Gettin' jazzy with it!

Proof, friends, that I truly won the parental lottery: It's early September, and I have decided I want to go to the Monterey Jazz Festival, in a BIG way. My Aaron Burr-crush Leslie Odom Jr. is headlining the Saturday main stage, and I am a jazz fiend. Sadly, Roommate David, who loves jazz more than anyone I know, is on call that weekend and can't go. So I text my parents, expecting them to laugh...and instead: 

Before I knew it, we had called each other half a dozen times, and my parents had not only booked flights but also bought us tickets...all before my lunch break. And that, friends, is how I found myself in mid-September driving us down to oh-so-charming Monterey, for a weekend of some of the best jazz performance I've ever experienced!

Held at the Monterey County Fairgrounds, the Jazz Fest is anything but bougie - and that just adds to the experience. Locals mingle with tourists and weekend warriors as snatches of music drift through the air - a high school jazz band in one building, an open-air soul-funk group in an amphitheater, snippets of the greats coming from the history presentations. I was in heaven. 

We made our way over to the Yamaha tent and had a blast discussing instruments...they even let me demo a flute, the first time I've touched one since senior year of college! For those concerned, I definitely still know all the Notre Dame fight songs...#nerd.

Parched after my masterful performance (HA!), we hit up one of the beer gardens, where I started with a Brother Thelonius. 100% of the sales from this jazz-themed beer went straight to supporting jazz education in California - the entire festival benefits several different jazz organizations and has provided major funding since its inception 61 years ago!

We spent the day bouncing around from building to building, seeing as many different artists as possible. Highlights: the California High School All-Star Jazz Band, Monsieur Periné's Latin/Afro/Caribbean/French melange of magic, Bruno Mars-esque Con Brio and their high-energy dance party in the amphitheater, and The Suffers, full of soul and so charismatic.

We took a quick dinner break and headed to the pier for fantastic seafood at the Old Fisherman's Grotto - being seated right by the windows and watching the sea lions frolic in the bay was a beautiful, amusing setting for a meal!

As soon as we had finished with our dinners, it was immediately back to the mainstage for the evening's highlights - the Clayton-Hamilton Jazz Orchestra teaming up with the Gerald Clayton Trio to premiere the festival's annual commissioned work. This year's piece was a nine-part "jazz symphony," if you will, following the trajectory of America over the last year or so. It was all-encompassing - atonal and grating alternating with incredibly lush and harmonious, overlaid with the spoken word and resolving in an absolute maelstrom of sound. I about died and went to heaven, and loved it all the more for sitting next to my father while a father-son duo made magic onstage.

And of course, the main event (for us, anyway) - Leslie Odom Jr, who made my month when he opened his set with a stripped-down, jazzed-up version of his iconic "Wait For It" from "Hamilton." From there on out, we enjoyed a rollercoaster through the best of jazz and classic Broadway - selections from "Rent," "Spring Awakening," and "Hamilton" interspersed flawlessly with original, pared-down jazz pieces that showcased his small ensemble to perfection. He even cracked jokes and riffed on his recent Nationwide Insurance commercial - the man is, in my opinion, a flawless human being and I can't wait to see him AGAIN in a few weeks at my beloved Orchestra Hall over Thanksgiving!

We took it so, so easy on Sunday - a leisurely brunch at First Awakenings, an old sardine factory, then a slow, gorgeous drive up the coast and over the mountains back to Redwood City. We provisioned ourselves, Schweg-style, for the afternoon...

...and, as Dave was still on call, and as Dave is one of my parents' favorite people ever, we had a fantastic dinner al fresco at home. Dad's perfect filet mignon, twice-baked potatoes, crusty fresh-baked sourdough bread, and an Italian salad - plus, of course, plenty of champagne! 

I headed back to my parents' hotel with them and watched the Emmys before calling it a night. They flew home early Monday morning, and I immediately reset the Schwegfam countdown clock...exactly 30 days to our New York trip! 

In short - I fell madly in love with the Monterey Jazz Festival, and am beyond jazzed that my parents shared the experience with me. Already looking forward to a repeat trip next year!

101 in 1001 #5: See a Broadway show...on Broadway!

You guys, hi! I’m fresh off a very lengthy blog break (partly intentional, partly accidental) and a fantastic trip to New York City with my parents and brother to celebrate my dad’s birthday. We had an absolutely outstanding weekend – shopping, drinking, sightseeing, and dining to our hearts’ content – but the unequivocal highlight of the weekend, for me, was seeing my first (and second!) Broadway show and checking off my 101 in 1001 #5!

I’ve grown up absolutely obsessed with Broadway musicals. My first trip to a show, the touring production of “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” with Donny Osmond, took place at the tender age of six…and my family never looked back. As anyone who reads this space knows, we all fell HARD for “Hamilton,” my dad and I share an affinity for “Phantom” that goes back over a decade, and I’ve seen too many touring productions on stage to even count up at this point. As much as we all love musicals, though, I’d never actually seen a show on Broadway before. Needless to say, when my parents floated the idea of a trip for Dad’s birthday, including seeing shows, I was all over it.

One of my deepest recent Broadway obsessions is with “Dear Evan Hansen,” the darling of the 2017 Tonys which has been universally praised for its richly emotive performances and the gorgeous music, penned by Pasek and Paul of “La La Land” acclaim. Ben Platt, starring as the anxiety-crippled, socially awkward title character, is ending his run at the end of November, and I couldn’t not see his Best Actor Tony-winning performance – especially after my parents and sister Em had already seen it and unequivocally raved about it.

Despite the fact that the ticket cost me nearly a third of my monthly rent, Friday night saw me absolutely losing my mind in the third row of the mezzanine as this stunning show truly left me speechless.  I rendezvoused with my family during intermission (we weren’t all sitting together, thank GOD) and was near-incoherent in my awe. While Ben Platt’s performance is truly a once-in-a-lifetime experience, the rest of the cast wowed in their own right, and the innovative staging and show design created a completely immersive experience.

I remembered with paralyzing detail how painful and awkward and stressful it was, at times, to be a teenager feeling like I didn’t totally fit in, to think in agonizing detail about how others perceived me and to worry incessantly about who I was. That teenage angst, coupled with the struggles of parents to understand their children and fulfill their own needs and desires, seemed to overwhelm everyone in the audience; the women sitting next to me had never heard the music and didn’t know the show’s premise, and collectively went through an entire packet of Kleenex in the first act alone.

After the show, we parked ourselves outside the stage door in hopes of seeing the cast up close and personal, but the closest we got was seeing Rachel Bay Jones (Tony Award winner for best featured actress!) drive by waving from her SUV after sneaking out the back door. I had a total fangirl moment, though, when we realized we could see into the reception room backstage, and watched Ben Platt greeting VIPs. To quote the musical, heavy-handedly, we were literally waving through a window...and it made my night!

While “Dear Evan Hansen” plumbed the deepest depths of my (admittedly soft-hearted, emotional, quick-to-cry) spirit, our Saturday night show, “A Bronx Tale,” left me grinning from ear to ear. We had originally purchased phenomenal seats to “Natasha, Pierre, and the Great Comet of 1812,” but the show closed early in September after a fair amount of casting drama. We searched around for other options aimlessly as a few more shows we were interested in closed, and ultimately landed on “A Bronx Tale” as a nice change of pace from the wringer that is “Dear Evan Hansen.” Based on a true story, and the ensuing Robert De Niro movie, the show focuses on the early life of a young Italian boy growing up in – you guessed it – the Bronx, being pulled between the rival good-and-evil forces of his upright, moral father and a local mobster.

While the show won no Tonys and earned much less critical acclaim than my beloved “Hamilton” or “Dear Evan Hansen,” the music (by Alan Menken) and the dance-heavy, big bold cast created an enchanting experience for the largely Italian, New Yorker audience. I’ve had “One of the Great Ones,” a rollicking love song, stuck in my head since Saturday night- and let’s be real, if every show was an emotional rollercoaster, I’d never make it through an evening at the theater without crying my mascara clean off.

So incredibly thankful to my parents for letting us celebrate in the greatest city in the world with them, and for planning not one but TWO Broadway experiences for us! I’m so hooked on the theater world, and have a feeling there will be many more cross-country flights in my future…after all, “Frozen” and “Mean Girls” both open next spring, wheee!

Lately I'm Loving

Things making me smile/on my mind/causing distraction lately:

- I've been doing a lot of thinking about books lately. Namely, the fact that my reading list has burgeoned to nearly 150 titles, all added in the last couple of months, and that I've done a shamefully lax job checking them off. While I attribute that in large part to the fact that my days are, in general, much fuller here, I've also been a total social media fiend lately (stories forthcoming). This piece, about a guy who read 400 books in the last two years, was thought-provoking in its direct call-out of people like me who waste a ton of time on apps. While I still polish off around 10-12 books a month, it's crazy to think about how much more I could be doing. 

(Related: this Atlantic piece about how smartphones are destroying today's teens was a lengthy but compelling read.)

- As far as reading goes, I started extremely young - I read the entirety of the "Little House on the Prairie" series in kindergarten, and graduated (rapidly and prematurely) to "Pride and Prejudice" and "Watership Down" in second grade and "War and Peace" in third. (For the record, do not recommend that course of action.) What I do recommend? Reading early and often with kids. Some of my happiest and earliest childhood memories are of reading in bed with my parents almost every night. With that in mind, I've decided my new go-to baby gift is membership in The Picture Book Club, which is, as far as I can tell, basically the Jelly of the Month club but for books. Sign me (and my hypothetical future progeny) up for the "Women Who Changed The World" subscription, please. 

- I think the reason I read so much from a very early age is that I was a very well-socialized but equally introverted child. It's a topic that I've seen addressed a lot lately, most recently in this way-too-relatable post a friend shared on Facebook about characteristics of the type. I can't even begin to express how strongly I identified with most, if not all, of the outlined traits...to the point that, even as I write this, I'm re-reading the list and aggressively nodding along in my cube. 

- In addition to reading literature that was targeted well above my age range, I also spent much of my childhood attending theatrical events and being exposed to classical music. I attribute my adult love of the arts entirely to my parents' focus on ensuring we were well-versed in that world from an early age - and that we knew how to behave there. This New York Times thought piece about children and their participation in the adult world of the arts could basically be a manifesto for how I intend to (someday, maybe) parent...just a few weeks ago, I had the pleasure of sitting behind a family of five at the opera and listening to the youngest, who couldn't have been more than seven, discuss the very mature themes of Thaïs with her mom during intermission. SIGN ME UP. 

Pinot noir and opera stars

This weekend was such a blast! One of Jonathan’s bffs from college lives in San Francisco, so Jonny spent a long weekend here. Seeing him was so great – I haven’t spent much time with him at all lately, as he’s living in Detroit and I’m (duh) here.

He and Tyler took the Caltrain down to Palo Alto on Friday in nearly 100-degree heat, with plans to go on a mini campus tour of Stanford courtesy of yours truly. Instead, we decided to scrap the tour in the face of the heat, and headed back to my place for ice-cold Chardonnay and a little chill time before dinner at my personal favorite restaurant in Redwood City, Vesta. While their wood-fired pizzas and wine selection are out-of-this-world good, we definitely made a mistake in selecting a restaurant with no AC with the temps as high as they were. By the end of the meal, we were all…dewy, to put it gracefully. Didn’t stop Dave and me from heading downtown with Jonny and Tyler to go out!

Or so we thought. We ended up heading back to Tyler’s gorgeous Nob Hill apartment to play drinking games…with a bunch of 23-year olds. I felt REALLY old, campers. Old like, one-foot-in-the-grave ancient next to these fresh-out-of-college children.

Jonathan, on the other hand, continued to live his best life by refusing to drink beer (as always) and instead enjoying a “healthy pour” of his two-for-one white wine. Always classy, Jonny D. Proud of you, boo.

After enjoying the insane view of downtown for a while, Dave and I departed around 11pm...but not before we kicked serious state-school kids’ ass at both flip cup and XL beer pong. (I may be old, but I’ve still got it.)

Saturday dawned bright, sunny, and hot for our planned trip to Sonoma! I picked up two moderately hungover boys early, and we made the quick 1.5-hour shot straight north to the Alexander Valley.

Our first stop? Hanna, a favorite from our family’s trip last Christmas. Perched high above Alexander Valley, I think the Hanna tasting room boasts some of the best views in Napa. Another claim to fame? Their delightful tasting staff, Ted and Carol, who took advantage of a fairly slow day to spend over an hour with us, pouring off-menu tastes, chatting about microclimates and local favorites, and ultimately convincing me I needed to be in the wine club. I walked out with a half case, utterly charmed by their personal attention and pride in the Hanna product.

The boys, meanwhile, made sure to keep me humble by reminding me that I was mostly a glorified chauffeur and that, obviously, Saturdays are for the boys. (I kid, I kid…)

After enjoying quite a bit of wine on very empty stomachs, we needed a quick pit stop, so we hit the Healdsburg Grill for salads. And Captain Morgan poses on empty wine barrels. It’s Sonoma, after all. We also swung over to Noble Folk Ice Cream and Pie, where Jonathan slaughtered an Oreo cone and I fell hard for the vegan passionfruit sorbet.

Thoroughly refreshed, we made stop #2 at Iron Horse! Another perennial Schwegfam fave, I think their summer tasting setup overlooking the vineyards is among the most picturesque in the entire area.

We scored prime spots right at the front of the overlook, under the shade of the giant umbrellas with champagne soaking in ice baths close by. Absolutely idyllic!

The boys agreed.

The primary reason we headed to Iron Horse was so that Jonathan could make a purchase he’s been low-key obsessing over since the holidays…the Iron Horse champagne saber. Long story short: he and Tyler borrowed my penthouse apartment at Eitel on the New Year’s Eve when I went to the Fiesta Bowl. Jonathan, being a smart and thoughtful houseguest, decided to use one of my Wusthof kitchen knives to saber a bottle of champagne in my living room. That Wusthof knife is now missing a quarter of an inch off the tip…yes, laugh with me at the plethora of “just the tip” and circumcision jokes we could all make (and have made) here. Jonathan’s been into sabering champagne ever since, and the Iron Horse saber is the perfect excuse for him to do it all the time.

Let it be known, I was against the saber purchase. Direct conversation was, I believe, as follows:

Lizzie: Think about how infrequently you’ll use it, Jonathan.

Tyler: Whateverrrrr. He’s gonna be sabering open like…bottles of ranch dressing. You know it.

Needless to say, I lost this particular battle, and we spent the rest of the afternoon yelling at Jonathan to put the saber back in the box while the car was in motion. He is SUCH an adult, you guys.

Stop 3: La Crema, where we totally scored with our sweet tasting host, Hannah! As I joined the club (yes, if you’re counting, I’m now in FOUR wine clubs, omg help I have a problem), the two Select Reserve tastings we purchased quickly spiraled into ten glasses on the counter, with wine flowing insanely liberally. We had their Nine Barrel ultra-reserve again. We tried a Gewurztraminer and their rosé. We sampled, at my count, seven different pinot noirs. And I, being a complete fiend (I HAVE A PROBLEM SERIOUSLY), left with half a case of La Crema…bringing my purchase total to a dozen bottles in under four hours. You guys. I need my wine country access revoked. Or restricted. HAAAALP.

We grabbed a bite in Santa Rosa, and on the way home Tyler had the inspired idea to stop at the Marin Headlands at sunset for one of the best views in the Bay Area. I was in heaven.

Jonathan, on the other hand, was COLD. Temps had dropped from over 100 degrees in the Russian River Valley to a brisk 55 on the Headlands, and yiddle brudder was having none of it. We stopped quickly, and hopped back in the car to drop the boys back in Nob Hill. It was so great to see Jonny…and the best part is, he’ll be back with my whole Schwegfam in just two weeks for a full Schwegman Party of 5 reunion!!

Sunday found me going full opera nerd, as my friend/fellow Minnesota native/soprano GODDESS Alex performed in the SF Merola Program’s Schwabacher Concert Series at Stanford’s Bing Concert Hall! As a professional fancy person, I would like to officially confirm that, while I may no longer be dominating the Twin Cities arts scene, I’m already deeply committed to exploring the Bay Area’s.

Bing, while a beautiful space, was not acoustically suited for the format of the Schwabacher concert, which bummed me out. In spite of the technical challenges, Alex, as well as Edina guy Tommy, and all their peers in the Merola program utterly killed it. Opera selections ranging from classics like Thais and Lucrezia Borgia to newer, more avant-garde works like Street Scene and The Ballad of Baby Doe highlighted and showcased each performer’s formidable power and dramatic range. I was spellbound.

We grabbed pitchers of sangria and toasted to the amazing performers in downtown Palo Alto after the show…already looking forward to continuing to check out the opera world’s up-and-coming stars at Merola’s two remaining summer performances!

All in all, a weekend for the record books. I’m loving starting to feel more at home here, and am so grateful to the friends and family who are making it possible for me to show off the west coast, best coast mentality firsthand!

#highwaytohal meets #sanfranlizco!

Last weekend, I hosted my first official California visitor, as ex-roommate Hal made a stop in San Francisco for the weekend! Although we lived together for nearly a year, I saw very little of him during that time due to our respective travel schedules, his grad school application process, and his side gig driving Uber…so having a whole weekend to spend together was an incredible treat!

As soon as he rolled in Friday, we headed to Vesta in Redwood City, which is quickly becoming a favorite of mine. We dined with our friend Erik, who is also a Bay Area resident, and then headed down the block to Blacksmith for more cocktails…

…including, naturally, frosé. A basic white girl never forgets (although this bar bill def didn’t rival last September’s shenanigans at the Godfrey roof…eek).

We took advantage of the gorgeous evening to head back to my place and enjoy the sunset on our deck – wine included, naturally. (A lot of wine included.)

The next morning, we had grand, ambitious plans of being up and on the road by around 8am to get to wine country by 10. Needless to say, Saturday morning actually didn’t find us crawling out of bed until closer to 9, so we arrived in Yountville around noon. First stop:

Bouchon, for foie gras, croques madames, and bellinis at the bar! Incredible food and the best chat with the bartender put us in the perfect mood for a strenuous afternoon of serious wine tasting.

Once we had finished up, we headed across the highway to Chandon (duh). While my June wine club shipment wasn’t ready yet (first world problems, amirite?), we did enjoy the free flights for members. While sampling, we chatted with Michael, our tasting host and a fellow recent transplant to the area, about his favorite wineries on the Napa side and a few restaurants he recommended.

While Napa is great, I really prefer Sonoma for the generally more laid-back atmosphere, and wanted to show Hal the contrast between the two valleys. We crossed the Oakville Grade, laughing all the way at the absurd roads, and made a brief, abortive attempt to stop at the (wrong) Hanna tasting room before heading to my personal fave: Iron Horse!

I’ll never get over the views – and Hal was appropriately enchanted.

Everything the light touches will one day be yours, Harold…if you MOVE HERE (not like I’m biased or anything).

After a fantastic tasting experience, including their special-edition Rainbow Cuvée (#prideweekend, duh), we made the most serendipitous of stops at La Crema’s Saralee estate riiiight around 4:57. As they close at 5, we were initially told we wouldn’t be able to taste, which I had expected, but I made sure to emphasize that I really wanted to show Hal the space – a spectacular renovation of a 100-year-old hops barn. After effusively exploring the building, the tasting room manager, Andrea, said possibly the most beautiful thing I’ve ever heard: “We just can’t let you leave without tasting something.” Andrea, you are LOVELY, and you speak my language.

We tried their delicious single-vineyard Shell Ridge pinot, and then hit the jackpot when Andrea brought over the day’s last open bottle of their 2014 Nine-Barrel pinot noir – a reserve label that retails for over $100, and is produced on select years with only the best grapes in La Crema’s entire portfolio. Andrea let us take our (generous) pours out back, admire the view from the deck, and relax while the La Crema staff finished closing. All in all, an utterly lovely and unexpected experience that definitely cemented La Crema’s spot as one of my favorite vineyards in the area.

 We took it easy Saturday night after a lengthy day of tasting, as we wanted to be fresh for Sunday’s jam-packed calendar. First stop: the unparalleled spectacle of the San Francisco Pride Parade!

Favorite shirt of the day: "Why ban gay marriage when you can ban KidzBop?" HA!

The following photos don’t even scratch the surface of the event, which featured everything from “Dykes on Bikes” to every imaginable protest group…

…plenty of Trump hate that was as clever as it was civil…

…every corporate sponsor in the Bay Area…

…the San Francisco cast of “Hamilton” as the honorary grand marshals!...

…and of course, this guy, making the day an absolute joy. We stayed for three hours, and when we left the parade was not even close to over. We had to hightail it back to Palo Alto for the evening’s entertainment: DCI WEST!

I’ve mentioned DCI, and Hal’s obsession with it, in the past (here, for example). I’ve also come to love the spectacle and sheer uniqueness of competitive drum corps through Hal, and was excited to join him, Erik and his friend Sean for the evening. It also marked my first trip to Stanford Stadium!

And I can’t wait to get back in there to watch some college football (GO IRISH, duh!). The show itself was fantastic and varied, with some amazing shows even this early in the season. We had a ball critiquing the performances, discussing the art of drum corps, and hanging out on a gorgeous NorCal evening.

All in all, I think the weekend went a long way toward convincing Harold he needs to make the Bay Area his post-Duke MBA future home…am I right, Hal? Am I right? At the very least, it was a fantastic weekend of shenanigans with a great friend, and I am so happy that #sanfranlizco made it onto the #highwaytohal!