff and start sailing this kite and go cruise down the coast, and ended up down at Kanawha or wherever. And I'm like, wow, that looks pretty interesting. What the heck is that? I didn't want to do it until somebody got back to the beach. They started out, I'm not really into this down winter and you're out there, on this thing, out in the blue water, with the, whatever could go wrong in palette around with the shark. So okay. If you could get back to where you started, that's what I finally started getting into it now. I don't know, in 97 or 98 or whatever, somebody was finally making it back. But what really got me into it was flash. Austin had moved over from Florida. He was lived in Daytona and he came over and he was this new kite guru guy. And I would watch him jump and he's  25 feet in the air and just hang in there and then come down real soft of flashy to have great Ky control. He still does. And I was just watching that going, wind surfing. If you jumped 25 feet in the air, you come down hard. I don't care what kind of stuff you're doing. It's that there's an impact. So I was like, I really want to do that. That's what really got me interested in kiting was watching flashed land softly. I'm like, okay, now I want to go boosting. So when you got into D did they still have those reels where you had two reel in the kite, if you get, if you drop it in the water. Yeah. Those guys were still using that, but I'm Brett lyrical and all those guys had their kite reels and I'm like, no, I'm not playing with that. Cut real. Does they look like you eat it? And then there's all this metal and stuff in your face. I started out with one of the two line whip, mocha kites, and then progressed to a two line Nash guy. And then eventually we started making four line kites and it got a little bit easier, those original to lion whip because, and stuff, they were all that was around, but they were a little bit dangerous. There was a lot of accidents in those early days. It took a while before at least five years before the kites got, safe enough to where, people weren't hurting themselves so bad anymore. Yeah. And then I guess around that same time the strap crew I guess layered and restaurant, all those guys started foiling, right? Torn, foiling and jaws and stuff like that. So when was the first time you tried foiling and how did you get into that? Foiling. I didn't try foiling until much later. Those guys were all into these BNN, bindings and strapped into this little board and everything weighed about 60 pounds. It seemed and big aluminum, mass and just super heavy. And then of course, these guys were real right. They were like, Hey, we're going to go to jobs. We're going to ride out or spread, it was like, you're all in, or you're not, and I'm like, they're like, Hey Alex, you got to try this. And I'm like, no way, man. I'm not going to be strapped into that tank and going over the falls. And that looks dangerous. But those guys there, they really were into it at the time. And we were all towing too at the time. With, our little tow strap boards. And I remember one day we were out at Spreckels mill and rush Randall is towing around. It's pretty small for tow day. We like to tow it. It's eight foot plus, and have some fun and it's four feet occasionally. And you're waiting for a set, but rush is going around in circles, just on his foil, cruising around at least doing backflips, going out with this thing while he's getting pulled with the checks. And we're like, man, what the heck? Russia's having a lot more fun than we are. So that was one of the first times where I really looked at it and go, wow, this could be fun. But for me to actually get into it myself, I was kite foiling at the time I had start, this is a, it was a funny story because I had stopped kiting for like about five years, Jesse Richmond, who was the world champion at the time. And his brother, Sean, they were like the best or kiters on Maui. And Jesse goes, Hey, you got to start making some kite or some tight race boards for us. I'm getting beat by girls out on the course. We just started this tight racing thing. So Jesse got me into kiting again. So I built a few boards. Then I had to test them with those guys. And that's how I got back into kiting then. So this lasted for. Maybe three years of kite racing. That was the one that we had the big, three fins on it. And you're, racing up when, so then my buddy in Martha's vineyard, we started foiling back then they were riding all kinds of funky foils, but it was the early days of foils. Most of them came out of France back then and he goes, Alex, I need you to make me a kite foil board and I'll trade you this foil, you got to start getting into foiling and you I'll trade it for a board. So I did this with my buddy, Rob Douglas, he's the world speed record holder for kiting back in the day. And he goes, okay, we're going to do a trade. So that was my introduction into kite foiling. And he gave me this foil that he had already beat up. He weighs about 2 35 or breaks the heck out of everything. And it was all wobbly and I had to keep fixing it. I was breaking it and stuff, and that's how I got. My first initiation into foiling and how to build foils. Cause I was always fixing it. And then I started making my own wings, and that's that was, started me all into foiling. Yeah. And on those foils for kite, for them back then were tiny, right? Really small wings and really long mass and so on. Or is that kind of what you started on? That's what we all started on because back then it was the same thing with layered in those guys. We had these really thin foils cause we were only interested in speed. We wanted to go faster and faster. Nobody wanted to make something to go slower. So everything back then it was, they were small, they were thin, everything was like the fast race foils were less than, 13 millimeters thick. They were, 14 or 15 millimeters was a fat foil. So that's what that's what we used to do. Yeah. And then at, and did you, when you made your own fuzzy, like CNC of them out of G 10, or what kind of how did you make your own foil? Basically what I did in the beginning was I would take some existing foil that I had, and then I would reshape it and try to figure out how to make molds. So I was making molds and figuring out how to do that. It was a whole different process. I was used to building boards and sandwich, construction, vacuum bag now on a changed to, Hey, you got to learn how to make molds and make these wings. So it was a big learning curve. I've made a lot of mistakes. I burned up a lot of molds. I did all kinds of crazy stuff. It was just like learning to build boards. You've got, there's a big learning curve, but that's what I ended up doing. And I would take some of the wings that I got and that I wanted it bigger or smaller or whatever, and I would reshape them and then make molds off of them. And then when did you actually start your business? The gold foil business and started making foils to sell? Like when was that? Yeah, and I think for Gofoil, I probably was in maybe 2013 or 14. First I put the, a name on my kite foils. Then I went to Vietnam to have my buddies over there at kinetic T. I taught them how to build the foils and then I changed it to go for it. I had this idea I'm over there with the boys in Vietnam and it, they don't speak English, super well. So I'm telling them, what do you guys think about this name? It's like gold foil, just go for it. They'd were like, yeah, I don't get it. I had to go for by myself cause I couldn't get anybody to confirm that, Hey, that's a good idea at the time, but I got my buddies over there to make me the logos and stuff. And that's where I came up with. The name go foil was when I first went over to Vietnam and started putting it in production that's way before any of the foils that everybody knows as gold foil. Now. So the kinetic factory was making your first kite surfing. Foils. Yeah. So the ones in production at first, I was building it all here, custom and I started building boards and the foils over there at Connecticut. Okay. I'm gonna, I'm going to screen share a little bit here. And then at some point He made a foil for Kailani. And then he posted this video that kind of took, I guess now it has over 5 million views, which is just amazing. But can you tell us a little bit about the backstory behind, behind this and how that all came about? There's a long story behind that, if you want to go into it, the, we want to hear all about it. Okay. In the beginning, this was about maybe eight months prior to this Kai was riding my kite foils and we decided that we were going to put one of them on his one of his standup boards. So we put a Tuttle box and one of his, I think he had an eight foot standup order, 76 or something at the time. And we put the kite foil on it and he was going to go stand up foil. And I never really heard back from Kai about it. He comes back about six or eight months later and he goes, Hey Alex, we gotta redo that thing about going down, wind foiling again. And I go what happened with the first foil? And he goes it's dangerous and there's not enough lift. And it was really hard to ride and I'm like, okay let me think about it. And I'll try and come up with something. We'll try it again. So what ended up happening was I spent two weeks taking one of the old kite foils that I had that I really liked that had the most lift and I kept changing it. And adding on, I had this idea that we got to rethink all of this, that, thin foils is not what you need to get going under your own power. We need something that's going to be a slower foil that can lift up more weight, at a slow speed. And I'm thinking shoot, these big aircraft planes that are lifting tanks and stuff go by having bigger thicker wings and different foil sections. And I started trying to mimic that on one of my kite foils. So I would build it up Bondo and AB foam, reshape it and glass in and kept playing with it. And about two weeks before I finally said, okay, you've done enough remodeling here. Cause you're never going to get it. Perfect. You have a little bumps here or whatever, and you're like, okay, let's try. So I call up Kai or I sent him a text and Kai is oh, I'm in LA, I'm on my way to Europe. I'm doing the indoor in in Paris with Robbie. We're doing, it's a wind surfing indoor. Okay I'll try it out and see how it works. So I go down to sugar coat, which is here on Mallee, which is a kind of a bumpy funky way when it's fairly big. And it's like head high Peaky sets all over the place and kind of gnarly, for trying to foil for the first time I go out and say, what the heck I'm going for it. And actually Jeffrey and fin Spencer are in the water surfing and my dentist Barclays in the water. So we've got all these guys witnessing me going out there and trying to kill myself. So I go out big standup paddleboard, or what did you put the foil on? Yeah, I had made a board that was. I think it was eight, six or nine foot was my standup board. I put a total box in it about 24 inches from the tail and I'm thinking, okay, this should be good. Where I want to stand on. It will give me a little bit of lift. Cause I moved it forward compared to what I do on my kite foil. And I use the kite mass though, which is 38, 39 inches tall. I've got this new front wing, which ended up being the original Kaiwei. And so I put that on there, go out. I had a tail wing that I didn't like for kiting, cause it had too much lift. So I used that for the sup foil to cause I needed more or less. So I'm like, okay, I'll try that. See if it works, get out there. All of a sudden I rise up and I'm like, I got plenty of lift and then I roll over and I'm looking at these wings in my life because I'm on this giant mask, and it's just, I kept looking at the wings. After about five near misses of hitting that wing with my face. I go into the beach and I'm thinking to myself now I know what Kai's talking about now. I know why it's dangerous to the masters too tall. So I go back to the shop, cut the thing in half, I cut it down to 18 inches or something and go back to lower lowers it. the next day. And actually take my GoPro and film myself writing. I remember I went over an Eagle Ray or something that day got a nice video and I'm going like, at times almost 50 yards, I'm like, whoa, I could do this. And it was just like amazing. And a couple of my buddies were in the water and saw that fuck buck saw it and Jerry Rodriguez saw it. And these guys were just like, they couldn't believe it. They're like, oh my God, he's doing it. But anyway, is this on your YouTube channel? I put it in Facebook back then Facebook. I put it in Facebook. I've got it somewhere. I can find it. I don't think I ever put it in YouTube. I don't know. I might've. Yeah, but you go that far back, but yeah, I tagged Kai on it and then Kai saw it. He goes, oh, wow, man. I've got to try that as soon as I get back. So he was all stoked. And then when Kai came back, you put Khan on the same board, the same thing. And it's hard to describe right now. We take it for granted that, what are you watching Tom Brady? I couldn't believe that's ridiculous. But anyway while I'm a big fan of the Tampa bay Buccaneers, so he's brought it back to my town. So he's like my hero. He was always a hero for me, but now he's like a super hero, but anyway, Comes back jumps on the same equipment and it's hard. Describe the first time you see a guy who's foiling and he goes, past the peak goes way out to the left, comes back across the peak goes way over to the right and keeps going back and forth. And you're looking at them going, what the heck is he doing? It's just, it was mind boggling to see somebody do that for the first time. And I was like, oh my God, what the heck is going on here? Maybe we have something here. And, Kai is just a freak. He was just doing stuff that was, unbelievable at the time. And I was just like, oh, maybe I should make a patent out of this. This is it. It was just like a revelation seeing something like that for the first time. Yeah. And that, the first foil I got we jet my friend, Jeff Chang, and I'd tried it on a kite foil at first, be behind a jet ski and stuff. And we were really struggling in same thing. Like almost killed ourselves, falling into the foil and stuff like that. But then when we got the first Chi foil, that was like, oh, this is so much easier, but it's funny because at that time, the Chi foils seemed like a huge foil, but now it's actually a kind of a small foil. Most people start on a much bigger flow. Yeah, exactly. That's a really small foil. Now, getting back to the story, how that evolved to your video. Okay. Kai was just riding in the waves that sugarcoat doing this stuff. Henry Spencer took a video of him that was like the first time where you see this going crazy. And then he starts going. He goes, okay. We got to, I got to talk to Rob. We got to put this on one of my downwind boards because we tried it on my downwind board, the same board that we were riding in the surf, and I'd go out there with Kai. He has his 12, six, his regular, Nash board. We're paddling down. When I cannot get up to save my life, no way, especially on a Chi foil. So he goes, Hey, let me try that. Give it to Chi and Chi proceeds to get up like seven times on the way down to sugar coat, like immediately, even on that standup board. And I'm like, the kids are free. He just paddles his weight to strength ratio is just off the chart when he's battling. So he's all over the place. We get all the way down to sugarcoat. He takes off from the outside, which is like at least a hundred and 150 yards outside. And he cruises all the way into the beach and it was like, wow, this is something he spends the next week, trying to talk Robbie into being able to turn one of his Nash boards and put a total box in it. So I go, okay. We'll do that. Just keep talking to Robbie. See if you can pull it off. Eventually Robbie gives him the, okay. Okay. You're going to do it on that board and blah, blah, blah. So we put a tunnel box in at 48 inches. Cause Kai says, that's where I stand. I think that's going to be the good place to put the tunnel box. So we put it in there. I get this text he's down at the Harbor practicing and he goes, Houston, we have a problem. And then he goes on to describe that I'm going plenty, fast enough to get foiling, but the tail is hitting the water and I can't get up just because the total box is so far forward, his tail would drag and bring him down again. So he goes, okay, let's put a tunnel box at 24 inches. Like it is on the other board. And w we should be able to get up and I go why don't we just cut the tail off, and see about it. Like in this video, you can see how I cut the tail off of that board. Put like little diamonds. Yeah. So the next day he shows up at the shop with the board, I said, yeah, we'll put the fellow box. And he goes, Hey, I think you're right. Let's cut the tail off and just leave the total box where it is. That'll give me less bored after he thought about it overnight. And then within about two weeks, he makes this crazy video of him just jamming down the coast on this. And one of the, one of the scenes from the video that really caught my eye was Dave Kalama. And Jr is his cousin are in a two man canoe, which is two man Outrigger, which is the fastest boat. Usually in Maui the pattern and he goes right by them and it was just like, oh my God, what is going on there? It was just amazing. It was like, oh, we've got possibilities now. Yeah. They always screws. That's the dream to be able to just surf the open ocean swells and just be able to keep going indefinitely. And then something that layered had always talked about, we always played volleyball and we were always around together. We always played at Brett's house and layered would always talk about that going. I think we're going to be able to just cruise for miles down the coast on one of these foils. And then, like 10 or 15 years later this is what we. Yeah. That's amazing. And then, yeah. And then what happened after that? Pretty soon after that, Nash started making foils as well. So how did you feel about that? I did not feel super stoked about that. And it was like, Hey, we've got it. All right here. You could just, we could build it for you to put your logo on it and you can go from there and then I could make some money out of it. And Robby was, he's always, do it all yourself and keep it inside the company. And they wanted to do it all ourselves and Mickey, he had told me one day he goes out, he really going to be bummed if we do this all by ourselves, because Rodney wants to do it himself. And I'm like I'll be bombed, but we'll still be friends. And I guess you did, you did that with star boards for awhile, right? You put the Starboard's logo on or co-branded with Starboard's was starboard logos as well. We had done a lot of them were just go foil and a lot of them were starboard Gofoil. So there was both of them were branded at the same time for a while. There we were in the early days we were connected with starboard. And then you got a patent on the, on your foil design. So how come you never, did you ever try to enforce that? I Obviously like now there's so many companies making foils. Is there any way, like anything you ever were able to do with that patent or was it just not feasible? He never really pursued it. If there was a lawyer out there who wanted to pursue it, and work at his, work on his dime and then split it, 90, he takes 90% of the profits. We get. Then we could do something, but it's something where, you don't really want to jump into that game unless, it's financially feasible. We've got patents on the patent that all kinds of aspects of, the surf foiling and stand up for healing. And basically as being, a new thing and, thickness of foils being thicker than the norm and all of that. So there's a bunch of aspects to the patent, but we never really pursued that to where it gets expensive, and you'd rather, nobody wants to take that on, and get their own money. You would do a 90 10 split, huh? Split. Get that out there. That would do it. Oh, rate is 8% is royalties that all the companies should be paying you, they could get 90% of the 8%, but yeah, that's just one of those things in the beginning, we went for that patent to, it was like, wow this could really be something big. And is it a utility patent or did design patent, do you know? I'm not even sure which one it is. It's the more expensive ones and that's a utility patent. That means that, that means it doesn't have to be like, even if it's not an exact copy, if it's the same concept and yeah. Basically. Yeah. Yeah. That's what we went for. And we have a big time patent lawyer firm that did it, but it's hard to enforce, obviously you have to prove that it's and he was going to chase it, on their own diamond set of you paying for these lawyers because the lawyers and all that gets expensive, we've got the patent and the us China and. Australia, we didn't pursue the other countries because you got to pursue every country separately. And then how, and then how did you, did it evolve? Like I know in the early days, like everybody wanted to buy foils and there, you couldn't just couldn't get them, like you couldn't make them fast enough. And like, how did you ramp up production and what kind of issues did he run into? Yeah, you're in the early days, you, haven't a lot of problems with how to construct this and how to keep it from breaking in me. I always making wind surfers in the early days. I really hated warranties that will end up ruining your business. You do all of this work and then you got to give the guy another board or fixes board or whatever. So in the beginning, we didn't even want to put out the product till we were pretty sure that we weren't going to break it. So that stalls your production and stuff. And then once you do ramp it up to get, full on production going, then you end up, you have to watch out that things are evolving so fast to not make too much of the, something that might be outdated by the time you get it, because it takes a long time for these factories to build our stuff. What happened with us, which was unique with us is that my two brother-in-laws build canoes over in China. My one brother-in-law owns the factory because he got burned by some Chinese factory he was working with. So he decided to do his own us own Chinese factory. And then he got asked to jump through all the hoops to do that. But anyway, they were making the canoes. And he makes a bunch of different models that you see around in Hawaii and the manager of the factory, my other brother, a brother-in-law Michael Gamblin is my other sister's husband that owns the factory. He's the genius behind, put it all together. He's the guy that I do all the CAD work with and building the foils and the wings and stuff. He's really super smart. And he's, can pull all of this stuff together. It has the drive to do it where people go, oh, wait a minute. That's way overwhelming. I'm not going to do my own Chinese factory. That's going to be too many things to overcome. But anyway, what happened was I had been building stuff in Vietnam. And it was getting to where it was hard to get stuff out of Vietnam fast enough. And I was seeing that these foils you're going to need a lot of these are going to need thousands of these things, cause it's in hot demand. So I asked my brother-in-law Michael, Hey, do you want to start building these at your factory in China? And I showed him the video of Kai and the 5 million views. He's oh my God. He just went by Dave Kalama and junior on the two man. Okay. We're all in. Let's do it. And that's how it started. And now it's a whole family business and we build all of the main hydrofoils in China at his factory. So I guess in the beginning, like I remember the first one I got it started to crack right by the mass of base, like between the base and the Tableau box. And then also on the fuselage. That's, those were the main points where a lot of. You had a lot of issues, right? Yeah. You have issues like that in the beginning where there's a, it's a process of trying to get your carbon fiber loaded, just right. The direction ability or, you're 45 degree angles and how much materials in there and, the compression, there's a lot of issues that you had to overcome. I like the first one I got we got one from the factory in China comes over and we had all of the fiberglass or carbon aligned in the wrong direction. And I snapped the front wing right off writing, riding. All of a sudden my front wings gone. And it's just a matter of, you've got to have fibers going the right way and the 40 fives and everything to work perfectly, especially with prepregs is a whole different animal where there are layers and layers put together in the middle. Okay. So they're made as a union directly. Think of it as the strands are uni directional. Like these are the strands are the carbon. Each sheet is like this, you can align it like this or whatever. And you cut these all, put them in the wall in a certain way. So there was a lot of learning curves to get, not all right in the beginning and how much should be here and how much should be there. And where are the weak points and all that kind stuff. Yeah. We went through all that too. So very frustrating to get stuff back that just breaks, right? Yeah. I know. Warranties. Yeah. And then again, then, sorry. And then and then what happened then? The develop, what was the development after that? Like how did you ramp it up and become a global brand. In the beginning, it was easy because nobody else had any foils. So we were, we went globally right in the beginning. And we were selling shoes couple thousand or 3000 foils in those first couple of years, just because we were the only guys who had foils. So that was easy. So then we got around worldwide, fairly easy in the beginning, then it becomes harder and harder because you've got, 10 guys get in, want to make foils. And you've got 20 guys who come in and then you got 50 guys. You've got people you'd never even heard of or trying to build foils. And everybody wants to jump in on this bandwagon. It's like the early days of wind surfing or stand up, everybody jumped into the show to try and be. So that makes it harder. So you've got to, you've got to keep up really good quality. Don't you don't want warranties to come back to ruin the business, but at the same time, you're trying to make faster stuff or easier stuff or, whatever and try and keep progressing is the way we try to do it over here. Yeah. And then, so you got into more high aspect, foils and fast, faster designs, thinner foils, smaller for us and so on. What do you, what are you working on now? It's like your latest latest designs and what's, what do you see for the future? What we're going to do in the future is we're going to try and weave the last couple of years, we've gone into speed and try to get faster and faster, and we've made a bunch of. So the wings to go a lot faster because in the beginning, everybody was hitting on us going, oh, your oils are outdated. They're so slow in this and that and blah, blah, blah. So then we worked on our speed. So now we've gotten to where we were like about the fastest foils out there. So now we want to try and get back to, without losing some of that, you'll have those lines of fast, easy foils to ride, but then something that is really easy to ride it, doesn't accelerate on the turn, something that's a little bit user-friendly for the intermediate type guys, the guys that are really advanced and ride. These are NL wings, which are super fast and, tourney and everything. But the the intermediate is get a little bit, shy away from that. It's we're going to make the GL is a really good one for winging it for the intermediate people, but I'm going to try for next year to make something that's super easy. So we're going to have a different line. We'll have three different lines, basically. So are you making a foil that's specifically designed for wing foiling or are they all all around foils for Steph prone, foiling, standup foiling and wink foiling, or depending on the size of the wing or like how, yeah. They all can cross over. So we're finding out that, you want one, that's supposed to be erasing foil. Okay. So we're thinking downwind or are racing for wings or or towing falls into that category. If you're in really big waves, you need some super fast and Then you have the other wings, like the NL, which are great for stand up. They're great for surfing the smaller ones, prone surfing, but they're really good for winging also. So it's funny how all of them, you can almost do every one of the sports on each one of those wings. It's just a different style of riding you have to do, or a different size riders, weight, might like the bigger wing where the smaller guys like, oh my God, I can't write that thing. I need a little tiny thing. But all of them seem to cross over. I can tow on, on different size waves on any of the wings I can wing on any of the wings. I need particular amount of, a lot of wind for the small toe wings, but on the Raceway. Like when I'm paddling downwind, a lot of the wings crossover to me, paddling downwind too. So there's, it's funny. They all have their moments and can crossover. Yeah. So I guess the same design just in different sizes works for different things. I guess when you're Don flooding, you probably needed a little bit more surface area, a bigger wing, to keep going. Yeah. Yeah, definitely. Cool. Yeah. And then how did you get into wink foiling? What I know you were one of the early wing furthers. You were on an ozone and stuff like that. Posting videos of you riding at lanes and stuff like that. So how did you get into that? A wing foiling started with the way it started over here was flash. Austin was always tightened down there with us and riding. Type foils and stuff just decided to put together this funky wing thing with some windsurfing battens and some old kite material and just put this whole thing together. And he goes, Alex, I need one of your foils. I think I can get distinct foiling. And I'm like, what are you talking about? He goes, yeah, I've been hiding down at the sewer plant, try and testing this thing. So get him a foil on it. He comes up there, we take pictures of them. These are the first things we see of the new of evolution of Wingfoot and where it started. So we kite and rode this thing at the same place where Ken winners, right next door to us, he does all of his kite testing there too. And then Ken saw him one day and he's oh my God, what is that? I'm going to put that in production. I'm going to build a couple of those and we'll start doing experimenting with it. So Ken takes it from there and puts the boom on it. Cause Ken's an old time windsurfer and he just liked the book. And the very first wings that I tried were kin winners, duotone wings. And that's how we first learned. Alan could, is got me down there one day. We were down there with Alan at canal and he goes here, go try it. And then I proceed to get up and cruise around. After about 10 minutes I was riding it pretty well. Cause I already had, was really good kite for her. So it was easy for me to learn, oh, I used to be a windsurfer and then my wife tried it and stuff. And then from there it was like, oh my God, this is fun. So the first year I went to the Gorge with, it was maybe three years ago and I was on a, do a tone. And then I got to try ozone for the first time they had a couple ozones there at the show and they gave me one of those. So then I was using the ozone and the duotone at the hatchery and just having a blast. I was like, oh my God, this is fun. It's like the early days of wind surfing. Where were you working? Everybody was super stoked and feeding off of each other. And it's just a bunch of fun between everybody and they're all talking about, Hey, what are you writing? What I'm I learned this, what should I do? I'm having problems with this. And it's like the whole same atmosphere of the early wind surfing days. Yeah. And people are very open about sharing their ideas and their knowledge and what they learned is pretty cool. That it's not as close hold as in some other disciplines, I think. Yeah. And then what, so what are the like behind see those two boards and like what is, what are you working on now? What are you latest products and yeah. Tell me what you're up to. Latest thing now is we'll be getting in our boards from the kinetic factory. I worked with the kinetic factory again that used to build my kite boards to start making a wing boards. Their full sandwich, Connecticut is known for making. Some of the best boards in the world, as far as the factory goes, they're super solid. They, anybody who's gotten any new Jimmy Lewis boards in the last five years knows that they're built very well. So we get a container of those come in. Yep. That you can see the they've all the boards and the first container will have a total and a plate. There's all kinds of foot straps placements. You can see that has a handle there in the middle. And just the typical things that you need to have on a wing board, as you could see how the volume of this is in a pretty volume forward on my boards. I like to have a lot of volume up forward when I'm winging, because we're going shorter and shorter board. And you have a tendency when you're standing up forward, the board goes underwater. So like you come down off the plane and then all of a sudden the front goes under. It does a summary. So as you can see some of these, can you show us yeah. Maybe pick one up and move that chair out of the way. I'd show us the shape a little bit. Yeah. Let's look here. This is 105 liter board is five, six, and you can see how we have a lot of thickness up in the front of here. Cause we get the five, six you get up forward. If you have the traditional theater noses that look really cool, they sink on their water. When you stand up here, basically we move the flotation of forward. It's a little bit bigger, fuller outline up forward as compared to the tail. So it's reverse of what a lot of the boards are. That bigger tails, a lot of float in the back. I like to have the full rotation of forward. We've gone shorter and shorter, and it's easier to stand on something when it's like that this one you can see has the traditional, like wind surfing style footsteps. This is 45 degrees here, and I have one strap in the back. I like to ride wind shift and style. It's really easy to switch your feet and stuff. You go from strap. A lot of people are coming from surfing background, have a problem with switching your feet. And so then you have foot straps that can go straight. Like you're just going to go one direction. So it has the answer it's for going riding with just one set or footsteps, or you've got the list surfing style where you can switch your feet and go forward and start to learn how to go both ways. Because if you get in a problem where you're trying to get up and really like when TOSA. You're crossed up on your bad tack. It's hard to get up like that. And it's hard to go up wind like that. So if you do get into light winds, it's easier to switch your feet better to learn in the beginning, because once you start going just tow side all the time, you never switch feet again. The deck is pretty much flat. Or do you have like concave in the deck? Any kind of, I don't like on caves so much. I want everything to be a flat platform for my feet and nothing weird. And I don't concave too, because. I'd rather, if you fall on it, I want it to be flat and not have a little bit of a rounded edge to hit your shins or your knees or whatever. I'd rather we're getting back on is easier on a slide deck. I find it. And you don't hit your elbow or whatever on that hitch. Yeah. Yeah. Like I used to ride on Connor. Baxter's, downwind board, he's got this big scoop out, all those star wars at the Umar and I'd fall on that thing. I'm like, oh my God. And he has whacked myself with this heavy concave. So it's cut that system. I don't like that. So I figure if it works, don't make it all fancy. Like the same thing with the bottom sheets are real flat so that it has an easier release to pop up when you're planning it real light. Is it a, if slat all the way to the nose and you have a little bit of convex in the nose, it was pretty much flat. The holes in soft rails, the rails in the back towards the tail of the board would have been, it's a little bit round here and you have a little bit of a kick in the last, behind your total box and your plates. And can you show that the profile, the contour, like you said, it's a little bit thinner in the tail than in the notes. No. They're about the same thickness, but now are thicker in the front and thinner and the thickness keep about the same thickness. So don't go crazy with, making a super sick. I don't like the way that feels when I'm winning. I want a lot of float up for, because most of the time on these short boards, like this board is my four, six. I tow with this and I wing with this and can kite with this also. But even with this board, it was one of the things too, when you're out of your boards you want the bone flow to be about the same so that when you sinking it, especially on sinker, it seems evenly because more of my boards, I have a pretty big it's a little bit thicker in the front than the back. And I float like this and I go down and it's hard when you're sinking like that. Not really far forward and concentrate on the nose going down. So there's all types of, trial and error and into figuring out what really feels good for me. Always made my own board so I can go ahead and, make a board that week and test it again. But I don't make custom boards anymore for other people, but the family still gets nice. Thanks for showing us that I'm going to show the screen share again real quick. Oh, sorry. Let me let me go back to that. So are you going to show your bottom here? You can see all of what the, oh, you got the measurement for where to place the foil and the bottom handle. Yeah, I guess guide there. So like you use your, this is how far you are from the tail and the measurements. And then if you like your plate in certain position, you remember what your number is to go, okay I like it at, seven inches or whatever it is for the plate title of course goes in just one place. When you got a, a nice. It's nice to have a handle on a wing board because getting in and out of the water is much more for me. And then on the deck, you don't have a handle though. So I don't like the handle on the deck because when I'm stepping all over the place and my toe gets in there, I've had a couple of problems with almost breaking my toe, like having all the dash. Yeah. But then I guess when you're carrying them without the foil attaches, it's off balance, but you can, I guess you can still carry with that bottom, but you could still carry it. It feels a little bit nose heavy, especially on the bigger six oh board, but you can always, the smaller words really. Yeah. Not that hard to carry it. Yeah. And I was going to show the different sizes you have available here. I guess you have a 46 by 44 liters, five oh, by 87 liters, five six by 106 liters and then 600 by 134 liters. So four different sizes. And when are those going to be available? Next week, I think container arrives next week could be the following week. I don't know how much we get stuck with, trucking and customs in Honolulu. It's already in Honolulu. So I'm just going through the, the process of getting it over here. Nice. And then, oh, I think I had this on here too. So tell us a little bit about the co also making your own wings now, right? Is that Craig, is this one of your prototypes? This is one of the prototypes. This is the actual version of the three. Which will it'll have stripes on it. It's got all the logos and stuff, and I moved the windows closer to the middle strut on the production style, but I've been using this thing since I want to say February or something, it's the the quality of it feels really good. I haven't stretched it out, and it hasn't blown apart. And I put it through some tail this day is probably, a regular 25 to 30 knots. And just imagine some of the days where we're 35 to 40 and I'm still using that week. So they're built super solid. And what I like about my wings is what we did was make the bladders a little bit bigger to make them stiffer. So when your sheet in with these things are not moving all over the place, like some of the wings, we got a little bit more of a, it feels like a windsurfing sail you shoot in, and it doesn't move all over the place. Yeah. And that makes them more powerful too, I'm, the Armstrong rings are like that, that they're really thick flatters, which make it more rigid and powerful. It seems yeah. It looks like you made the wing tips pretty squared off. So you have less of a wing span to, is that one of the things you were working on or, just maybe talk us through the different prototypes, you try it out and what you've learned from trying different things. We did with this is basically our, we call it our elliptical style. It's more of a standard style, but we do bring the wingtips closer together than some of the wings. Cause you'll notice how on, F1 or Armstrong have pretty long wingtips and you have a tendency to touch those in the water very easily. So my wing tips are broadened together a little bit more on that. Ellipticals. So you got a little bit more cord in the middle. So think of it as a longer strut in the middle shorter wingspan, just to make it easier to turn without touching your tips. Then we have a square model, which is the one that I was writing at home keep. Or the one day you might've seen that with the square model is better for really light wind so that when you're, you get on those bigger wings and you're having problems pumping, to get up. So they like you're, you just want to get foil, like that one, that's the square model. You see how that one's way more square than that elliptical style you just saw. This looks almost a little bit more like a, that slick wing at a new Ken winners. S duotone one. Yeah that closer to a slick, whether you score off the ball just so that what I like about this is I do a lot of windsurfing style wave riding, hurting like that. When I call it cheating in, you can keep the tip further up out of the water, but the main advantage of this one, forget all this hotdogs and stuff that I'm doing here is when it's really light. When you have problems pumping up to get onto a foil, it's a day where you're out. It's Hey, I wonder if I can get foiling today, and you go to the pump, and you keep touching your tip in the water and it stops the whole progression of trying to get up. You got to start all over again. So the square tips are made for that to where when you pump it, it's easier to pop up the foil and have a lot less problem of the wing tip touching while you're trying to accomplish them. That's the biggest advantage of these square model. So the square models are made in the bigger size. It's like a four or five, a five, five and a six, five. Yeah, I totally agree with that. And that's one of the things about some of the earlier designs is when, you think you could use a bigger size to get it going in lighter winds, but then then the wing tips were so wide that you couldn't really create a lot of power with it because of it has, because it's like the wingtips is drag and you can't really bring it vertical. You give you that forward power, this just lifts up, but you can't really get that forward momentum with it. That's where that, I think the square design makes a lot of sense. So you actually have two different wing designs or is it just by size or how does that work? You can wing styles, but it's by size where they convert over to the other ones. So by elliptical side, Those 2, 2, 2 7, 2 7 is like a main state here in Maui. Everybody, when they get lit up over here, the two seven is really nice. I ride the three, five, and then the four or five. So those are the ellipticals. You got 2, 2, 2 7, 3, 5, 4 or five. Now the square model, like you saw in that last video is a four or 5, 5, 5, and six five. So it's more towards the higher end because when I, those ones don't loft is easy. They're a little bit more unstable if you're just luffing and want to cruise down the coast and, hi, I win. So the medical ones, I like a little bit better for that. And my feedback from my riders that, you've got to get it, some of the intermediate and beginner riders, because feeling stuff that's different than you and they get on it all the way out. This elliptical is way easier for me to. In handled. But when you get into that day, when it's six to eight knots and you cannot get foiling, like even my wife, she was, didn't like the square model, having all kinds of problems with it. And I'm like, I put her out in it's fairly windy. Then we have one day where it's not very windy. She goes out with the four or five elliptical and she kept touching the tips and she's getting all upset. And I go, okay, here now try the square model. She goes, gets right up. She was like, oh, okay. Now I get fantastic. So those wings you have available now for sale, you have them on Maui. No those are all prototypes as everybody who are having problems, getting wings, those will probably show up in September. If we're lucky. I said, yeah, we're going to start building them in August and we're going to ship them in September, then. Nice. Oh, my shipping, do they have to go in a container or do I get a good rate to air freight them then what we won't know until we actually have the product and see how you take the ship. Yeah, let's talk about that a little bit. The whole pandemic thing and like what, how did it affect you and your business? I know shipping has been a nightmare, like getting stuff shipped in containers and stuff like that. But other than that, like how did the whole pandemic workout for you at Maui? The pandemic here on Maui, it was we're out in the, to where, there's not as many people over here, they shut down the islands, nobody was loud and, people didn't want to leave because they couldn't get back in type of thing. So I was in Florida when all this happened, we were doing a tour over there and demos all over the place. And then they're like, Hey, they're going to shut down the state. We got to fly back to. On a mad rush to get back home. And then I stayed there for a, since last March. No. Did I go anywhere? I think I went to a wahoo last month when they finally opened it up to where I could go without all kinds of tests and get my nose probed and everything. I went anywhere. Maui is they closed down the beaches. We're not allowed to go to canal hall. They closed it all down and that's where we were all winging it from. But you're allowed to go to the Harbor. So you go to the Harbor and what ended up happening was everybody had nothing to do and started learning how to go when they closed down the canoe guys, because the six man canoe, as you're too close to quarters and they wouldn't let them do a six man canoes and they have all the lessons and stuff from the teaching and races. So they closed down. Basically the canoes were. The wing foiling, and then the wing Oilers just took over. There was no trap boat, traffic, and all, there was a bunch of wing boilers and all of a sudden you've got kids and grandmas and old windsurfers who had, and wind surfed in 25 years coming back into the water. And it's, it was just crazy. There's some days there was 50 or 60 people down there and it's still going on down there now it's started a whole, a whinging. This COVID started a winging revolution on a big community down there. Yeah, that's awesome. And then more recently you had that you had a gold foil get together at that at a big house over there. And I know my friend, Derek, Thomas Saki went over there and stuff. And talk a little bit about that. That was great. We do this usually once a year, we have we rent we have a friends that have the access to the house down. Yeah. And he lets us go into it for a weekend or whatever we're trying to do. So we do go foil weekend and i

•Soundstories• Bunker Spreckels war ein Innovator des Surfens, ein radikaler Stylist. Er ritt meterhohe Wellen im Stile eines Kung-Fu-Kämpfers: wild, giftig, angriffslustig. Auf Brettern, die so kurz und wacklig waren, dass jede Surf-Session zum Tanz auf der Rasierklinge wurde. // von Tom Noga / Regie: Thomas Leutzbach / WDR 2010 / www.wdr.de/k/hoerspiel-newsletter Ein 1LIVE-Podcast, © WDR 2021

•Soundstories• Bunker Spreckels war ein Innovator des Surfens, ein radikaler Stylist. Er ritt meterhohe Wellen im Stile eines Kung-Fu-Kämpfers: wild, giftig, angriffslustig. Auf Brettern, die so kurz und wacklig waren, dass jede Surf-Session zum Tanz auf der Rasierklinge wurde. // von Tom Noga / Regie: Thomas Leutzbach / WDR 2010 / www.wdr.de/k/hoerspiel-newsletter Ein 1LIVE-Podcast, © WDR 2021

Caitlin Rother has written or co-authored 14 books and several Kindle ebooks. As a Pulitzer-nominated investigative journalist, Rother worked nearly 20 years for daily newspapers. Drawing from decades of watchdog reporting on topics ranging from addiction to suicide, mental illness, murder, government, and political corruption, she has written books full-time since 2006. A popular speaker, she appears regularly on TV and radio as a true crime expert. As a private narrative non-fiction writing coach, she helps aspiring and published authors to shape, write, research, and promote their books. She also works as a research consultant. She loves to go ocean swimming, and sings and plays keyboards in the acoustic group, breakingthecode.Her latest book, DEATH ON OCEAN BOULEVARD: Inside the Coronado Mansion Case investigates the the traumatic events that occured in July of 2011 at the Spreckels mansion that resulted in two tragic deaths. Matt Coyle is the Anthony, Shamus and Lefty Award-winning author of the RIck Cahill crime series.

Spreckels mansion part 2! McKenzie had to do a follow up episode after realizing how much content and research she left out of part 1. Please accept this follow-up episode with our sincerest apologies. 

A harassment incident during a Marine Corps Birthday Ball pushed one pilot's career into limbo, a decade after the Don't Ask, Don't Tell policy ended. Meanwhile, Escondido Police have released the names of the man killed in last week's police shooting and the officer who shot him. Plus, a new book tells the story of the mysterious death of 32-year old Rebecca Zahau at the Spreckels mansion in Coronado 10 years ago.

Two people dead within 48 hours, in the same house, seemingly unrelated, with no charges? That’s exactly what happened at Spreckels mansion when 6-year-old Max Shacknai seemed to accidentally fall off a second-story landing. Two days later, his dad’s girlfriend Rebecca Zahou was found hanging from an outside balcony. All signs point to foul play, but investigators weren’t convinced. Tell us what you think happened! 

On the 13th of July 2011, 32 year old Rebecca Zahau would be found hanging from the balcony of Spreckels mansion. Some speculate suicide, others are convinced it was murder. What do you think?

Sometimes at lunch, I hear the organist practicing at the Spreckels Organ in Balboa Park. The organ is “the world’s largest outdoor instrument,” and has “more than 5,000 pipes” that are usually used to play a variety of show tunes … Continue reading →

In this episode we discuss the deaths and the theories about the deaths of Max Shacknai and Rebecca Zahou who died at the Spreckels mansion in 2011.

Der plattdeutsche Erzähler berichtet von seiner Ausbildung zum Decksjungen auf der Viermastbark "Passat", wie er in Hamburg auf der MS "Horncap" anheuerte und auf große Fahrt ging.

Geballte Kompetenz ohne Vorbereitung und ohne festes Thema. 60 Minuten Spontaneität: Das ist „Nach Sendeschluss“! Wir haben „Yellowstone“ Autor Philipp Spreckels an unserer Seite und beleuchten mit ihm die Liebe zu Rollenspielen, durchqueren SciFi-Universen und entdecken neue fantastische Serien. Nach Sendeschluss 3 mit Philipp Spreckels – von Rollenspielen, SciFi und tollen Serien

DA209 Philipp Spreckels & Herr Scheffel: Yellowstone

Unser Künstlergespräch mit Philipp Spreckels und Dave Scheffel zum Comic "Yellowstone" - Crossover mit "Das Alles" Ihr findet uns auf: Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram | YouTube sowie Apple Podcast | Google Podcasts | Podcast.de | PlayerFM | Spotify | Deezer und im rss-feed Yellowstone Verlag | Facebook | YouTube | Patreon Philipp Website | Facebook | Twittter | Instagram Dave Twitter | Instagram Andi Preller Twitter | Instagram Das Alles Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram Eerie, International Website | Facebook | Twitter | Instagram Andi Prill Facebook | Twitter | Instagram Der Tele-Stammtisch Website | Facebook Intro-Song: „sad and silly vocal tune“ by blimp66 | Attribution 3.0 Unported (CC BY 3.0) Outro-Song: „A Silly Vocal Tune“ by blimp66 | Attribution 3.0 Unported (CC BY 3.0) Ihr möchtet uns unterstützen? Bitte benutzt die Affiliate-Links hinter den Titeln, falls Ihr diese käuflich erwerben möchtet, sofern vorhanden. Die generierten Einnahmen helfen uns, dieses Podcast-Angebot aufrecht zu erhalten. Vielen Dank. Folge direkt herunterladen

In this episode Teresa and her Crew cover the Spreckels Mansion Mystery. Did Rebecca Zahau commit suicide or was it a murder. Rebecca was the girlfriend of Jonah Shacknai and was found dead in the backyard of the Spreckels mansion from an apparent suicide. Adam Shacknai brother of Jonah supposedly found her and cut her down from a rope hangong from the second floor balcony. Did she hang herself or was there foul play, thats the question.

In this episode Teresa and her Crew cover the Spreckels Mansion Mystery. Did Rebecca Zahau commit suicide or was it a murder. Rebecca was the girlfriend of Jonah Shacknai and was found dead in the backyard of the Spreckels mansion from an apparent suicide. Adam Shacknai brother of Jonah supposedly found her and cut her down from a rope hangong from the second floor balcony. Did she hang herself or was there foul play, thats the question. --- Support this podcast: https://anchor.fm/teresa-gabelman/support

Esta semana contamos la historia de Natalee Ann Holloway, quien era una adolescente estadounidense que misteriosa desaparición se convirtió en noticia internacional después de su desaparición el 30 de mayo de 2005, casi al final de un viaje de graduación de secundaria a Aruba en el Caribe. Tambien contamos la historia de Rebecca Mawii Zahau, también conocida como Rebecca Nalepa, fue descubierta muerta en la Mansión Spreckels en Coronado, California, donde vivía con su novio Jonah Shacknai, un millonario y CEO de Medicis Pharmaceutical

Raul Ramirez, Artistic Director for the Spreckels Organ Society and San Diego’s Civic Organist, chats about the importance of the Spreckels Organ and the 32nd Annual San Diego Organ Festival concerts that will take place at the iconic Organ Pavilion at Balboa Park from June 24 through August 31. Ramirez is joined by singer Lauren Leigh Martin, and Kenseth Thibideau, a bass guitar player, who will perform with Ramirez at the opening night of the Festival

It’s said that musicals are the bread and butter of community theatre, so here’s a list of the North Bay productions I toasted this past year. Here are my top torn tickets of 2018: Part Two, the Musicals (in alphabetical order): Always, Patsy Cline… - Sonoma Arts Live - Danielle DeBow’s Patsy was as heartbreaking as Karen Pinomaki’s Louise was amusing in director Michael Ross’s labor of love. Excellent costume and set design work (also by Ross) along with outstanding live music accompaniment under the direction of Ellen Patterson made this a memorable evening of musical theatre. A Chorus Line - Novato Theater Company - Few small theatre companies would take the risk of producing a vehicle that requires triple-threat performers in most roles. Director Marilyn Izdebksi’s decades of experience in dance and choreography and terrific casting were key to this production’s success. Hands on a Hardbody - Lucky Penny - The perfect sized musical for the Napa company’s small space, there wasn’t much room for anything else once they got the pickup truck that’s central to the story on stage. Director Taylor Bartolucci and choreographer Staci Arriaga had just enough room for a nice, diverse cast to beautifully tell the atypical story. I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change - Raven Players - The cavernous Raven Theatre in Healdsburg was converted into a quaint black-box space where director Diane Bailey let loose four talented performers to tell musical stories about the arc of human relationships. It worked really well. Illyria - 6th Street Playhouse - Shakespeare. Ugh. A Shakespeare musical? Groan. A really entertaining musical production based on Twelfth Night? Surprising! Director Craig Miller’s swan song was a clever adaptation of the Bard’s comedy that combined excellent vocal talents and the musical direction of Lucas Sherman to produce the best sounding show I’d seen at 6th Street in a long time. Peter Pan - Spreckels Theatre Company - There’s no better stage in the North Bay on which to see a large-scale musical than the Codding stage at Spreckels. Flying around on wires is so much more impressive in a 550-seat theater, and Sarah Wintermeyers’ winsome performance as Peter was good enough for me to set aside my long-standing beef with always casting a female in the role. Scrooge in Love! - Lucky Penny - A fairly new play (this was only its third production) that’s good enough to become a Christmas standard. A great lead performance from Brian Herndon was supported by a top-notch ensemble in this reverential continuation of the Dickens classic.

This week on the show, the boys are headed up on stage. Well, were watching a show about being on stage. Huell does go on stage for a minute though. What stages might you ask? well we start at the world famous Hollywood Bowl, then were on to Laguna Beach to visit the Pageant of the Masters, a display of living art, or tableau vivant. Huell gets super stoked on this, and you hear it in his proclamation of "That is AMAZING!!" Then we head south to San Diego to visit the only outdoor organ in the world, the Spreckels organ is quite a monument in Balboa Park. and Huell goes INSIDE the organ. Its pure 24k gold!!  Pageant of the Masters Spreckels Organ Video: California's Gold- On Stage Huell's Gold Instagram Huell's Gold Facebook Huell's Gold Twitter

For folks looking for some respite from Christmas shopping or from becoming participants in the demolition derby that is mall parking, North Bay theatre companies are providing several seasonal entertainments to help keep you in the holiday spirit. Family-friendly musicals are the usual fare and there are several on tap. While not all would be classified as holiday-specific shows, they’ll still get the kids out of the house for a few hours and give adults some welcome relief. Santa Rosa Junior College Theatre Arts (theatrearts.santarosa.edu) is presenting Shrek, the Musical. Burbank Auditorium renovations continue to require them to do their shows “on the road”, so you’ll have to travel to Maria Carrillo High School to see this one. Spreckels Theatre Company (spreckelsonline.com) is doing The Tailor of Gloucester. This original holiday musical, based on the Beatrix Potter story, was originally commissioned and produced by Petaluma’s Cinnabar Theater back in 2004 and had several Youth Theatre productions there. Michael Ross directs (mostly) adults in this studio theater production. Sonoma Arts Live (sonomaartslive.org) brings Anne of Green Gables to their Rotary stage. This musical version of the L.M. Montgomery classic is about a spunky redheaded orphan winning over her new family and an entire Canadian island. Speaking of spunky redheaded orphans, 6th Street Playhouse (6thstreetplayhouse.com) assures us the sun’ll come out tomorrow with Annie. It’s Daddy Warbucks versus the evil Miss Hannigan with Annie - and her little dog, too – as the objects of their attention. The 12 Dates of Christmas will run in the 6th Street Studio Theater. It’s a single woman’s ‘holiday survival guide’. For nostalgia fans, Redwood Theatre Company (redwoodtheatrecompany.com) will be presenting It’s a Wonderful Life in the live radio play format. A plucky little girl – this time named Eve – takes center stage at the Cloverdale Performing Arts Center (cloverdaleperformingarts.com) in Yo Ho Ho: A Pirate’s Christmas. Can she rescue Santa and Christmas from the clutches of a gang of directionally-challenged pirates? If she doesn’t, the audience may mutiny. Over in Napa, Lucky Penny Productions (luckypennynapa.com) is presenting Scrooge in Love. This will be only the third fully staged production of this original musical after having been done twice by San Francisco’s 42 Street Moon. It musically answers all the questions you may have about what happened after the end of Dickens’s classic A Christmas Carol. Dyan McBride, the show’s original director, heads this production as well. Finally, for those in the mood for a big, splashy music and dance extravaganza, there’s always Transcendence Theatre Company (transcendencetheatre.org) and their Broadway Holiday Spectacular. They’ll be doing three performances at Santa Rosa’s Luther Burbank Center and two performances in Napa at the Lincoln Theatre in Yountville. Lots of entertainment options, and I’m sure the producing companies would like to remind you that theatre tickets make GREAT stocking stuffers. You can find links to all these shows and more on the calendar page of the North Bay Stage and Screen web site at northbaystageandscreen.com.

So, what’s former Spreckels Performing Arts Center Manager Gene Abravaya been doing since his retirement to the Arizona desert? “Well”, he told me in a recent interview, “I’ve been enjoying my retirement and developing style and techniques for the abstract sculptures I am interested in designing.” “Oh”, he added, “and I’ve been working on a new play.” That play, The Trial of John Brown, will have a one-time staged reading at the Spreckels Performing Arts Center in Rohnert Park this Saturday, August 25th. In 1859, John Brown, an ardent abolitionist and a fanatically religious man, led his followers into Harpers Ferry, Virginia. His objective: confiscate weapons from a rifle factory and an Armory, then sweep across the Southern United States, setting free every black slave he encountered. He was met with heavy resistance. After a three-day battle, during which all but five of his men were killed, Brown was finally captured. The trial that followed brought the issue of slavery to the attention of the nation and the entire world. What piqued Abravaya’s interest in this moment in American history? Abravaya told me that he’s “always been fascinated with it ever since seeing Raymond Massey’s portrayal in a 1940 Errol Flynn film called Santa Fe Trail”. Although he felt that the character was somewhat distorted and superficial, there was much about John Brown's personality that rang true to him and he was captivated after reading more about the actual raid and the trial that followed. Abravaya is bringing it to Spreckels from Arizona for practical reasons – his previous connection to the facility plus the quality of talent he knew he could find in the North Bay. Abravaya said that he “wanted actors who were talented enough to make the written words come to life”. He knew he would find the people he needed up here to give life to the play and to help him see what legitimately works in the play and what still needs work. Spreckels Theatre Manager Sheri Lee Miller is excited for the opportunity to offer North Bay patrons the first look at Abravaya’s script and will be participating in the reading. “Since Gene had been so much a part of Spreckels for many years,” said Miller, “it was only natural he should give us the first shot at sharing the script publicly.” Miller said that when she read the script, she found herself in the very uncommon position of having no suggestions on how it might be improved. She thinks it's a tight script with a clear narrative. “I didn't know much at all about John Brown,” she said, “so it was great to learn something historic through a play.” Cast members will include Heather Buck, ScharyPearl Fugitt, Chris Ginesi, Mary Gannon Graham, Nate Mercier, Sean O'Brien, Dixon Phillips, Michael Ross, Chris Schloemp, Tim Setzer, William Thompson, Zane Walters, and Sarah Wintermeyer. The project, Abravaya says, is more than about just writing a play. “I want to illustrate that the injustices of the past, no matter how much we try to deny them, are still with us, influencing the course of our lives”, said Abravaya, “If I manage to agitate someone enough to become an agitator or an activist, I will have succeeded and maybe have contributed something of value to what might be the most important issue of our time.” ‘The Trial of John Brown’ will be performed at a staged reading on Saturday, August 25 at 7:30pm at Spreckels Performing Arts Center in Rohnert Park. Admission is free, but the seating is limited.

The Hunchback of Notre Dame was originally scheduled as the closing production of the Spreckels Theatre Company’s 2017-2018 season. The musical, whose development by Walt Disney’s theatrical arm started in Germany and ended in New Jersey (having never made it to Broadway), is an atypical Disney production. More Les Miserables than The Little Mermaid, it’s an interesting amalgam of Victor Hugo’s original gothic novel with music and elements from Disney’s 1996 animated adaptation. Far darker than one would expect from a production with the Disney named semi-attached, Spreckels’ decision to replace it in their season with a more ‘family-friendly’ production of the classic Peter Pan is understandable. It’s also regrettable, because as the production running now in San Francisco produced by Bay Area Musicals reveals, it’s a very good show. Hugo’s 15th century-set tale of Quasimodo (Alex Rodriguez), the bell ringer at Paris’s Cathedral of Notre Dame, his guardian (and uncle) Archdeacon Frollo (Clay David), and a gypsy girl named Esmeralda (Aysia Beltran) contains enough thematic elements for a half-dozen shows. Religious extremism, class differences, bigotry, love vs. lust, lookism, repression and oppression are all explored in Hugo’s story and Peter Parnell’s book and through the score with music by Alan Menken (Little Shop of Horrors, Beauty and the Beast) and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz (Pippin, Wicked). It’s grand opening number “The Bells of Notre Dame” provides the somewhat lengthy backstory before the main narrative kicks in. A band of gypsies has come to Paris and its newest member Esmeralda has caught the eye of both Quasimodo and Archdeacon Frollo. Quasimodo is taken by her kindness while Frollo is taken by ‘impure thoughts’. Add a dashing French soldier to the mix (Jack O’Reilly) and you have one helluva triangle. Music director Jon Gallo and the nine-piece orchestra do well by the score, which runs from the light (“Topsy Turvy”, “Tavern Song) to the dark (“Hellfire”). The choral numbers are particularly powerful with tremendous vocal work done by the entire cast. Alex Rodriguez makes for a fine Quasimodo and Clay David is excellent as the conflicted Frollo, who utters a few comments about immigrants and borders that might seem rather prescient. Both bring substantial vocal power to their musical moments. Director/Choreographer/Scenic Designer Matthew McCoy and his team do a pretty good job with the show’s technical aspects and the limitations imposed by the venue. Narration eliminates many of the challenges, but the solution to how to present a flood of molten lead poured over a rioting crowd was ingenious. The Hunchback of Notre Dame is no children’s show, talking gargoyles to the contrary. Operatic at times, classic American musical at others, it’s a worthy addition to the season of any company with the talent, facility and budget to do it as well as this production. 'The Hunchback of Notre Dame' runs Thursday through Sunday through August 5 at the Victoria Theatre in San Francisco. Thursday and Friday evening performances at 7:30 pm, Saturday evening performances at 8:00 pm. Saturday and Sunday matiness at 2:00 pm. For more information, go to bamsf.org

When 6-year-old Max Shacknai, son of wealthy pharmaceutical executive Jonah Shacknai, plummets to his death in a mysterious fall over a second-floor banister at the Spreckels mansion in Coronado, CA, the family is left in a state of shock. But only two days later, Jonah's live-in girlfriend, Rebecca Zahau, succumbs under equally suspicious circumstances, leaving both deaths begging the question: suicide or murder?

J. M. Barrie’s Peter Pan has been seen on stage in one form or another for well over 100 years. It’s survived being Disney-fied and even Christopher Walken-ized in a disastrous live television spectacle. The most popular adaptation is the 1954 musical starring Mary Martin. It’s that version that takes flight in a well-mounted production running at the Spreckels Performing Arts Center through May 20. Peter Pan (a winsome Sarah Wintermeyer) has lost his shadow while eavesdropping on story time at the Darling household. While retrieving it late one night, he awakens eldest child Wendy Darling (Lucy London) and after a quick flight demonstration, Peter convinces Wendy and her brothers to join him in Neverland. They’ll soon cross paths with some warriors and the dastardly Captain Hook (David Yen) and his scurvy pirate crew. Director Sheri Lee Miller and her team get almost everything right here, from casting to costumes and sets, from choreography to musical direction. Wintermeyer is so good as Peter that she almost gets me to put aside my bucket list wish to see a production cast with a male in the role. This is actually the first production I’ve attended where I haven’t been surrounded by little tykes asking “Why is Peter a girl?” David Yen must be on a low-fiber diet as he doesn’t really chew up the scenery as much as one would expect with such a role. Still terrifically entertaining, his decision to go ‘small’ with some things puts the bits in danger of being lost on the large Spreckels stage. Nice supporting work is done by Craig Bainbridge as Hook’s right-hand man Smee, Morgan Harrington as Mrs. Darling and the entire cast as Wendy’s siblings, various warriors, pirates and Lost Boys. Honorable mention goes to the backstage “flight crew” and to Andy Templeton who spends the show costumed as either Nana the dog or a tick-tocking crocodile but manages to get some of the biggest audience reactions. Miller handles the problematic parts of Barrie’s script - its depiction of Native Americans - by transmogrifying them from an “Indian” tribe to non-specific “warriors” and costuming them in a patchwork of styles and designs. It helps, but dialogue (“Let’s smoke a peace pipe!”) and lyrics are still a bit cringe-worthy. The show is in three acts and runs about two hours and forty minutes, which seems long, but the first and third acts only run for a peppy 35 minutes. Act II runs about an hour and does get a bit sluggish. There are intermissions between the acts to give the kiddies a restroom break. In toto, Peter Pan makes for a great evening of family entertainment. Peter Pan runs Friday through Sunday through May 20 at Spreckels Performing Arts Center in Rohnert Park. Friday and Saturday evening performances are at 7pm; Saturday and Sunday matinees are at 1pm. There’s a Thursday, May 17 performance at 7pm. For more information, go to spreckelsonline.com

Avoiding the typical “Best of…” lists that are commonplace at this time of year, last week I presented Part I of my 2017 “Special End of Year” Awards for local theatre. Here now is Part II: The “One is the Loneliest Number” Award - I’ve been asked a couple of times “If you could open up a theatre company in Sonoma Country, what kind of shows would you do?” Getting past the issue that no one in their right mind would open another theatre company in this area, my answer is “one-person shows.” Why? Well, this year we had Patrick Varner as a Streisand employee, Libby Villari as a former Texas governor, Sheri Lee Miller as a ghost, and David Yen as a disgruntled Christmas elf. All were highly entertaining and each came down to a single performer and an audience. The “No, I’ve Got Something in My Eye” Award – I found myself quite taken with two holiday presentations (that aren’t really holiday plays.) Main Stage West’s Daddy Long Legs and Spreckels’ Little Women, the Musical took me by surprise. Credit the performers for getting me to dust off the adjective “sweet” in my vocabulary. The “Better Than It Had Any Right to Be” Award – The Redwood Theatre Company has impressed me in its short life for the energy and passion they bring to their productions. As one who has never succumbed to the cult of Star Wars, my expectations for their production of Brittany Law’s original musical parody The Farce Awakens were not high. I expected it to be a bunch of young folk in cheesy costumes with dime-store props saying silly things. That is EXACTLY what it was, and yet it was all delivered with such a sense of joy and fun that they won me over. The “If You Build It, They Will Come” Award – Sonoma County is blessed with several excellent set designers who often do wonders with often tiny, restricted spaces. The sets for Cinnabar’s Man of La Mancha, Spreckel’s The Sugar Bean Sisters, and Main Stage West’s The Birds all grabbed your attention and transported you to another place from the moment you walked through the theatre door. The “Just (Don’t) Do It” Award – Just because a show hasn’t been done in Sonoma County before (or in a long time), doesn’t mean it should be done. Some are chestnuts that are best left buried (The Children’s Hour), while others just aren’t very good (David Mamet’s Race.) And why do companies recycle shows that have played in the community within the past few years? You couldn’t pick one of the other 1,000 plays available? 2018 will be a challenging year for both theatre companies and audiences. The Sonoma County landscape has changed in many ways. Theatre companies that struggle even in good times face even greater difficulties now. I know our community’s support of the arts is greatly appreciated. Again, here’s to an artistically invigorating 2018. I’ll see you at the theatre.

It’s that time of year again for the usual “Best of…” lists where critics review their picks for the best (and sometimes worst) in music, movies, fashion, and the like and give people at holiday parties something to argue about. For the past three years my approach has been a little different as I prefer to offer a few “Special End of Year Awards” to Sonoma County theatres and artists. Here is Part I of my 2017 awards: The “Now You See It, Now You Don’t” Award - The Santa Rosa Junior College production of It Can’t Happen Here opened on October 6 and closed on October 8. The adaptation of the 1935 Sinclair Lewis novel about the rise of a populist blow-hard to the Presidency had a lot to say about our current political climate, but not a lot of people had a chance to see it. Its run was cut short with the closure of the SRJC campus as a result of the fires. The “Show Must Go On” Award – There were many theatre companies that understandably postponed their runs during the North Bay fires. Cinnabar Arts and Spreckels Theatre Company went on with their scheduled openings of Quartet and Monty Python’s Spamalot. While neither facility was in immediate danger, I was conflicted about the decision. I attended both productions, enjoyed them both, and was glad they decided to open. That being said, I’m still not sure they should have. The “Yes, There IS Diversity in Sonoma County, Dammit” Award – The Santa Rosa Junior College production of Lin Manuel-Miranda’s In the Heights proved the claim that there isn’t a diverse enough talent pool from which to cast many shows is suspect. Perhaps choosing shows in a season that speak and appeal to more diverse artists and audiences would widen the pool. Maybe it’s also time to check some artistic egos at the door and go and find them. The “Big Things Come in Small Packages” Award – The studio theatres of Sonoma County’s largest companies often offered superior work to that displayed on their main stages - 6th Street’s Visiting Mr. Green and A Masterpiece of Comic… Timing and Spreckels’ The Sugar Bean Sisters and Little Women, the Musical for example. The “Out of Left Field” Award – Not many people are willing to venture out to Monte Rio to catch theatre. You should give it a shot. You’re not going to get the bells and whistles other production companies may provide, but Curtain Call can do a lot with a little. They put on an excellent production of The Elephant Man with local comedian James Rowan giving an incredibly touching performance as John Merrick. Live theatre continues to struggle in Sonoma County (as it does most any place else.) Like many residents, the theatre community did not escape the fires unscathed with some companies losing their performance space and others losing equipment, props and costumes. Numerous theatre artists lost their homes. Live theatre will go on because Sonoma County supports it but, as with every other part of our community, change is inevitable. Tune in next week for Part II of my awards. Here’s to an artistically invigorating 2018. I’ll see you at the theatre.

In recent years, when you entered the Spreckels Performing Arts Center’s Codding Theater you found yourself in an undersea world, or on the deck of the Titanic, or in Philadelphia’s Independence Hall. Currently, you’ll find yourself in an African jungle as the Spreckels Theatre Company presents Disney’s Musical Tarzan, running now through May 21. It’s a stage adaptation of the 2009 animated film and follows the “origin” story pretty closely. Stranded in the African jungle and soon orphaned, a young boy is taken into the care of a mother gorilla and raised as one of her own. After growing up into a strapping young (ape)man, the boy named Tarzan comes face-to-face with other humans. It’s a science expedition led by Professor Porter and his daughter Jane. They’ve come just to observe and study gorillas but their nefarious guide Clayton has other plans. The film had five songs written by Phil Collins, including the Oscar-winning “You’ll Be in My Heart”, and for the stage show he added nine additional numbers. Like in the film, most musical numbers serve as narration. Tarzan didn’t sing in the film, but he sure does in the stage show and yes, he yells, too. The songs aren’t particularly memorable but they serve the play and they’re well delivered by the cast. The show is well cast with the role of Tarzan split between two actors, Walker Brinskele and Michael Lumb, each taking the role in alternating performances. At the show I attended Tarzan was played by Lumb, who has the athleticism and voice to tackle the role. The always delightful Abbey Lee makes for a fun Jane and plays well off of Lumb and Kit Grimm as her father. Jeremy Berrick adds another villain to his Spreckels résumé with his over-the-top take on the role of the evil guide Clayton. He’s a lot of fun to watch, even if the character choice seems a bit out of place, especially in comparison to others. The array of character choices and acting styles is quite substantial, ranging from the almost method-like performances of Brian Watson and Shawna Eiermann as Kerchak and Kala, Tarzan’s ape “parents” to Berrick’s cartoonish, self-aware Clayton. Everyone else falls somewhere in between. This may be the result of having the directorial reins shared between Gene Abravaya and David L. Yen. It’s not that any of the choices or styles seem wrong individually, I’m just not sure they gelled. That being said, Watson and Eiermann are quite good, both in their characters’ physical beings and in their vocal delivery. It takes some time to adjust to the very human voices emanating from Pamela Enz’s inventive costumes (no gorilla suits here) but once you suspend belief you realize their performances are quite magnetic. Scottie Woodard amusingly fills the sidekick role as Tarzan’s buddy Terk. The shows best moments were when the elements of costume, lighting, choreography and music came together, best exemplified by Act I’s almost hallucinogenic “Waiting for this Moment” number when Lee’s Jane sings of the joy of finally living a life she only dreamed about while the local flora and fauna dance, float and fly around her. The ensemble also opens Act II energetically with “Trashin’ the Camp”. Disney’s Musical Tarzan may have been intended as a young male-attracting counterpoint to The Little Mermaid, but I don’t think we’ll be seeing many kids arriving at the theatre in little loincloths. While definitely one of the lower-rung entries in the Disney theatrical canon, it’s still a well-produced and entertaining family show with an imaginative set and the aforementioned costumes making it a visual feast for the eyes. Between a band of gorillas, a man-eating plant, a marauding leopard, a hiss-worthy, rifle-toting villain and a vine-swinging ape-boy and man, there’s plenty to keep the younger tykes’ attention. Disney’s Musical Tarzan plays through May 21 at the Spreckels Performing Arts Center. For more information, go to spreckelsonline.com

Songs for a New World is not a typical piece of American musical theatre. There is no book or “story”, per se, with a standard beginning, middle and end. There are no characters to follow from Act I to Act II. There are no lavish production numbers and set and costuming are minimal. “Songs…” is exactly what it says it is – a collection of stories told through song. They are by composer/lyricist Jason Robert Brown (The Last Five Years, Honeymoon in Vegas) and were apparently written over several years for several different projects while he performed in New York City nightclubs and piano bars. Brown has linked the 16 songs in the piece by the barest of threads. As Brown himself says, “It’s about one moment. It’s about hitting the wall and having to make a choice, or take a stand, or turn around and go back.” It’s about the choices we all make in life. The production is a labor of love for producer Lucas Sherman, best known to the local theatre community for his work as musical director and pianist on numerous projects for a variety of companies. Sherman retains that role in this production as well as taking the reins of stage direction and performer. Joining Mr. Sherman for vocal duty are Robert Finney, Daniela Innocenti-Beem and Kat Ray. Mr. Sherman also retains piano-playing duty and is joined by Abe Newman on bass, Quinten Cohen on drums, and Erica Bergeron on percussion. The songs are written and performed in a variety of styles ranging from pop and rock to gospel and jazz. Half are solos, the rest are duets or ensemble numbers. Some are comedic, some are dramatic, some are inspiring, some are downbeat. Regardless of tone or design, they all have the feel of musical theatre, so much so that you almost wish there were entire shows written around some of them. For such a variety of style and themes, a versatile cast is required and Sherman provides one (including himself.) While experience does tell, each performer is given his or her own moment to shine. For Finney, it’s telling the story of a youth overcoming the hardships in life and pressing on in “The Steam Train.” Kat Ray’s moment came with “Just One Step” the darkly comedic tale of a woman’s futile attempt to get the attention of her husband from the ledge of their high-rise apartment building. Sherman acquits himself quite nicely with his earnest delivery of “She Cries”. Dani Beem, clearly the most experienced performer and most comfortable in a musical revue-type show, showed her versatility with her regret-filled woman looking back at what money couldn’t buy in “Stars and the Moon” and as a frustrated Mrs. Claus in the show-stopping “Surabaya Santa”. Beem also nicely duets with Sherman in “I’d Give It All for You”, a song about lovers reuniting after realizing they can’t be apart. The aforementioned musicians provide these performers with excellent accompaniment which is no small feat due to the variety of styles at play. Being it’s really more of a staged concert than a full-fledged musical production and it’s staged in the Spreckels’ small Condiotti space, errors or missed notes would not be easily masked. No such concerns with these talented musicians. The musicians were just as much a pleasure to listen to as the singers. Songs for A New World is a difficult show to review as it is actually 16 different shows in one. Rather than subject you to 16 mini reviews I’ll just say that, like in most shows, some songs hit better than others – both in form and delivery – but that collectively it’s a very appealing night of song and theatre. Because of its unfamiliarity, it’s the type of show that demands an audience’s attention. As with any good storytelling, there are rewards to be had from careful listening. You may not know the songs, but you’ll be glad you heard them. Songs… can be heard Friday and Saturday nights and Sunday afternoons through May 7. For more information, go to spreckelsonline.com

We examine a New World species, whose natural habitat is not a cathedral or a hockey arena, but rather it makes its home in the out of doors. The Spreckels Organ in San Diego is the world's largest outdoor organ, and playing and maintaining it can be quite tricky. Come and visit this American landmark with us.

Truly effective plays are often built on big ideas. And ideas don’t get much bigger than the Birth of America – or E = mc 2, which happen to be the subjects of two shows currently being performed by a pair of prominent Sonoma County theater companies. One’s a classic, rarely performed due to the monumental size of its cast, The other is brand new, notable for the minimalism of its scope, in the face of the gargantuan themes it dares to tackle. Let’s start with the classic - Spreckels Theater Company’s grand staging of Peter Stone and Sherman Edwards historical musical ‘1776,’ first produced in 1968. Telling the surprise-laden story of how America’s Declaration of Independence came to be signed, the production, under the direction of Larry Williams, combines a cast of nearly 30 actors, along with clever projections and elaborate, gorgeously detailed costumes. Not surprisingly, the show looks magnificent, and the somewhat longish tale — clocking in at just under three hours, with one intermission — only rarely loses its momentum. That’s really saying something for a show boasting just thirteen songs, only two or three dance numbers, and a “plot” - if that’s the word - in which impassioned political debate carries the bulk of the “action.” The story, fortunately, includes a Who’s Who of American historical figures. Jeff Coté plays John Adams, who – in May of 1776, is desperate to convince his fellow Continental Congress-members to separate from Great Britain. Coté is wonderful, fiery and fun, even if the singing does sometimes get away from him, pitch-wise. Adam’s chief supporters in seeking Independence are Benjamin Franklin, played by a thoroughly delightful Gene Abravaya, and the darkly moping Thomas Jefferson, David Strock. Then there’s the genial Richard Henry Lee, played by Steven Kent Barker, who shines in one of the show’s most rambunctious songs, ‘The Lees of Old Virginia’. It’s thorough-lee infectious, and if you think that joke is bad, wait till you hear the ‘Lee puns’ layered through the song itself. ‘1776’ is a massive undertaking, and Spreckels pulls it off with only a few bumps. Assisted by a large orchestra under the fine guidance of Lucas Sherman, Spreckels accomplishes a very difficult task with, as audiences will clearly see, far more grace and polish than the founding fathers showed in bringing our still struggling nation to life. On to another big idea. At Cinnabar Theater, Trevor Allen’s delightful ‘One Stone’ takes on Albert Einstein’s development of the Theory of Relativity — but approaches it on a much smaller scale than that with which Spreckels tackles 1776. Under the inventive direction of Elizabeth Craven, working on a simple stage suggesting a cluttered office, a single actor, Eric Thompson, represents Einstein’s Brain, his various discoveries and observations brought to life by a balletic puppeteer (Sheila Devitt) and an often-present violinist (Jennifer Cho). Elevators fall through space, bicycles scoot along at the speed of light, and much more. The miraculous thing about ‘One Stone’ is how emotionally powerful it is. With little in the way of actual plot, Allen’s words, plus Thompson’s exuberant performance, and the rich, magical puppetry of Devitt, all create a poetic space where Einstein’s ideas scamper about like curious children in a playground. ‘One Stone’ is consistently lovely, excitingly unconventional, and thoroughly extraordinary. ‘One Stone’ runs through February 19 at Cinnabar Theater, www.cinnabartheater.org. '1776' runs Friday–Sunday through Feb. 26 at Spreckels Performing Arts Center. www.sp[reckelsonline.com

Some stage musicals are lighter than air, soothing as water, sounding good and feeling delightful as long as they last, then evaporating on the wind, fading fast into the folds of our cerebral cortex, almost immediately after the show is over. Big Fish, the new production offered by Gene Abravaya and Spreckels Theater Company, is that kind of show. Light and fluffy, with pleasant but strikingly unmemorable songs, tinged with a touch of serious human drama, but mostly just a good old-fashioned American musical. But, as written by John August, with music and lyrics by Andrew Lippa, this adaptation of the Daniel Wallace novel and the Tim Burton movie it inspired is so sweet-natured and so crammed with positivity and eye-popping pleasures, one can’t help but walk away feeling good. The stage version deviates wildly from the movie, which deviated wildly from the book. In many ways, the stage play is even more grounded and clear than the others, which tended to obfuscate the line between reality and fantasy. In the version now playing at Spreckels, playwright John August only occasionally muddies the line between what’s really happening and what is only happening in one of the many tall tales of master storyteller Edward Bloom. A travelling salesman with a knack for telling outrageous stories in which he’s always the hero, Bloom is played by Darryl Strohl-DeHerrera, who joyously protrays a variety of ages from teenage to old age. Bloom has spent his life gleefully fabricating encounters with mermaids and giants, werewolves and witches, but why? And why are there parts of his life he seems unwilling to even make up a story about? That what Edward’s adult son Will decides to find out. A recently married investigative reporter Will has always resented his father’s tendency to make things up. When Edward is diagnosed with a terminal illness, Will sets out to discover the real Edward Bloom, one way or another. Will’s mother Sandra—played nicely by Heather Buck, also portraying numerous ages — is clearly the love of Edward Bloom’s life, and in his stories, she’s the primary “plot motivation” for his various adventures and exploits, from his colorful love-at-first-sight encounter under a circus big top, to his unorthodox method of travelling to see her once he finds out who his heartthrob actually is. The script by John August drops some of the book and movies more outrageous images, so don’t go in expecting Siamese twins or magical glass eyeballs. The mysterious town of Specter, where no one where’s shoes and everyone seems to be under a magical spell? That’s gone too, which means August has to do a little fancy storytelling footwork to make the remaining pieces fit together. The cast is energetic and clearly having a great time playing so many colorful characters in gloriously offbeat costumes by Pam Enz. The songs by Andrew Lipa feature genuinely clever lyrics, though somewhat hampered by repetitive, oddly monotone and melody-restricted music. Most of the time, it’s all singing and no song. Abravaya’s staging makes ingenious use of Spreckel’s acclaimed projection system, which provides much of the ever-shifting scenery, along with a number of clever visual effects, including a man being shot from a cannon. Of course, the best part of a story is the ending, and ultimately, this ambitious and mostly satisfying production delivers a climax that is both impactful and surprising. It might even inspire you to call up your own parents or children, to tell them you love them—and perhaps to share a story or two. ‘Big Fish’ runs through August 28 at Spreckels Performing Arts Center, rpcity.org.

One recently-opened Bay Area stage show takes place under the Sea, where fish creatures dwell, another takes place on the Sea, where dangerous men scheme and battle for buried gold. One show features fish on roller skates; the other presents pirates and parrots. Both have singing and dancing—though only one is a musical. One is in Berkeley. One’s in Rohnert Park. One is Disney’s ‘The little Mermaid.’ The other is a brand new adaptation of ‘Treasure Island.’ Both are well worth a voyage to the theater. First, let’s talk about ‘Treasure Island.’ Writer-director Mary Zimmerman’s richly reimagined action adventure—adapted from Robert Louis Stevenson’s beloved novel—is visually inventive and surprisingly emotional. And it rocks. Literally. As presented at the Berkeley Repertory Theater, in Berkeley, the show employs a stunningly well-engineered stage that—during scenes where the characters take to the open sea—actually rocks, swinging back-and-forth from side to side like a pirate ship rolling on the ocean. That is just one of many eye-popping delights that await, as director Zimmerman launches a wildly unexpected, subversively psychological adaptation that might skimp a bit on the sword-fighting and swashbuckling, but makes up for it with beauty, pathos and rich human comedy. Now, there’s no doubt that Treasure Island is a good book, but it would be hard to make the case that it is a very deep book—despite the fathomless depths of fondness many, including me, still feel for it. It’s a great story, but not exactly packed with psychological insight. That’s why it’s such a surprise that Zimmerman has so deftly managed to turn the tale into something so humanely perceptive and emotionally rewarding. Packed with poetic touches—including a an odd but effective bit of dreamy piratical ballet—this rollicking interpretation is stirring and fun, achingly lovely, frequently sweet, occasionally a bit weird, and a tad upsetting. Which is to say that, for a story about ships and pirates, with a set that swings into the action, it’s practically perfect. Meanwhile, in Spreckels Theater Company’s splashy new production of Disney’s The Little Mermaid, colorful costumed fish on wheels appear to swim across the stage. Seagulls fly and mermaids frolic, huge waves splash and crash, octopus women grow to six times their normal size, while six-foot strands of seaweed bob and wiggle in time to the music, thanks to dancers dressed up in seaweed suits. It is, in a word, dazzling. But of all the special effects unfurled in Spreckels elaborate production, directed with charm and energy by Gene Abravaya, the most impressive is the strong-voiced, agile and energetic cast. Led by Julianne Thompson Bretan as the adventurous title character, Ariel, with memorable turns by Mary Gannon Graham as the villainous sea-witch Ursula and Fernando Sui as Flounder, Ariel’s BFF (that’s “best fish friend”), the show is made colorful and clever by the costumes and set pieces, but succeeds on an emotional level primarily due to the delightfully cartoonish, occasionally quite moving performances. Despite some glaring script flaws, an over-stuffed score and a confusing, undercooked climax, this Mermaid still delivers a level of onstage dazzle-dazzle that is pretty much unmatched in ambition and spectacle by any other local stage musical in recent memory. ‘Treasure Island’ runs Tuesday–Sunday through June 17 at Berkeley Repertory Theatre, www.berkeleyrep.org. ‘Disney’s The Little Mermaid’ runs through May 22 at Spreckels Performing Arts Center, www.spreckelsonline.com.

Magic isn’t easy. And sometimes, it takes a village to make something truly magical—and that even goes for fairy tale villages perched on the edge of a mysterious forest. With leads us to Stephen Sondheim’s ‘Into the Woods,’ now playing at Spreckels Performing Arts Center for one more weekend. Featuring a strong ensemble of North Bay performers, the show is bolstered by uniformly fine singing voices. Those voices are the primary magic ingredient in the show, presented by Theater-at-Large, in an encore production of Stephen Sondheim’s crafty musical homage to—and reinvention of—the classic Brothers Grimm-style fairy tale. The show played to full houses and rave reviews last autumn in Novato, and now it gets a reprise run at Spreckels. It’s not a perfect transformation—but there is much to recommend this second look at Sondheim’s delightfully dark masterpiece. First of all, there’s the jaw-dropping beauty of the music — spun as if from a magic loom by a chamber orchestra directed by Debra Chambliss—and the fine singing and playful presence of the cast. It’s plenty enough to make audiences glad they came, even if the woefully straightforward staging and a few clumsy moments of transition do come off as less than inspired. What might have seemed cozy and warm at the much smaller Novato Theater Company space, struggles to fill out the massive Spreckels stage, often swallowing the best efforts of the first-rate cast. About that cast… I do not have space or time to list them all, which is a shame, because like a village working together, each performer plays an important part. As the sweet but conflicted Cinderella, Julianne Thompson Bretan gives one of many standout performances, and Krista Joy Serpa, as a fierce and funny Little Red Riding Hood, is a song-belting hoot. Also exceptional are Sean O’Brien and Allison Peltz as the show’s childless protagonists, the Baker and his wife, who launch the action with a scavenger hunt for magical items to reverse a witch’s curse and give them a baby. Playing Cinderella’s ‘Prince Charming’ with a swashbuckling grin and a smarmy swagger, Anthony Martinez is wonderful, as is Johnny DeBernard, bringing a comforting presence—and supremely clear diction—as the mysterious narrator. And, as The Witch—the unexpected moral authority of this fractured fairy tale—Daniela Innocenti Beem is a force of nature, taking chances with the first part of the story, playing the witch for laughs rather than the usual menace, then morphing into a powerhouse of emotional strength and sheer vocal dynamite. I only wish they’d used some of that brilliance in figuring out to stage to the show, especially the scenes where a giant invades the land and causes murderous mayhem. Use a projection for the giant, a big puppet, a shadow, whatever. Anything would have been better than simply having people point up at the imaginary giant coming at them from the audience, then run off stage and scream, only to have other people point off stage and say, “Oh no! They’re dead.” Wow! And then there’s the moment when one character is magically transformed. A flash of lighting or something to add some magic to the moment would have been nice. But to watch that actor run off stage, change their look, then run back on . . . um, really? Sorry. It’s just not magical. And it’s not fair, when the performers are doing such a good job, to not to support them with matching effort in the staging of their scenes. That criticism aside, I do recommend this show. Yes, some of the effects may leave you underwhelmed, but there’s no escaping the forceful enchantment of this fine ensemble of actors, making merry magic with their mighty voices. 'Into the Woods' runs Thursday–Sunday through January 17 at Spreckels Performing Arts Center. www.Spereckelsonline.com

A little emotion goes a long way. And music is one of the best communicators of emotion, as Beethoven, Mozart, Tchaikovsky, and Billy Joel can tell you. The richer the music, the deeper the emotional response to it. Which is why emotions combined with music can be so powerful, and so dangerous. When 2005’s The Light in the Piazza first materialized on Broadway, there was much talk that the show—a musical adaptation of Elizabeth Spencer’s 1960 novel—marked a return to the kind of gorgeous scores and lyrical drama that fueled the golden age of Broadway. Ignoring decades of rock and pop influences on Broadway, composer Adam Guettel created a score that was lush, orchestral, complex, operatic and deeply, brazenly romantic. Some people hated it. After years of easy, amiable, non-challenging throwaway tunes, ‘The Light in the Piazza’ just sounded so . . . old fashioned. Because of that, others fell in love with it. Like music, and definitely like love itself, its all a matter of taste. In a remarkably strong new production at Spreckels Performing Arts Center, director Gene Abravaya—taking a real risk in tackling something this difficult—has more than met the challenge, assembling a cast of first-rate singers and a stellar chamber orchestra, for what is quite possibly the most beautiful, satisfying, musically competent, and artistically successful show Spreckels Theater Company has ever staged. And that some of the cast sings and speaks (convincingly) in Italian, that only adds to the impressiveness of the achievement. Whether all of this is excellence and musical skill is enough to draw an audience remains to be seen, though positive word-of-mouth will certainly help. Based on a book few have read, this is no Mary Poppins. But for audiences loudly clamoring to see something that dares to venture beyond the confortable familiarity of the same old overdone standard musicals, here is your chance to prove it. Set in Italy in the 1950s, the story follows two visiting Americans, the wealthy southerner Margaret—brilliantly played by Eileen Morris—and her wide-eyed daughter Clara—played by Jennifer Mitchell, whose pure singing voice and expressive face make every emotion and discovery as clear as a bell. When Clara falls in love, at first sight, with the youthful and exuberant Frabrizio—Jacob Bronson—the stage is a set for a series of clashes between Margaret and Fabrizio, between Margaret and Clara, and between Margaret’s own desire to protect her daughter, and to also allow her the love she never has the courage to claim for herself. The clever, entertaining book by Craig Lucas—who wrote Prelude to a Kiss and Amélie: The Musical—does include scenes spoken in Italian, giving a sense of the lost-in-translation confusion that impedes Clara and Fabrizio at every turn. In one delightful scene in the second act, Fabrizio’s mother—Barbara McFadden, who’s wonderful—drops the Italian to explain in English what her husband—an excellent Steven Kent Barker—has been saying to their other son and his wife—played respectively by Tariq Malik and Amy Marie Webber. That said, the Italian sequences are so well staged, it’s pretty clear what’s going on. With some fine design and technical support, and a strong ensemble cast, Spreckels’ Light in the Piazza is a truly impressive show, dripping with music and the dangers and allure of love—and that’s worth experiencing in any language. 'The Light in the Piazza' runs Friday–Sunday through Oct. 25 at Spreckels Performing Arts Center. Spreckels online.com

Alma de Bretteville Spreckels, mother of the Palace of the Legion of Honor, and a real SF character

It’s a striking coincidence. You don’t have to be the writer of stage thrillers to see it. Maybe it’s the work of some devious theatrical conspiracy. How else to explain two shows opening in the North Bay the same weekend, each one a play about people writing a play about people writing a play. And just keep things interesting, one of these self-referential theatrical endeavors is a musical. "[Title of Show]," and yes, that’s the title of the show, was written in 2004 by Jeff Bowen and Hunter Bell, who proposed to the New York Musical Theater Festival that they be allowed to write a musical about the process of writing that very same musical. Eventually, with the addition of two actresses named Susan and Heidi, "[Title of Show]," with brackets, did actually appear in the festival, followed by an off-Broadway run and after a period when it looked like the show’s life was finally over, it ended up on Broadway. And yes, all of that is in the show, too. And now, it’s in San Rafael, presented by Marin Onstage at Belrose Theater, this loopy, tuneful love story to the creative process is directed by Carl Jordan, and features Fernando Siu and Phillip Percy Williams as Jeff and Hunter, and Abbey Lee and Amanda Morando as Susan and Heidi. Justin Pine appears too, as Larry, the guy at the piano, because evidently every would-be playwright has his own accompanist hanging out in the corner of his apartment, just in case inspiration strikes. It really is a show about the creation of the show it’s about, which gets a little weird at times, as we watch the writers writing the show in front of us. At one point, Jeff asks Susan why she hasn’t said anything in a while, and she responds by saying, "Because this is the first line you’ve written for me to say in a while.” The songs are, for the most part, all about writing songs, but also - and this is why "[Title of Show]" is such a great show - the songs get to the heart of what it’s like to try and create something: the insecurities and doubts, the discoveries that come out of nowhere, the thrills and joys of hitting the mark when you finally do. Energetically and sympathetically performed by the entire cast, who bring their own unique personalities to the characters indelibly established by the original Jeff, Hunter, Susan and Heidi, this is a show for anyone whose ever dreamed of doing something really hard, and knows the heartache of failure and the sheer, ecstatic wonder of success. There’s one more weekend. And running through April 5th is Spreckels Theater Company’s production of "Deathtrap." Written by Ira Leven and directed with nastiness and glee by David Yen, ‘Deathtrap’ is a two-act, five-character play about a blocked playwright discover a two-act, five character play called "Deathtrap." There is little I can say about it without spoiling the many surprises, so let me just say that the cast of five drive the play with mounting energy, balancing the mounting tension with plenty of authentic comedy. Some of the murder weapons hanging on the wall are a little conspicuously rubbery and non-threatening, but everything else in this show is sharp, loaded, and entertainingly lethal. And there you have it: Two shows about people creating shows. You should consider showing up for one for both. You won’t regret it. I’m David Templeton, Second Row Center, for KRCB.

Well, Monday night was a good night for North Bay theater people. At the 39th annual San Francisco Bay Area Theater Critics Awards, a batch of Sonoma County theaters were honored, with some very talented actors, directors and theater artists walking the steps up to claim awards for their work in 2014. Winners included Denise Elia-Yen for her snappy portrayal of Annie Oakley in Spreckel’s Performing arts Center’s brilliantly presented production of "Annie Get Your Gun." Other North Bay actresses who picked up awards included Abbey Lee, honored for her outrageous portrayal of an oversexed gangster’s moll in "Victor/Victoria," and Rebekkah Pearson for playing the title role in "Thoroughly Modern Mille," both of those shows at 6th Street Playhouse. 6th Street saw a few more of its artists win awards: Anthony Guzman and Evan Attwood both picked up wins for "Thoroughly Modern Mille," and for the same show Joseph Favalora was honored for his choreography. And back to Spreckels, Mary Gannon Graham was awarded for her splendidly goofy turn as a wacky modern day witch in "Bell, Book and Candle," and Jeff Coté picked up a win for the title role in Gene Abravaya’s "The Book of Matthew (Liebowitz)." Oh, and Janis Wilson won for musical direction of "Annie get Your Gun." Main Stage West, in Sebastopol, also saw a few wins, beginning with singer-songwriter Si Kahn, for best original music for his show "Mother Jones in Heaven." Also honored were Tyler Costin for his fine work in "Vanya and Sonja and Masha and Spike," and for Albert Casselhoff, for his sound design on "T.I.C. (Trenchcoat in Common)." And for Cinnabar Theater, the love continued with wins for Mary Chun, for her musical direction of last year’s "Fiddler on the Roof," with the entire cast of "Of Mice and Men" winning for best ensemble. And speaking of love, local actor, writer, director Dezi Gallegos, who’s just nineteen, picked up a special award, the first ever Annette Lust Award, given to young theater artists who show incredible promise and potential. His acceptance speech, promising to find the next young dreamer and help them follow their passions, had the audience crying and cheering. That’s just a few of the winners in the North Bay. For the full list, go to the Cristics Circle website at S-F-B-A-T-C-C dot.org, standing, of course, for San Francisco Bay Area Theater Critics Circle. And while we’re celebrating the art of theater, let me just mention two upcoming shows about the art of theater, in one form or another. Opening this weekend, down in San Rafael, is a little thing called "[Title of Show], in brackets." It’s a musical about two guys writing a musical about two guys writing a musical, and when they invite two talented women to join them, it becomes a show about four people creating a musical about four people creating a musical, and then there are songs. Songs about writing songs. As it so happens, the cast of four were ALL nominated for awards Monday night, for previous works, and two of them, including the aforementioned Abbey Lee. It runs March 13-28 at Belrose theater, presented by Marin Onstage, marinonstage.com. The show sounds like a blast, as does "Deathtrap," opening in a couple of weeks at Spreckels performing arts Center. It’s the story of dueling playwrights who might just be trying to kill each other. It runs March 20 through April 5. Who knows, maybe next year these shows will be picking up awards of their own. And either way, as was recently stated, theater awards are just a party game. Getting to make theater, that’s the real party. I’m David Templeton, Second Row Center, for KRCB.

This City Hall was once San Francisco’s grandest building. It's collapse during the 1906 earthquake was attributed to political corruption. My examination suggests otherwise.

It’s one of San Francisco’s best-loved monuments — the figure of a heartbreakingly beautiful girl balancing lightly atop a granite column high above Union Square. She soars above both pedestrians and pigeons, gracefully clutching trident and victory laurels, lifting her shapely arms in triumph over the city of San Francisco. It was intended to memorialize […]