Ask yourself if you've heard music from a female composer lately
Go to a wine festival to learn about wine and get a scoop of the scene
You Don’t Need to Win the Lottery: Free Events in San Francisco
This is a big summer for San Francisco. With the 75th Anniversary of the Golden Gate Bridge, and the U.S. Open Golf Tournament at The Olympic Club, the city will turn into one big party this summer. Here’s how you can get your ticket to the fun without spending a dime:
Street Festivals
The unique street festivals in San Francisco don’t require any entrance fee, plus there’s one almost every weekend from May to July.
Carnival, May 26th and 27th, Mission District
This inclusive street party is San Francisco’s all-in-one carnival with a weaving of traditions from many South American countries. The original inspiration that began this 33-year custom was to share stories and cultural experience with the students and young people, but everyone has fun at this colorful party.
Yerba Buena Gardens Festival, May to October
Features live music and entertainment from around the globe including a free circus performance on July 29 by Circus Bella. YBGF also hosts LitQuake events – the area’s primer writing and reading festival.
Union Street Festival, June 2-3
This is one big festival, so be ready for the crowds! The eco-focused blocks are at the east entrance to the fest, at Gough Street where food, crafts, and organizations who consider their long term effect get to show off their goods. I’m in!
Haight Ashbury Street Fair, June 10
This year marks the 35th annual Haight Ashbury Street Fair, so the three stages of bands, the Kid’s Alley, and the craft and food booths are amping up for an extra special one.
Gay Pride Weekend, June 23-24
Pride events have no start and end date here – and that’s the way it should be if you ask me. Gay Pride Weekend is really something that can’t wait to get started, so it doesn’t: typically official celebrating begins May even though the main events like the parade (this year’s theme is Global Equality) aren’t until June 24th. Check out floats from local organizations like SF-based electric music events guide The MML, and dance troops, sex toy shops – even the SF Police.
Nihonmachi, August 4-5
For almost 40 years people have congregated to celebrate and to learn more about Japanese culture. On Post between Laguna and Fillmore will be one of the very best selections of craft vendors and a tempting food fest, which last year featured two food truck grand openings.
Live Music
In the spirit of making the arts accessible to all, there are many groups and organizations in San Francisco that have figured out a way to bring music to the locals and visitors.
Stern Grove, (Sundays June 24 – August 26 in Stern Grove at 19th and Sloat)
Be sure to arrive early, bring a blanket and a picnic, dress casually and get ready to dance. This summer’s line up includes the San Francisco Symphony (July 8), The E Family (July 22), and OK Go! (August 26). All concerts are free to this SF summer classic.
SF Chamber Orchestra, throughout the year at various locations
Fabulous and free of charge, the orchestra even offers a series just for young concertgoers.
Fillmore Street Jazz Festival , July 7-8
The largest free jazz fest on the West Coast brings together everything from “Asian to Cajun,” as they say. It’s fun flexing your listening muscle with such world class tunes.
Midsummer Mozart Festival (July 19 – 29 at various locations)
Two programs perform at four different venues so as many people as possible can appreciate the refined renditions of Mozart’s epic works. This summer the concerts feature two of my favorite piano concertos, opus 482 in E flat and opus 453 in G. Although the main festival concerts are around $20 per person (there’s a 20% discount before July 20), the Noontime Concerts are pay-what-you-can.
Cinema
Summertime is movie time in San Francisco. Amen.
Top of the Mark, (Tuesdays May 29 to September 4)
Held in Union Square, classic films are screened and wineries such as Domaine Chandon sponsor free tastings at these popular summer movie nights.
Film Night in the Park, (Fridays and Saturdays June 8 to October 6)
Most of the films are shown in Marin, but there are always a few at Dolores Park or Union Square where the friendly, loudmouth crowd makes the movies much more fun.
More
Golden Gate Bridge Anniversary Festival , May 27th with events throughout the summer
This will be one to remember. The celebrating continues throughout the summer with various Golden Gate-themed events and exhibits going on across the city. Don’t miss the fireworks at the main event on May 27, or the four stages of performers playing right in view of the bridge.
So You Think You Can Paint at Club Six, Every Thursday
Artists-at-heart will love the art parties at this Soma bar and dance club. All the paint and canvas is provided and beers are just $3 if you need some liquid inspiration.
Free Folk Festival , June 9-10
Bring your friends and family of all ages to hear music, make music, and maybe even make an instrument or learn one.
What free upcoming event are you looking forward to attending? Let me know in a comment, and you will be entered to win a free copy of my book, GrassRoutes San Francisco: An Urban Eco-Guide, packed with recommendations of the best local businesses in the city.
Mother’s Day Concerts at Yerba Buena Center for the Arts with Kronos Quartet
It almost seems strange, finding a Kronos Quartet concert billed as “Women’s Voices.” In a genre dominated by dead white guys, this group is naturally inclined to work with women.
Not only has string group Kronos Quartet assembled a significant list of long-term female collaborators and composers over their tenure, they come from around the world. Franghiz Ali-Zadeh is a pianist and composer from Azerbaijan, Alexandra du Bois got her start learning violin in Virginia, Tanya Tagaq is an Inuit throat singer from Cambridge Bay, Canada, and that’s without mentioning Asha Bhosle, Sophia Gubaidalina or the others.
Over Mother’s Day weekend Kronos continues its multi-year collaboration with Yerba Buena Center for the Arts (YBCA), one of the most unique and exciting art museums in the country. The contemporary concert features more than one world premier, thematically collected as a concert that celebrates the female perspective.
Serena’s preview picks for Dry Creek Passport Weekend
Come mid-Spring, wine festivals sprout like bolting chard. Although there are dozens I’ve never attended, and dozens more of which I’ve never heard, the flurry I have been to over the years has left me with a steady pattern: this season means wine tasting for me.
I tend to rack up points on my odometer and learn a lot about wine.
Even with the abundance of wine-growing regions celebrating new releases, Dry Creek Passport Weekend has been marked on my calendar years running. Some combination of the stunning setting, the variety and quality of wines, and the fanfare at each winery make it a consistent hit. It’s sold out again this year.
If you didn’t snag ticket you can head to most of the wineries today and enjoy the same reduced rates offered for Passport Weekend. (a full list included at the bottom of this pdf) Also, the area is worth visiting at many times of year, say, on a quiet weekend in the fall when you get the Adirondack chairs on Dry Creek at Truett Hurst all to yourself and the old zin vines are lit up with electic mustard flowers.
So this is by no means your only chance, but if you are one of the lucky ones, here are my preview picks for the festival, the things that I’ve enjoyed and recommended in the region before, and places that are new or caught my eye.
The Travel Writer’s Handbook
Posted in Good Ideas
When I first arrived on the scene – the travel writing scene in the Bay Area – I was told more than once that next to being a celebrity actor, you couldn’t find a more sought-after career choice. That was my tune until I discovered the monthly meetings of Wild Writing Women, a group of amazing female travel writers and story tellers who used to meet near Union Square to talk shop. These ladies sung a different note. Their encouragement really helped me get my first book off the ground.
Over the years I have watched their projects flourish with excitement, and even been a part of some of them, like contributing a story to the anthology they put together about Ireland. Last year, when one of the Wild Writing Women, Jacqueline Harmon Butler, asked me to add my two cents on trip preparedness for her most recent edition of The Travel Writer’s Handbook I jumped at the task. And now I am happy to say I’ve got a copy in my hands!
Earth Day Project: How to Make Soap
Posted in DIY / Good Ideas / Kitchen Adventures / Places / San Francisco Bay Area
As Earth Day weekend quickly approaches I find myself preparing to teach another class of how to make soap. This Sunday I’m teaching the more popular cold process method for the Institute of Urban Homesteading here in Oakland – there still room for one or two more and you can sign up here. If you can’t make it this weekend I’m teaching another cold process class and a hot process class this fall.
*NOTE: Use caution, we are dealing with a seriously caustic hydroxide. Although it’s totally possible to teach yourself, if you are at all apprehensive I do recommend learning soap-making in a class setting where all of the steps are demonstrated and specific issues can be addressed, and I’m not just plugging my class here.*
Making soap is one of those connective activities that, while I’m doing it, makes me feel as though I am really a part of the generations before me. Even though its been years since my first batch, I still recall the myths of soaps discovery along the Tigress River ages ago. It was told to me that the intense ash from nearby active volcanos mixed with mountain stream water and the fat from ritual sacrifices so that when the women would go to wash in the river they’d find suds where the streams met with it. Ash is one of the most basic ways to make a strong base liquid, which then saponifies when it meets with fat. If you couldn’t source lye or potassium hydroxide from the hardware store you could make your own by dunking a pillowcase full of charcoal into a bucket of purified water for several hours, then testing the pH. But even when using store-bought ingredients. the chemical reaction is the same reaction those washer women experienced, and all those who have made soap since.
There are as many variations in making soap as there are in making cheese, and the primary division follows this analogy – there are soft and hard cheeses and soft (liquid) and hard (bar) soaps. So as you research soap making for, perhaps your Earth Day project, keep in mind that there are numerous approaches and styles even within both main types.
I think making your own soap is a fun and simple contribution to make to reduce the packaging you use, but as I said, the historic context also makes it a joy to do.