Next West Beach Music Fest Will Be Good for Kids

Dear Elizabeth Cutright, the Santa Barbara community, patrons, and fans who came to enjoy and support the West Beach Festival:

My brother and I have taken serious consideration of your letter [“Warning: West Beach Festival Not Family Friendly,” 10/8/09] this past week and greatly appreciate your feedback, as this is often the only way we can address problems. I think we may have created a solution for your concern regarding our “family-friendly” promotion of the West Beach Festival, and the reality, in which family-friendliness was not completely considered in all of our planning.

In our effort to provide a family-friendly environment, we allowed kids 10 and under to be admitted free to the festival, where we provided an exclusive kids stage with two days of programming and entertainment; however, we did not take great enough consideration of the sound bleed and cultural bleed that might compromise our family-friendly agenda.

We are firm believers in keeping our community a priority as we continue to bring the West Beach Festival to our beautiful beaches every September. To address your concern, next year we are planning to rent Plaza del Mar from the City of Santa Barbara, providing the entire family a 100-percent free Kids Stage with entertainment and special activities geared toward kids. Tor Hyams, producer for Kidzapalooza and Austin Kiddie Limits, will return for his third year with the West Beach Festival in 2010.

Plaza del Mar is the park just down the block from West Beach, next to Pershing Park, with the Band Shell-that will be our kids stage. We envision a free and relaxing day for the family on the green grass under the palm trees, away from the noise of the main stage, listening to world-class entertainment with special guests from the festival, like we had with Ziggy Marley (2008) & G. Love (2009). Thank you for your feedback and patronage of local business. – Jeremy and Joshua Pemberton, founders, Twiin Productions, Inc.