MOTM (Music on the Meadow) presents
Episode 0
Music with the Meadow

May 8, 2026 • 4:00 - 6:00 pm

Kretschmer Plaza (Music balcony) and the meadow extending from it

UCSC Music Department

McHenry Rd, Santa Cruz

Featuring

Rodrigo Barriga

Shanna Sordahl 

Maven Maybee

Tin Yi Chelsea Wong

Bell Bringers

Curated by

Marc Perez

Lukáš Janata

Kev Young

Ben Carson

Jay Afrisando

MOTM presents Episode 0: Music with the Meadow that invites the audience to “listen with the meadow,” asks what it feels/sounds/looks like, and considers how the meadow reciprocally influences our listening.

Episode 0 features various outdoor engagements. The audience will be invited to experience Piano Liberado (Liberated Piano) by pianist and sound artist Tin Yi Chelsea Wong, a dispersed performance Spaces I by composer Rodrigo Barriga, meadow-tracing listening walk Imprints and Echoes by composer, performer, and sound artist Shanna Sordahl, listening-to-the-sky multisensory meditation Blue Magic in the Air: DEEP SKY EMBRACE by geographer, writer, and multimedia player Maven Maybee, and hundreds of audience-activated bells Bell Bringers, presented by Burrow of Investigation.

Accessibility and important information

• The event will be centered on the auditory experience, with opportunities to engage multisensorially.

• The audience can have freedom of agency to decide how they exist and participate in this space. You can move freely through the space, experience the meadow and any existing soundscapes at that moment, and/or you can also sit back, relax, and enjoy nature and music with the meadow.

• Kretschmer Plaza (Music balcony) is wheelchair accessible through McHenry Road. The meadow extending from the balcony is wheelchair accessible via an elevator inside the Music Department. The audience may also access the meadow through stairs (16 + 16 steps) on the balcony’s edge.

• Kretschmer Plaza’s flooring and a small part of the meadow (adjacent to the Music Center building) are made of concrete.

• Built-in benches on the balcony and the concrete part of the meadow are available. A limited number of folding chairs and floor mats will be available. The audience is welcome to bring their own folding chairs, mats, or seating pads.

• The program will be digitally accessed through a QR code pointing to a website link.

• When you attend this event, you enter an area where photography, audio, and video recording may occur. By entering the event premises, you consent to such recording media and its release, publication, exhibition, or reproduction.

• During the event, Parking Lot 126 will be set up as a three-hour ParkMobile Flex Zone in Lot 126​. The code is 15168 and will be available from 2:30 pm to 4:30 pm at $5/hr for up to 3 hours.​ More information about parking access will be posted throughout Lot 126.

Episode 0 is curated by Marc Perez, Lukáš Janata, Kev Young (Guest Curators), Ben Leeds Carson (Co-director of April in Santa Cruz Creative Music Festival 2026), and Jay Afrisando (Lead Curator). Organized in partnerships with the April in Santa Cruz (AiSC) Creative Music Festival 2026 and UC Climate Action Arts Network (UC CAAN).

Music on the Meadow (MOTM) is an ecosystem beyond a festival. A site for low-key (but not low-quality or low-impact) celebration, gathering, mourning, remembering, rethinking, unlearning.