Year: 2006

Corrections 3-23-2006

The ArtsLife article on the harp program at the Santa Barbara Braille Institute [“Soothing Sounds of the Week,” Mar. 9] mislabeled the weekly class as Healing Harps; it is actually called the Joy of Harps. Dr. Jeanne Martin-one of nine harpists presenting this free series-is also not employed by or affiliated with the Braille Institute, as the article suggested. For more information on the Joy of Harps program, or to sponsor a harp program at a school or organization, email JeanneLMartin@cox.net.

Nine Become One

Camerata Pacifica’s March concert.

At Victoria Hall Theater, Friday, March 17.

Bassoonist John Steinmetz got Camerata Pacifica’s March concert off to an even more than usually jocose start on Friday by introducing the evening’s opening number with a string of deadpan puns and one-liners that had everyone laughing. Composer Joseph Rheinberger was helpfully located within the context of the tradition of composers with “burger” in their names, and his composition, the Nonet in E-flat Major, Opus 139, was deemed a dangerous piece, “to be played without safety precautions.” (As in “no net.”) Steinmetz finished with an entirely sincere and on-target characterization of the piece as designed to entertain, and capable of communicating a sense of deep delight.

MAKING BABIES:

Biologists rejoiced last week when an apparently healthy bald eagle egg was discovered in a treetop nest on Santa Cruz Island. Due to the devastation of DDT poisonings, no known bald eagle has hatched on the Channel Islands since 1949. The Institute for Wildlife Studies has been working to reintroduce the endangered bird to the northern Channel Islands since 2002, releasing 46 juvenile birds with mixed results. The eggwhich is the most promising indicator so far that a stable bald eagle population may eventually return to the Channel Islandsis the product of two young eagles from a similar, though unsuccessful, program on Catalina Island. Biologists’ fingers are crossed, as the egg is expected to hatch sometime in mid-April.

Supervising Gaviota

by Ethan Stewart Several issues related to the Gaviota Coast had environmentalists and land conservationists alternating between smiles and frowns

BIG HOUSE ORDINANCE BELITTLED:

A group of homeowners wanting to enlarge their houses won a key battle against venerable neighborhood associations who have sought for several years to keep houses small in the city of Santa Barbara. Succumbing to pressure from the newly formed Citywide Homeowners Association, the Neighborhood Preservation Ordinance ad hoc steering committee voted 5-2 Friday to limit house-and-garage floor area only on lots smaller than 7,500 square feet. That describes fewer than half of the city’s residential lots. But until Friday’s vote, the draft ordinance established hard-and-fast maximum house sizes for lots smaller than 15,000 square feetor 82 percent of lots, according to city planner Heather Baker. Instead, the committee decided that lots larger than 7,500 square feet should be subject merely to recommended square footages and negotiable design guidelines. Committee members Dianne Channing and Joe Guzzardi voted in dissent. After some refinement, the ordinance will return to the committee April 12 for the final time.