Southern California musician, teacher says Santa Rosa is a great music town

Music has always been a creative outlet for Southern California native Dylan Juhan and their two siblings. At a young age, their mother encouraged their participation in music through school bands and as extracurricular activities.

As a career? Not so much, but it was an opportunity for creative development and an avenue for potential college scholarships.

After taking music classes in middle school, Juhan began adding more instruments to their repertoire. Starting with oboe, they quickly gravitated to bass in jazz band, then to the French horn for the high school marching band. The electric guitar and ukulele were also added.

“I was playing in classical music, but then I was also playing in the jazz band. I was learning rock music as well,” Juhan said. “It was really just kind of, like, an obsession where there was always different avenues to be interested in. If one thing gets stale, there’s another instrument to practice, to play and to learn music on.”

After fleeting thoughts of majoring in computer science, English literature and even aerospace engineering, Juhan decided that they wanted to study something that they knew they would never lose interest in: Music.

As their graduation approached, Juhan and their fiancee, Katie Michel, decided they needed a change after the two visited Michel’s parents in Santa Rosa.

During the initial trip in summer 2019, Juhan landed many opportunities to perform at local gigs, so much so, that they made the permanent move to downtown Santa Rosa.

For Juhan, 27, and Michel, 25, both lifelong residents of Southern California, it felt like the logical thing to do, though it may seem a bit backwards at first glance.

“I talk to a lot of people, like a lot of musicians, that are from here (Santa Rosa),” Juhan said. “They’ll say, ‘I’m going to go down to L.A.,’ and, ‘I’m going to go down to San Diego, there’s so much to do,’ and, for me, it’s kind of the opposite sentiment.”

For a multi-instrumentalist trained in classical jazz with a bachelor’s degree in music from University of California, Irvine, the idea of moving hundreds of miles away from the Los Angeles area seems like the wrong move. After all, Los Angeles is known as La La Land and Tinseltown for a reason, with thousands of people moving to the area every year for a chance to be in the spotlight. However, Juhan and Michel were making their big move during the global pandemic, like many others. According to the U.S. Census 204,776 residents left the Los Angeles, Long Beach and Anaheim areas during a time when shuttered businesses, social distancing and travel were all in limbo.

Leaving Los Angeles and settling in Santa Rosa

The two eventually found an apartment near Santa Rosa City Hall and Juilliard Park in 2020.

“We were either going to live downtown and were going to be (in a spot that’s) walkable and we’re going to do that kind of lifestyle. Or we’re moving out and we’re going to have cows for neighbors,” Michel said. “Those were our two options – and we couldn’t afford cows for neighbors, so we ended up here.”

Juhan also admits that, while it’s been great to move closer to family, it’s also great to be in an area of California that isn’t a sprawling metropolis.

“I was doing a lot of gigs in Orange County and L.A., a lot of background music for corporate dinners and stuff like that,” Juhan said. “I still get some of that up here, but it’s not like the L.A., Orange County sprawl. It’s nice that all the towns have different personalities and some nature in between.”

Spike Sikes, frontman for the band Spike Sikes and His Awesome Hotcakes, met Juhan after a performance at Elephant in the Room in Healdsburg. Juhan handed Sikes their business card, said they play upright bass and Sikes has been utilizing Juhan’s talent since then.

If anyone understands Juhan’s decision to relocate to Sonoma County for its eclectic music scene, it would be him.

Born and raised in El Paso, Texas, Sikes relocated to Sonoma County in 2016 after nine years in the Coast Guard, where he’d been stationed in Northern California, Maine and New Orleans. When Sikes settled in the county, he quickly began playing jazz at local restaurants, wineries and festivals.

On June 14, his band will open Sebastopol’s Peacetown Summer Series 2023 at the Barlow from 5-7:30 p.m. Gigs like these, he insists, are more than enough to keep busy between recording sessions.

“It has everything to do with what your goals are,” said Sikes, referring to what it means to succeed as a musician in the area. “In Sonoma County, we have tons of different types of opportunities. You can play at wineries, breweries, restaurants, weddings, festivals ... It’s also not limited to just one type of music, either.”

Teaching around the North Bay

In between gigs and for the better part of two years, Juhan teaches private lessons in Santa Rosa at Bananas At Large, a Northern California instrument and audio retailer. They also teach at the San Rafael location. Currently, Juhan offers lessons on bass guitar, guitar and ukulele.

“Dylan is a wonderful teacher who brings enthusiasm for music to the students,” said Shaana Keller, an Installation Project Manager and Lessons Coordinator at Bananas At Large. “We appreciate that they work hard and helps inspire the next generation of musical talent.”

For several years down south, Juhan even worked to repair, reconstruct and set up violins and other string instruments for the San Diego Music Exchange while going to school.

“That was really fulfilling work,” Juhan said. “It was nice because I could just be a little gremlin in the back of the shop, but now I’m mostly teaching and gigging.”

And between the two musicians, Sikes knows Juhan won’t have to look too hard for work.

“Being a multi-instrumentalist and then also having some good music education in his background, he’s a more-qualified music teacher than a lot of the people in the area that are teaching music,” Sikes said.

Of course, more music to come

Michel will graduate from University of California, Davis, in spring with her master’s degree in environmental policy and management and, if it all goes as planned, Juhan will then return to school for their graduate degree, possibly at the San Francisco Conservatory of Music.

Like Michel, though, who commutes to Davis for class, Juhan would do the same. Michel gets a little more scientific about her reasons for staying in Santa Rosa, citing different microclimates that she prefers, but Juhan and Michel still arrive at the same conclusion.

“We love the area,” Michel said. “The ability to be 10 minutes from the nearest National Park is insane, the weather is so much nicer (than Los Angeles), there’s no concrete and people are more like people.”

If Juhan wants to continue teaching and performing while studying for that graduate degree, Santa Rosa has proven to be an area with ample opportunity for talented musicians looking to make some money.

Sikes, who’s currently underway on his third studio album, knows the work will always be there, so long as Juhan wants it. The two also have an interesting way of gearing up for gigs.

“Dylan and I have never had a rehearsal,” Sikes said. “I don’t have time for that. I need players that can just show up and do it. Dylan is one of, maybe, four or five people that I’ve met in this area who can do that at all and I would say that Dylan is definitely in the top two or three as far as being able to do it really well.”

As for summer plans, Juhan’s currently working on a mix of original and cover songs with a band made up of drummer Shane Schlick and guitarist Ben Prentice. They plan to perform those songs at weddings, wineries and taprooms.

Though the band name is still undetermined, Juhan is planning a busy schedule for summer gigs.