All that jazz continues to dominate Oregon music this week, and some of the Portland Jazz Festival‘s finest offerings are coming up (e.g. Pharoah Sanders, Ravi Coltrane and Africa/Brass Ensemble Saturday, or Joe Lovano and John Scofield on Sunday, but there are many less starry but nearly as scintillating shows), so be sure to read Angela Allen’s ArtsWatch preview and catch at least one of those if you’re at all interested in America’s grandest contribution to music.
Ravi Coltrane performs at Portland Jazz Festival.
And there’s plenty of other musical styles available around Oregon as well, many combining in various ways with classical music. You’ll find at least half a dozen more orchestra concerts around Oregon at the all classical radio calendar, and feel free to alert ArtsWatch readers to those and others in the comments section below.
Black Violin
February 24
Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall. Portland
Read my Willamette Week preview and interview. Portland’s Bravo Youth Orchestras will join the Florida-based violin/viola duo and their band.
Brian Blade & the Fellowship Band
Feb. 24, The Shedd, Eugene. and Feb. 25, Revolution Hall, Portland.
Read Kaleb Davies’ ArtsWatch preview of the great jazz drummer’s ensemble.
Quetzal
Feb. 25
Beall Concert Hall
Read my Eugene Weekly preview of the great Chicano rock band’s University of Oregon world music series show.
PSU Orchestra
Feb. 25
Crystal Ballroom, Portland.
Read my Willamette Week preview of the orchestra’s first appearance in a hallowed Oregon rock venue. Just don’t try dancing any tangos.
Black Violin performs Wednesday in Portland.
Alasdair Fraser & Natalie Haas, Jay Ungar & Molly Mason
February 25
Jaqua Concert Hall, The Shedd Institute, Eugene
Read my Eugene Weekly preview of this feast of folk fiddling.
RW Workz with James Carter
Feb. 26
Alberta Abbey, 126 Alberta Street, Portland
With a few outsized exceptions like Charles Mingus, jazz bassists tend to recede into the background, obscured by front-line stars. So it is with Reggie Workman, whose supple lines undergirded classics by John Coltrane, Thelonious Monk, Pharoah Sanders and so many other stars from jazz’s last golden era. Just when Workman had the chance to step into the spotlight, the most formidable of RW Workz’s rotating cast of soloists, tenor sax deity James Carter (last seen here last year eclipsing a backup band as large as the Oregon Symphony at the Schnitz), was announced as a late inclusion in RW’s band, which likely transforms a worthwhile show whose value was apparent mostly to jazz insiders into a top festival attraction.
Saxophone titan James Carter, who tore up the Schnitz with the Oregon Symphony last year, returns with RW Workz Feb. 26 at the Portland Jazz Festival.
“What’s New Pussycat?”
February 27
Eugene Concert Choir, Silva Concert Hall, Hult Center, Eugene.
Read my Eugene Weekly preview of the 100 voice choir’s Burt Bacharach tribute.
Dianne Davies performs Sunday at Portland State University.
“Attachments and Detachments”
February 27
Dianne Davies & Cascadia Composers, Lincoln Hall, 1620 SW Park Avenue.
Read tomorrow’s ArtsWatch preview of the stellar Portland pianist’s show that uses music from Oregon composers along with dance, theater and other multimedia elements to tell a personal story of grief (over her sister’s death), and her own struggle and recovery.
“In a Time of Extinctions, a Call to Life”
Feb. 27
Kathleen Dean Moore and Rachelle McCabe, Central Lutheran Church, 1820 NE 21st Ave. Portland
In this benefit for the climate change prevention organizations 350PDX, ne of Oregon’s finest writers and pianist McCabe present a program that blends Moore’s prose with McCAbe’s performance of Rachmaninoff’s “Variations on a Theme of Corelli.”
“Frankenmass”
Feb. 27
Vox Resonat, Central Lutheran Church, 18th and Potter, Eugene
Read my Eugene Weekly preview of this stitched-together concert of Renaissance and early Baroque music.
Paul Roberts & Students
Feb. 27
The ever popular pianist-lecturer-writer-teacher Paul Roberts returns to Portland to lead a master class and concert featuring the three late, great Debussy sonatas (for Cello and Piano, Violin and Piano, and Flute, Viola and Harp) written at the end of the revered composer’s life.
“Return to the Cotton Club”
Feb. 27-28
Oregon Symphony, Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, Portland
Pops Conductor Jeff Tyzik the band with the spectacular trumpeter Byron Stripling (who specializes in golden era jazz), singer Miche Braden, and tap dancer Ted Louis Levy in music by the immortal American composers Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong, and more made popular by bandleader Cab
Ted Levy tap dances with the Oregon Symphony this weekend.
Calloway, singer Billie Holiday, and more.
Caballito Negro
Feb. 27, Lincoln City Cultural Center, Lincoln City, and Feb. 28, First Presbyterian Church, Roseburg
Read my Willamette Week preview of the band’s Portland performance.
MarshAnne Chamber Players
February 28, MarshAnne Landing Winery, Oakland, and March 1, Wildish Community Theater, 630 Main Street, Springfield
Read my Eugene Weekly preview of the chamber ensemble’s concert of music by Brahms and Franz Strauss.
Bruce Dickey and Liuwe Tamminga
Feb. 28
Central Lutheran Church, 18th and Potter, Eugene
Read my Eugene Weekly preview of this free concert of 17th century Italian music for cornetto and organ.
Tai Hei Ensemble
February 28
Aasen-Hull Hall, University of Oregon, Eugene.
The UO student ensemble performs new music by young Oregon composers and more, all related to the dialogue between Western music and the world’s other musical traditions.
Want to read more about Oregon music? Support Oregon ArtsWatch!
Want to learn more about contemporary Oregon classical music? Check out Oregon ComposersWatch.