
Story by BRETT CAMPBELL
Photographs by JOE CANTRELL
Portland’s All Classical Radio, one of the nation’s most successful classical radio stations, is entering a new incarnation. ArtsWatch’s Joe Cantrell was on hand — trusty camera in hand — a couple of weeks ago for the public opening of the station’s gleaming new headquarters on the third floor of downtown Portland’s KOIN Tower.
As the station’s spiffy new 15,000-square-foot Media Arts Center opens to the public, it’s become clear that the move represents not only a new physical location, but also a new incarnation — the culmination of All Classical Portland’s transformation from a classical music radio station to a vibrant Oregon cultural generator.
OREGON CULTURAL HUBS: An occasional series
“It was really intentional from the beginning to create a space that would be a beacon for arts on the air and cultural hub off the air,” says All Classical President and CEO Suzanne Nance. As Cantrell’s images show, they’ve succeeded.
Transcending Radio

The new headquarters at Southwest Second Avenue and Columbia Street constitutes All Classical’s third incarnation. (You can read more about All Classical’s four-decade-plus long history in Daryl Browne’s recent ArtsWatch story, in this account of its original home at Portland’s Benson High School, in my 2013 ArtsWatch story about the station’s move from Benson to the Portland Opera building, and on All Classical’s own website.)
I recounted the reasons for the move when ArtsWatch broke the story in 2023. Since then, All Classical has raised almost 90 percent of the funds needed for the $11.5 million move (nearly double initial estimates), expansion and reboot.
The station now boasts 12,000 members and a staff of nearly 30. You can tune in to its main 24-hour-per-day broadcast online and the old-school, over-the-air way at KQAC 89.9 FM in Portland and other channels elsewhere in Oregon.
Over the years, the station has added some welcome original programming to the usual classical formula. But Nance’s accession to leadership ignited an expansion of its mission beyond radio.
The vision realized this month really began “about seven years ago,” Nance remembers. Inspired by her admiration for the fertile artistic scene in early 20th century Paris, during those rich fin de siècle years so fascinatingly chronicled in Roger Shattuck’s The Banquet Years, Nance imagined an analogous environment involving the artists and creativity in the Pacific Northwest.
Nance started brainstorming with the All Classical team about creating “a meeting place where the arts are woven into the fabric of the community, and artists and community members have access to each other.”

“This is one of the most creative places in the world,” she told the staff, “so how can we be amplifying that creativity to our quarter-million listeners here in the Northwest [over the airwaves] and over a million worldwide [via the internet]?” And how could All Classical also create a physical, not just virtual, space to nurture that creativity?
She started dropping that language into staff meetings, writing it on whiteboards. “We have the best team in the nation for a public radio staff,” Nance declares. “I trust them and value their guidance.” She also checked in with the station’s board of directors, and says she received nothing but encouragement from all concerned. Two years of meetings with community leaders, potential donors (individual, corporate, and foundations) and other supporters ensued, followed by 15 months of construction.
Nance, who recently received Portland Metro Chamber’s Sandra K. McDonough Leadership Award, didn’t really have a role model for All Classical’s next phase. Sure, a few other American radio stations — mostly National Public Radio affiliates, unlike the independent All Classical — do some non-radio programming, and create their own radio programming. (New York’s WNYC is probably the most expansive I know of, and of course Boston, Chicago and other cities boast some ambitious stations.) Some European radio stations even have their own orchestras. But “I don’t know of another radio station that’s become a full-fledged arts and culture network,” Nance says. Neither do I. (Readers, let us know in comments if you can think of comparators.)
In last year’s ArtsWatch story, I listed the aspects of All Classical Portland that extend its role into a broader cultural producer:
• A weekly live music show recorded in the All Classical studios, featuring local performers and sometimes composers.
• Weekly locally produced shows featuring contemporary music, film scores, recordings of recent Oregon performances, local young musicians, and more. (A new show about music and literature appeared last summer.)
• A second channel devoted exclusively to programming for children, families, caregivers, and educators.
• Artist in Residence and Youth Ambassador programs, and an arts journalism mentorship.
• An anthology of profiles of 40 Oregon artists.
• An initiative to “change America’s playlist by producing new high-quality recordings of classical music by underrepresented composers,” including an excellent locally produced CD. (Read our coverage.)
Last year, the station rebranded itself to reflect its new and expanded ambitions. And that all happened before the move across the river completed this month.
New Possibilities

When Nance and the All Classical team took their first tour of the KOIN Tower space in 2022, the vision of a cultural hub started to solidify. Its extra 3,000 square feet of space would afford the physical capacity, more advanced broadcast and digital tech, better acoustics, and other features needed to fully encompass the station’s expanded vision.
“When we first saw the space, we realized we could turn this into a performance hall with excellent acoustics, a place where our artists and performers could create, take risks, and have their art documented on audio and video,” Nance recalls. “I could see this space being activated on a daily basis with poets, musicians, composers, all sorts of artists coming together and creating and exploring new endeavors. We could help them on their journey as artists.”

Boasting five (count ‘em) high-tech production studios, the new HQ allows All Classical to unleash that expansive vision in new ways. “We’re basically a full-fledged TV station, with a theatrical lighting grid, video capabilities, and a professional recording studio,” Nance says.
The new, 100-seat “state of the art” Irving Levin Performance Hall, with its 16-by-9-foot LED screen, phenomenal acoustics, and live audio and video broadcast capabilities, allows multimedia performances and artist collaborations. Via rentals to corporations and other organizations, the hall can also “generate some revenue to offset the ever-changing media landscape, and subsidize the space for our artists,” Nance explains. She envisions the hall eventually hosting several events per week for hundreds of audience members.
Levin is a long-time station supporter, successful businessman and accomplished amateur cellist whose donation with his wife, well-known local broadcaster Stephanie Fowler, helped make the studio possible.
“We offered naming opportunities to fund the build,” Nance explains. “I wanted the names for people whose values and vision align with All Classical. I couldn’t think of a better human being for the hall. He said, “Just don’t put my name on the wall.’” Fowler insisted.

Another name, among several gracing one of the new HQ’s spaces, is ArtsWatch’s own Joe Cantrell, thanks to capital campaign donors Nancy Ives (who’s worked with Cantrell often) and Truman Collins, who wanted to recognize his artistry by naming a gallery space at the entrance to the performance hall.
The new arts center also looks to the future. For the first time, All Classical now has a dedicated studio for youth mentorship, which allows students (35 and counting so far) to conduct interviews with artists, astronauts, athletes, and more for the station’s International Children’s Arts Network (ICAN). The new Moonflower Studio is “a game-changer,” Nance says. “In five years, I hope we’ll look back and say that was a profound pivotal moment for the organization that allowed us to get the next generation to have ownership of this place. We can start dialogues we might not otherwise have started.”
There’s much more, and more to come. Nance envisions near-future efforts involving music and healing, culinary arts (it’s Portland, after all), even a theater company in residence, and more. And yes, she’s already dropping those buzzwords into staff conversations. Right now, the staff is still settling into its new home.
“Now we’re in that phase of, how do we maximize the space?” she explains. “It’s been such a whirlwind, and we’re still learning the equipment. It’s such an opportunity. Let’s look at the math, and make sure we’re covering our expenses, but also making the space as accessible as possible to local artists.”

All Classical Portland’s new headquarters is already far more than merely a broadcast studio and administrative office. Nance and her team dreamed big, and since moving into the space beginning in August, “I believe that dream has been realized,” Nance says. “We’ve really all just been here for three months, and already, every artist who has been in the space has said, ‘I want to create in this space.’ That’s exactly why we created this home for All Classical.”
Nance also hopes its new home will benefit more than the station, its listeners, and the artists who create there.
“We want to get people out and connecting here with other humans, experiencing great art,” she says. “That’s the way to help everybody, to help local businesses and stimulate the economy. People coming in to experience those artistic endeavors will also help to activate Portland and move this city forward in a vibrant way,” she says, “with the arts leading the way.”
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Read more stories about Oregon cultural hubs. Donate to All Classical Portland here.
This kind of innovative, collaborative thinking and leadership is what Portland has always been about. So glad to see the arts leading the way to create a newer, fresher version of the city that is hopefully more accessible and inspirational for all Portlanders. In other words: This is rad.
Portland is so lucky to have Joe Cantrell contributing to the arts. His widely varied life experiences are reflected in his photos.
What a great wrap, Bob and Brett! Way to go. And what a joy and honor to be even a tangential part of all this.