{"id":2064963,"date":"2025-10-02T19:04:56","date_gmt":"2025-10-02T19:04:56","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/?p=2064963"},"modified":"2025-10-02T19:04:56","modified_gmt":"2025-10-02T19:04:56","slug":"best-9-top-events-for-the-week-ahead-in-santa-cruz-county-arts-entertainment-oct-2-9","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/best-9-top-events-for-the-week-ahead-in-santa-cruz-county-arts-entertainment-oct-2-9\/","title":{"rendered":"Best 9: Top events for the week ahead in Santa Cruz County arts & entertainment, Oct. 2-9"},"content":{"rendered":"

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Here they are, nine necessary know-abouts for the week ahead. It\u2019s wake-me-up-when-September-ends B9:<\/p>\n

\"Painting
Credit:<\/span> Kevin Painchaud \/ Lookout Santa Cruz<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

\u27a4 It\u2019s October and in Santa Cruz County, for 40 years now, that has meant Open Studios<\/strong>, the moment when the community\u2019s wealth of visual artists open their creative spaces to visitors like you and me. Open Studios features more than 300 accomplished artists from one end of the county to the other, for three consecutive weekends. It\u2019s all free, and it affords art lovers the chance to see up close and interact with their creative neighbors, building genuine connections. If you\u2019re looking for a taste of what to expect, the Santa Cruz Art League is hosting a preview exhibition<\/a>, with a big event on Friday. Pajaro Valley Arts in Watsonville is also hosting a preview<\/a>. Then it\u2019s the first weekend<\/a> of the event, focusing on the artists of South County (south of the yacht harbor), Saturday and Sunday from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Make a plan: Find a few<\/a> intriguing artists, visit them where they do their creative work, and support them by taking something home. You\u2019ll not only get something glorious for your home, you\u2019ll also have a newfound appreciation for the special place we all call home.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u27a4 Yes, the Santa Cruz Comedy Festival lives, though under a new, kinda awkward name. \u201cLaughtopus\u201d<\/strong> is a two-day stand-up comedy show at Woodhouse Blending & Brewing that features a big bunch of young and hungry comedians with headliners Valerie Tosi<\/strong> (Friday<\/a>) and Myq Kaplan<\/strong> (Saturday<\/a>). These days, you can cry, rage and brood, or you can laugh. Let\u2019s laugh.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u27a4 Los Angeles guitarist Molly Miller<\/strong> just has that swing in her bones. You can tell it immediately through her chops that glide effortlessly between insouciant jazz and cutting blues\/rock. You can check Miller\u2019s guitar heroics out for yourself when she and her trio visit the Kuumbwa on Oct. 9<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"legendary
Credit:<\/span> Los Straitjackets<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u27a4 Accept no substitutes, there is only one genuine, OG, legendary surf rock band that performs in lucha libre masks. It is, of course, Los Straitjackets<\/strong>, the veteran rockers keeping alive the proud tradition of Dick Dale, the Surfaris, etc., while at the same time dragging surf rock into areas it\u2019s never before explored. The \u2019Jackets are ready to blow minds at Moe\u2019s Alley, Friday<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u27a4 Big weekend for the Santa Cruz Symphony<\/strong>, which will be showcasing the otherworldly talents of its concertmaster, violinist Nancy Zhou<\/strong>, in a sure-to-be-sterling performance of Rimsky-Korsakov\u2019s haunting \u201cScheherazade,\u201d preceded on Saturday<\/a> by a Middle Eastern-themed street fair outside the Civic Auditorium. The concert will be repeated Sunday<\/a> afternoon in Watsonville.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u27a4 Autumn arrives in style in downtown Santa Cruz on Saturday afternoon<\/a>. That\u2019s when the Harvest Festival<\/strong> takes over Church Street, setting up a wide variety of activities for the family, with lots of participation from local farms and businesses.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u27a4 The Seymour Marine Discovery Center is the site for a big event on Friday<\/a> that carries a familiar name. It\u2019s not the NEXTies exactly, but an offshoot of the annual Santa Cruz awards party, honoring leaders in culture and entrepreneurship locally. This one is called \u201cThe NEXTies: Earth and Sea\u201d<\/strong> and gives attention and love to Santa Cruzans making a difference in the realm of environmentalism.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u27a4 Holly Near<\/strong> has worked a lifetime as a performer and artist to make a meaningful difference in the world. First emerging more than 50 years ago as a young folk musician in opposition to the Vietnam War, the Northern California native became an icon of a new genre of folk that took women\u2019s lives seriously. Now in her 70s, Near is still fighting the good fight with song. She plays the Kuumbwa Jazz Center in a special show next Wednesday, Oct. 8<\/a>.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"dancers
Credit:<\/span> Taste of Ireland<\/a><\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

\u27a4 We could all use a \u201cTaste of Ireland\u201d<\/strong> occasionally (is it dark and bitter like Guinness?). In the case of Sunday<\/a>\u2019s performance at the Santa Cruz Civic, Ireland comes to life through stunning displays of Irish dance, from folk to tap, all with that storytelling moxie that the Irish are all too famous for.\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n

\u2018 The preceding article may include information circulated by third parties \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n

\u2018 Some details of this article were extracted from the following source lookout.co \u2019 <\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Here they are, nine necessary know-abouts for the week ahead. It\u2019s wake-me-up-when-September-ends B9: Credit: Kevin Painchaud \/ Lookout Santa Cruz \u27a4 It\u2019s October and in Santa Cruz County, for 40 years now, that has meant Open Studios, the moment when the community\u2019s wealth of visual artists open their creative spaces to visitors like you and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":1947228,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[25172],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2064963","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-entertainment"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/08\/Best-9-Top-events-for-the-week-ahead-in-Santa.png","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2064963","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2064963"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2064963\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2064964,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2064963\/revisions\/2064964"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1947228"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2064963"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2064963"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/celebrity.land\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2064963"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}