Hello, and welcome to the return of the San Diego Reader to the proudly persistent world of print.
Our website, sandiegoreader.com, is still the best, most complete source for what’s happening in San Diego. But as with the rest of the internet, there’s a muchness to all that information, no matter how well organized, that can get overwhelming.
Below, please find a curated selection of local events for your perusal. It’s just a sampling, but hopefully it will serve to whet your appetite. Enjoy!
Alien Girls
The meta manifests early in Amy Berryman’s sweet drama about female friendship. (And it is sweet, despite the painful betrayals, tragic deaths, and surprising brutality it contains, thanks in no small part to the sympathetic performances from its leads, Brittany Bradford and Emma Ramos, and the propulsive — though not linear — action of the play. There’s too much humanity, and too much artful revelation, to let things curdle to sourness.) We meet Tiffany and Carolyn as they hit the club, buzzing about their future as fellow writers — rich, respected, but not famous. It takes only a moment before the beat takes hold and one of them blurts a confession, whereupon the action freezes, the set’s LED light ring flashes blue, and a voice dictates, “Delete.” Our girl tries again. “Delete.” The first two of many such moments that let us know we are in the somewhere in the midst of someone’s creative process.
Speaking of creative processes: the other girl has been doing another sort of creating, and has some news to share. The difference between those two creations provides the tension of the play. But it isn’t the story of the play. These writers write to process their encounters with the world — a world which often seems, as the title suggests, hostile and strange. They also write to process their encounters with each other.
The fragmented narrative can get a bit disorienting, which may explain why the audience laughed at moments that felt not at all comedic. (There are puppets. Try to give yourself over to the puppets.) And the dialogue is not above going for the easy gag here and there, and once or twice shades into self-conscious speechifying. But that’s the “here and there” and “once or twice” of it. Again, the overarching sensation is sweetness, because the overarching dynamic is love.
- Where: The Old Globe Theatre,
- When: Tuesdays at 7 pm, Wednesdays at 2 pm and 7 pm, Thursdays at 7 pm, Fridays at 7 pm, Saturdays at 2 pm and 8 pm, Sundays at 2 pm and 7 pm, through May 10
- Ages: Adult material discussed
- Cost: $47-$125
Moonchild
Fronted by multi-instrumentalist and singer Amber Navran and co-founded in 2011 by fellow alumni of the Jazz Studies program at USC Thornton School of Music in Los Angeles, neo-soul trio Moonchild is known for blending elements of jazz, R&B, and electronic music. On the release of their debut album “Be Free” in 2012, they earned the attention and endorsement of Stevie Wonder, who invited the band to open for him at that year’s annual House Full Of Toys benefit concert. Their “Voyager” LP was named among Bandcamp’s Top 100 Albums of 2017, and a 2019 release called Little Ghost hit number six on Billboard’s Heatseekers Album chart. Their full-length album “Starfruit” was nominated for a 2023 Grammy Award for Best Progressive R&B Album, further widening their fan base and bringing them to the attention of mainstream media. They’re touring in support of their sixth full-length “Waves,” released in February and featuring collaborations with Jill Scott and Lalah Hathaway.
- Where: The Music Box, 1337 India Street, San Diego
- When: Sunday, May 3, 2026 at 7:30 pm
- Ages: 21+
- Cost: $36
B-Side Players
“We now represent the Brown Majority,” said Karlos Paez, the dreadlocked frontman of global funk act B-Side Players who helped launch the group in 1994. “The surfer, suburban stereotype of California is changing fast. It’s not all bleach blondes anymore.” Specializing in socially conscious dance music sung in both Spanish and English, the ensemble fuses sounds from Latin America (Cuba, Mexico, Brazil) with funk, rock, jazz, and hip-hop. The group won a San Diego Music Award for Best World Album for their 2009 record Radio Afro Mexica, and they won Best World Music at the 2011 SDMAs — then took it home again in 2012. Their live shows celebrate diverse cultures, especially Chicano identity, drawing frequent comparisons to iconic worldwide Latin groups such as Ozomatli. They dropped a new single in February for their track “Flowers,” which continues to showcase the band’s ability to seamlessly work elements of Cumbia, street Samba, Son Montuno, and Jarocho into their arrangements.
- Where: Lou Lou’s Jungle Room, 2225 El Cajon Boulevard, San Diego
- When: Tuesday, May 5, 2026 at 8 pm
- Ages: 21+
- Cost: $25
Seven Bridges Children’s Hospital fundraiser walk
Yes, it’s a little earnest and olde-timey to be citing Counting Crows lyrics in 2026, but there’s a line from “Long December” that’s appropriate here: “It’s been so long since I’ve seen the ocean/I guess I should.” When you live in San Diego, it’s sometimes all too easy to never do the things that every San Diegan has done — or ought to have done. The Seven Bridges Hike is one of those: Park Boulevard, Cabrillo, First Avenue, Quince Street, Spruce Street, Vermont Street and Georgia Street. (Don’t get cynical when you realize that the anti-suicide fence on Cabrillo starts only once you’ve over the 163.) A testament to civic engineering, a unique perspective on San Diego, City of Canyons, a sense of what makes this city this city. And in case you need a little extra motivation, now you can do it for a cause, and receive a guided audio tour from Jeffery the Surfer Reindeer.
- Where: Meet at Tavola Nostra, 1040 University Avenue B101, San Diego
- When: Saturday, May 16, 2026, 9 am to 1 pm
- Ages: All ages
- Cost: $30-$75
San Diego Museum of Art’s Resident Free Tuesday
For too many San Diegans, Balboa Park is a place you send folks from out of town — “And after you’ve seen the Zoo, why not check out the rest of the Park?” It’s fun to single out the Timken — “We’ve got Rembrandt’s Saint Bartholomew” — before launching into the celebrity hook: Orson Welles famously used the park for his newsreel announcing the death of newspaper mogul Charles Foster Kane at the opening of “Citizen Kane.” It stood in for Kane’s Florida estate, named Xanadu after the site of the ‘stately pleasure dome’ built by the Chinese emperor Kubla Khan. But while Xanadu was described in the newsreel as “the world’s largest private pleasure grounds,” the park is a democratic answer to Kane’s elitist paradise: a public pleasure grounds, with the Museum of Us as its cathedral and the San Diego Museum of Art as its principal palace. And if you live in San Diego, there’s one day a month when you can just walk in for free! Stop in and marvel at another sort of democratic triumph: the gloriously low-culture posters of Toulouse-Lautrec.
- Where: San Diego Museum of Art, 1450 El Prado, San Diego
- When: Tuesday, May 19, 2026, 10 am to 5 pm
- Ages: All ages
- Cost: Free
The Bulwark Live
It is a commonplace that modern American politics is theater. (“Show business for ugly people” as one wag famously put it.) Has it always been a commonplace that American political commentary is its own sort of theater? When the Bulwark first coalesced around the idea of conservatives/Republicans standing against the raging storm that was President Donald Trump, a great many people rallied to its cause. A number of others suggested that it was just a canny fundraising move — in other words, theater. Now, as if to short-circuit the argument through sheer bravado, the Bulwalk crew is taking its show on the road and visiting literal theaters around the country, including our very own Balboa. But theater or no, don’t go looking for drama: the promo copy promises something altogether friendlier. “Tim Miller, Sarah Longwell, and Sam Stein bring their signature political insights and banter to a crowd for one night in San Diego for an evening of politics among allies. We can promise you a fun night of sharp political insights and a community built on good faith.”
- Where: Balboa Theater, 868 Fourth Avenue, San Diego
- When: Wednesday, May 20, 2026 at 7 pm
- Ages: All ages
- Cost: $104-$131
Working Title No. 5
In 2017, the Episcopal Diocese of San Diego passed Resolution 17-05, declaring itself a “Sanctuary Diocese.” The resolution stated that the diocese would stand alongside undocumented immigrants, oppose large-scale deportations, and encourage all diocesan congregations to explore becoming “sanctuary congregations and institutions.” Small surprise then, that its Cathedral is playing host to Project [BLANK]’s latest festival of art and music, which has Sanctuary as its theme. (“What defines a sacred or protected space? What boundaries — physical, social, spiritual — are drawn to offer refuge to those under threat?”) Sanctuaries can be created by architectural spaces, but also by personal practices and political actions, as recent events have made clear. At the exhibition’s center: “a major new work by San Diego composer Michelle Lou—a mind-melting composition for voices, tubas, pipe organ, and electronics.” And as John Philip Sousa knew, when they bring out the tubas, they mean business.
- Where: St. Paul’s Cathedral & Episcopal Church, 2728 Sixth Avenue, San Diego
- When: Saturday, May 30, 2026 at 6 pm
- Ages: All ages
- Cost: $15-$25
