When I worked at an Out Door School for a couple of years, my nature name for the kids was Animal. My nickname became Animo. When I started booking gigs I would book it as "Animo" or "Animo Jams" for the bar jams. When I started touring outside of Santa Cruz I added the Cruz so people knew which Animo I was, I guess. It wasn't till later I knew the meaning of the name. 

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I started playing out at clubs when I was 16 and took a break from the industry at 20 to learn more about life before I expressed myself about it. Varying degrees, licenses, studies, surf, martial arts and travels later, I decided to return to playing music out I decided to let the music lead the way...so I decided to start at the bottom with Monday night open mics in town. 

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Acoustic Guitar at open mics became acoustic gigs, turned into bar band jams, grew into original tunes, developed sets, became EPs, started touring shows...

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I'm blessed with the incredible roster of musicians, in my little black book I have built over the years and get to play with. Where each show is independent of the other and all sets are unique and never the same, sometimes the same players and many times not, but always a professional and lively show with heavy elements of dance and groove, Santa Cruz Music. We pride ourselves on the truly live element that we bring to shows. 

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Music is simply an expression of life...by all means, please Cruz with us.

 

Cheers!

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