Voices of the Valley Podcast & Radio Show

Join us for a fascinating episide with longtime valley resident and tea connoissure, David Lee Hoffman. David has spent more than four decades traveling the remote backcountry of Asia in search of the world's finest rare, organic, and wild pure leaf teas, becoming the first American to work directly with tea farmers in China and to form joint ventures with long-established tea gardens. This deep engagement with place and culture is captured beautifully by his photographic essay of his 1971 journey to the remote Himalayan region of Dolpo, Nepal, where he documented landscapes and communities rarely seen by outsiders. Whether through tea or photography, Hoffman's work is marked by respect, authenticity, and a commitment to preserving moments, traditions, and environments on the cusp of change.

to learn more about David's work and specialty teas go to: http://thephoenixcollection.com/

And here's a great article: http://thephoenixcollection.com/press/all-the-tea-in-china.pdf

Join us for a terrific interview with Nicasio resident wine industry mover & shaker Patrick McNeil who shares some amazing family stories about the history of his fascinating family, Nicasio and Northern California at large.

Patrick McNeil is a native Californian with roots and influences in both Southern California and the Bay Area,. Patrick McNeil's personal history is entwined with—and endures in—this state's world-class wine industry. Since graduating from UC Davis in 1996, Patrick has enjoyed a fully integrated career in all aspects of wine: from sales, marketing, and distribution to winemaking and viticulture—with healthy doses of creative entrepreneurship to fuel his efforts along the way. His experience building wine brands has brought hard-earned national attention to some first-rate estates, from Napa Valley to Paso Robles.

Aja Couchois Duncan is a social justice coach and capacity builder of Anishinaabe, French and Scottish descent living on the ancestral and stolen lands of the Coast Miwok / Tamal-ko people. Her debut collection, Restless Continent (Litmus Press, 2016) was selected by Entropy Magazine as one of the best poetry collections of 2016 and awarded the California Book Award for Poetry in 2017. In 2020, Sweet Land—a collaborative opera project which brought together composers Raven Chacon and Du Yun, librettists Aja Couchois Duncan and Douglas Kearney, and co-directors Cannupa Hanska Luger and Yuval Sharon—was produced in the Los Angeles State Historic Park to critical acclaim and named the Best Opera of 2020 by the Music Critics Association of North America. Her forthcoming book, The Intimacy Trials will be published in early 2026 by the University of Chicago Press as part of its Phoenix Poets series. When not writing or working, Aja can be found running the west Marin hills, training with horses, or weaving small pine needle baskets. She holds an MFA in Creative Writing from San Francisco State University and a variety of other degrees and credentials to certify her as worthy. Great Spirit knew it all along.

Join us for an exceptional episode about poetry, indentity and creativing community right where you are!

For more information about Aja Couchois Duncan's work go to https://ajacouchoisduncan.com/

For more information about the San Geronimo Valley Community Center and to donate go to www.sgvcc.org

James Baraz is a founding teacher of Spirit Rock Meditation Center. James started the Community Dharma Leader program, the Kalyana Mitta Network, the Spirit Rock Family Program and helped create the Heavenly Messengers Training Program. James has been leading the online course "Awakening Joy" since 2003. He serves as a guiding teacher to One Earth Sangha, a Virtual EcoDharma Center devoted to Buddhist responses to Climate Change. He co-authored Awakening Joy and Awakening Joy for Kids.

In this exceptional and inspiring episode James leads us through the history of Spirit Rock Meditation Center's founding here in the valley, and leads us through a beautiful introduction/reminder to core Buddhist Principles.

for more information on Spirit Rock Meditation Center got to www.spiritrock.org

for more information on James Baraz's work go to https://awakeningjoy.info/

to donate to the San Geronimo Valley Community Center go to www.sgvcc.org

Join us for an exceptional episode with Woodacre resident and Lagunitas School student Larkin Sylvester. Larkin is a Greenstitch Climate Action Intern, a Aerial Performer, a Stilt-Walker, and all -around amazing creative. This inspiring episode will give you great hope for a bright future!

Richard Lang is a poet, short story writer, performer, painter, and printmaker. His stories seek to link the modern human with the natural world.

He is a recipient of the Marin Arts Council Individual Artist Grant in poetry. First at Burning Man then later at fund-raising events for Bay Area non-profits, he can be seen performing poetry as The Poetry Jukebox. It has feted folks at fancy sit-down dinners and has cajoled passersby at the Marin County Fair.

Since 1999 Richard Lang and Judith Selby Lang, as a collaborative team, have been visiting Kehoe Beach, Point Reyes National Seashore in Northern California.

As a studio artist, Richard Lang draws with a variety of mediums including the notoriously difficult monoprint and watercolor, which he describes as either rock climbing or downhill skiing. He has been transforming his studio into a temple for the art he calls "The Large Hadron Collider", a device for discovering the Higgs/Boson Particle of Art.

Marty Meade has been a glass artist since 1973, studying traditional stained glass with Judy Raffael, (now known as Judy North). Marty has been teaching glass art at the College of Marin since 1978 and won the College of Marin's Academic Senate award for Community Education teacher of the year in 2006. In 1981, she traveled to Chartres France to study with Roger Darricarrere.

Her teaching has taken her to the Banff Center for the Arts in Alberta, Canada, where she introduced stained glass as a fine art. In 1982 she testified before the California Assembly as the expert in the field on changing AB3299 to include stained glass as a fine art. She has specialized in commissioned stained glass for private homes and autonomous panels for galleries. She is also a painter, teaching watercolor at the College of Marin since 1995.

Marty has been inspired by her Pima Indian and Mexican heritage. Her Corn Necklace came from a dream image, and was created as a tribute to this sacred food source.

She is the recipient of a California Arts Council Grant, Marin Arts Council Community Grant. A stained glass series depicting San Geronimo landscape, is now part of the permanent art collection at the San Geronimo Community Center. It was designed by Marty, and created by Valley students under her direction.

Join me for a lively and informative conversation with Elaine Doss and Amy Morse of the Nicasio Historical Society with some fascinating tid-bits of West Marin History.

Elaine Doss grew up in New York City's Hells kitchen neighborhood in the 1950s and 60s. Shortly after graduating from Columbia University in 1968 with a BA in French and Italian, she married talent agent Richard Loren and enjoyed traveling with him in the NYC area and along the East Coast to Jefferson Airplane's, Doors' and Chambers Brothers' shows.

After a dropout year of travel through Europe and the Middle East, and at the behest of Jerry Garcia, they moved with David Grisman in 1970 to Stinson Beach in hopes of launching the music careers of Chris and Loren Rowan.

When she found herself in 1977 living in Jerry Garcia's Stinson Beach home with two horses in the small backyard, she decided it was time to look for bigger property. That's when she located and purchased the 150 acre parcel in Nicasio that she has lived on ever since.

When she enrolled her older son in the Nicasio School kindergarten in 1978, she was warmly accepted by the Nicasio community. Elaine later taught at Nicasio School in the combination 3/4/5 classroom for 20 years. She has been president of the Nicasio Historical Society since its founding in 2003 and now serves on the Nicasio School Board of Trustees for several years.

Amy Morse and her family have lived in Nicasio for over 40 years. Born and raised on one of the oldest, continuously operated farms in New England (Morse Farm dates back to 1704), Amy had a love of history from an early age. Serving on the Nicasio Historical Society Board for many years, she enjoys researching and celebrating the rich history of her beloved Nicasio.

Join us for an inspiring and helpful converstion aboiut aging in place from multiple perspectives—both urban and rural.

Marian Cremin, received her Masters Degree in Social Work from Columbia University in New York, She is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker, who has been in private practice as a DBT therapist, was the former Owner/Director of a major Bay Area Senior Homecare Agency, and currently works as a medical Social worker at Kaiser Permanente San Rafael. She is also the former Board president of the San Geronimo Valley Community Center.

Stacy Torres, PhD, Is an Assistant Professor of Sociology in the Department of Social and Behavioral Sciences at the University of California, San Francisco (UCSF), core ladder rank faculty in the sociology doctoral program, and affiliated with the Institute for the Study of Societal Issues at UC Berkeley. Stacy is the author of At Home in the City: Growing Old in Urban America recently out from University of California Press.

Voices of the Valley is all about community and we usually focus exclusively on local valley residents, which is true here with Marian who has lived in the San Geronimo valley for 25 years, but we also happen to have an aging population in the valley and when I came across Stacy's book, which is sub-titled "Growing Old in Urban America" I thought it would be really interesting to bring in a local expert to compare and contrast what the differences are between growing old in Nicasio & the San Geronimo Valley say, than in New York City, San Francisco, Chicago or Atlanta.

Zoila Berardi is often referred to as "The Matriarch of the Valley," since she has been nurturing young people in our community for more than 50 years. She is one of the founding members of the Open Classroom and a pioneer in early childhood development and started her first childcare program in the 1970s. Since then thousands of young people have come through her programs with a deeper creativity, kindness, compassion, with an open understanding of the world and the powers of community.