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MusicWatch Weekly: it’s raining music

By Brett Campbell
September 20, 2017
Featured, Music

Here’s a few of this week’s Oregon music highlights. Please tell our readers about others in the comments section below.

Angelique Kidjo sings with the Oregon Symphony Tuesday.

Third Angle New Music
The Portland Japanese Garden’s splendid new Cultural Village hosts the world premiere of a new work by one of Japan’s leading composers, Dai Fujikura, and (thanks to unseasonable weather) another indoor space, the older Garden pavilion, will feature other solo and ensemble music by contemporary Japanese composers for horn, marimba, harp, bassoon and more.
Wednesday and Thursday, Portland Japanese Garden.

Tim Berne’s Snakeoil
This Creative Music Guild show brings one of jazz/improvised music’s fieriest sax virtuosos and his ace quartet with clarinetist Oscar Noriega, pianist Matt Mitchell and percussionist/vibraphonist Ches Smith.
Wednesday, Fremont Theater, Portland.

Simrit
The Athens-born singer composer grew up in South Carolina, dove deeply into yoga, and was entranced by a Ghanaian drum ensemble at her state’s famed Spoleto festival. Her her folky pop accordingly incorporates her native Greek Orthodox influences with southern rock, Indian devotional music, and  West African beats, backed by cello, kora, and percussion.
Wednesday, Alberta Rose Theater, Portland.

Portland Columbia Symphony Orchestra
You don’t have to wait till November (Veterans Day) or May (Memorial Day) to remember the citizen-soldiers of World Wars I & II in pop and classical music of the eras and more by Copland, Holst, John Williams, Beethoven and others.
Friday, First United Methodist Church, Portland and Sunday, Mt. Hood Community College.

The Bylines Quartet 
This free Celebration Works show features the local foursome (Marianna Thielen, Reece Marshburn, Leah Hinchcliff, John Moak) performing jazz standards and theatrical originals on vocals, trombone, piano, bass and drum.
Friday, First Presbyterian Church, 1200 SW Alder, Portland.

JoJo Mayer & Nerve
Zurich-born one time jazz “drum god” JoJo Mayer, who in his youth backed jazz legends like Dizzy Gillespie, Nina Simone, Sonny Fortune, and Monty Alexander realized that if jazz were to remain relevant to younger listeners, it needed to embrace today’s technologies (including, lately, augmented reality) and audiences. His Nerve project began as a jam session at a little New York City Bar, quickly grew into a regular dance party at a bigger club, and then became a touring band (bass, drums, keyboard, DJ/mix) that blends jazz, electronic music, and various experimental strains into a true 21st century sound.
Friday, Hi-Fi Music Hall, Eugene and Saturday, Dante’s, Portland.

BGS Trio
All well known performers and leaders on their own, guitarist Peter Bernstein, organist Larry Goldings, and drummer Bill Stewart have also maintained one of the best classic organ trios in jazz for three decades.
Friday, The Jack London Revue, Portland.

Portland Chamber Orchestra
In this concert of mostly 20th century music, Finnish pianist Ruusamari Teppo, the great-great-granddaughter of Jean Sibelius, stars in longtime Oregon coast resident Ernest Bloch’s Concerto Grosso No. 1 and Mozart’s lively Piano Concerto #14. The orchestra also plays American composer George Walker’s elegiac 1946 Lyric For Strings, a pair of Piazzolla gems (The Death of an Angel and Ave Maria) and Sibelius’s lush Andante Festivo. On Sunday, at a private home in Southwest Portland, Teppo combines a recital and lecture that explores the Finnish national identity as it emerged in Sibelius’s music and his circle.
Sunday, Liberty Theater, Astoria.

Oregon Symphony
Rising star violinist Augustin Hadelich returns in Beethoven’s mighty 1806 Violin Concerto, and the orchestra also plays major 20th century American composer Morton Gould’s tuneful 1995 Pulitzer Prize winning Stringmusic, inspired by its dedicatee, the great cellist and conductor Mstislav Rostropovich, plus a 1907 arrangement of Balakirev’s famously complex piano solo, Islamey.
Saturday-Monday, Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, Portland.

The Gondoliers
Light Opera of Portland’s latest Gilbert & Sullivan show.
Thursday-October 1, Alpenrose Dairy Opera House, 6149 SW Shattuck Road, Portland.

The Legend of Zelda: Symphony of the Goddesses
The 30th anniversary tour of the mother of all video game franchises features music from most of the many versions, especially the most recent incarnations. Read Maria Choban’s ArtsWatch story about Zelda’s last Portland appearance.
Saturday, Keller Auditorium, Portland.

Terra Nova Trio
The new trio debuts with an eclectic mix of jazz, tango, classical, klezmer and tango music. The Eugene Symphony and Oregon Bach Festival players (Annalisa Morton, Mike Curtis and Sandy Holder) deploy not only “classical” instruments (oboe, bassoon and piano) in music by Bach and modern French composers, but also sax, guitar and accordion.
Sunday, First United Methodist Church, 1376 Olive Street, Eugene.

Angélique Kidjo with the Oregon Symphony
Now based in Brooklyn and Paris, the reigning diva of African music has lately ventured into orchestral territory with an album by the Luxembourg Philharmonic and arrangements of some of her classics by Swiss conductor Gast Waltzing, who’ll lead the OSO here. As usual with these celebrity shows, they haven’t bothered to announce repertoire (isn’t The Name enough?), but she may even sing an original written for her by her buddy Philip Glass.
Tuesday, Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, Portland.

Bill Charlap
Classic jazz piano doesn’t get much better than Bill Charlap, who has worked with many of the greats, including Wanton (oops, meant Wynton, thanks, Mitch!) Marsalis, Tony Bennett and so many more. He’s visited Oregon often with his superb trio, but this relatively rare solo piano recital should provide an even more intimate experience.
Tuesday, The Old Church, Portland.

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