“My desire is not to reinvent something but to penetrate it in a different way. I have a persistence about finding another way of doing something, another way of seeing, another point of entry." - Joan Tanner

This free concert features student composers, performers, and writers from a workshop led by Grammy Award-winning saxophonist and composer Ted Nash who joins them on stage. Responding in part to artist Joan Tanner’s unorthodox use of materials and inspired by Nash’s original composition first performed with Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra, these young artists explore the idea of transformation, both personal and collective, bringing word and music together in this exuberant community-sourced celebration of the expressive and empathetic power of art.  

The backdrop for this performance will be created by students ages 12–14 enrolled in the Museum’s Emerging Teens Program and is inspired by the exhibition Out of Joint: Joan Tanner. 

This program is in partnership with the Santa Barbara Symphony and Santa Barbara City College. Work from the writers in the concert will also be featured in Open Fruit , the student-run Creative Writing Magazine at Santa Barbara City College, alongside other submissions of poetry, fiction, and visual art related to the theme of transformation.  

First come, first seated