COAST

Coast through summer: theater, music, visual art along the beach

Entertainment along the Oregon Coast includes old-time melodramas, jazz performances and art celebrating birds.

July 12, 2018 // COAST, CULTURE, FAMILY, MUSIC, THEATER, VISUAL ART //

Hot, sunny days make it prime viewing season for the art and entertainment nature offers along the Oregon Coast. But when the sand, wind and occasional rain get to be too much, beachgoers can find plenty of manmade amusements. Summer on the coast brings theater performances, gallery shows and music.

Not every stage welcomes cheers, boos and popcorn-throwing, but that’s how The Astor Street Opry Company defines audience participation during their performances of Shanghaied in Astoria. Given this is their 34th season presenting the play, they must be doing something right. In their words, it’s live, award-winning, family friendly, historical and hysterical; part vaudeville, part soap opera and an entertaining look at cultural folklore on the Columbia River. The story, directed this year by Ashley Mundel, centers on the “shanghaiing” of the play’s hero and his daring rescue in melodramatic style. It runs at 7 p.m. Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, and 2 p.m. Sundays, July 12 through Sept. 1. Tickets range from $10 to $20. Get the details here.

The Astor Street Opry Company is presenting its 34th season of “Shanghaied in Astoria.”

“Saxophonist to the stars” Patrick Lamb takes the stage at the Coaster Theatre Playhouse in Cannon Beach at 7:30 p.m. Sunday, July 15, as part of the Tom Drumheller Summer Series. Lamb’s last three singles have made the national Billboard Charts, and he was recently inducted into the Oregon Music Hall of Fame. He’s toured with Smokey Robinson, Esperanza Spalding, Gino Vannelli, Bobby Caldwell, Jeff Lorber Fusion, among others, and is now touring solo.

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Henk Pander brings Vanport to Newport

In his first show in Newport, the celebrated Portland painter reflects not only on the devastating 1948 flood, but also on his childhood, racism and war.

July 3, 2018 // COAST, NEWS & NOTES, VISUAL ART //

NEWPORT — When celebrated Portland artist Henk Pander opens his show here Friday, July 6, it will mark not only his first exhibit in this coastal town, but also the first time nearly all of the watercolors have been out of his studio.

Times of Our Lives: Selected Watercolors by Henk Pander will run from July 6 through Sept. 2 in the Runyan Gallery at the Newport Visual Arts Center. The show, presented by the Oregon Coast Council for the Arts, will feature large-scale watercolors and works from Pander’s recent series, War Memories, Liberty Ships and the Climate Refugees of Vanport.

“Buildings Are Floating” is among Henk Pander’s large scale watercolors on the theme of the Vanport flood.

Pander said he painted the watercolors for the Vanport Mosaic project, which commemorates the city north of Portland that was wiped out on Memorial Day 1948, when a dike broke, flooding the town in less than an hour and displacing 40,000 people. Many of the residents worked in the shipyards and included African Americans who were not welcome in Portland.

The Vanport watercolors were shown briefly this spring as part of the Vanport Mosaic Festival in Portland, Pander noted, but never in a gallery. His previous work on Vanport felt dated, he said.

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The gift(s) of David Ogden Stiers

The late "M*A*S*H" star, who lived in Newport, took an active role in the Oregon coast's cultural life. After his death in March, he kept on giving.

May 16, 2018 // COAST, NEWS & NOTES //

NEWPORT – Two months after his death, the generosity for which the actor and musician David Ogden Stiers was known in this central Oregon coast community continues.

The 75-year-old Stiers died March 3 of bladder cancer at his home in Newport. A well-known national figure at home in this small coastal town, he was best-known for his role as the stuffy Major Charles Emerson Winchester III in the TV series M*A*S*H, for which he was twice nominated for an Emmy Award. He was also a stage actor, debuting on Broadway in 1973 in productions of Chekhov’s The Three Sisters and as Peachum in The Threepenny Opera, and a frequent voice for animated film characters, including the Disney hit Lilo and Stitch and as Cogsworth, the imperious talking clock, in Disney’s Beauty and the Beast.

David Ogden Stiers (left) with Alan Alda in a 1980 episode of “M*A*S*H.” 20th Century Fox

Stiers didn’t just live in Newport, he took an active part in the central coast’s cultural life, and his last will and testament reveals some of the many ways his influence continues. Filed April 17 in Lincoln County Circuit Court, it details numerous donations to nonprofit organizations. He left his collection of CDs and DVDs to the Newport Public Library and his collection of audio recordings (LPs and 78s), his wine collection, artwork and pen collection to the Newport Symphony Orchestra, which he often conducted. He also gave $50,000 each to the Southern Poverty Law Center; My Sisters’ Place; Samaritan House, Inc.; the Oregon Coast Council for the Arts; and the Children’s Advocacy Center of Lincoln County, as well as $50,000 to the University of Maryland, Eastern Shore to establish a scholarship program for persons planning a career in politics.

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The Washed Ashore Project: Saving the Seas with Art

Bandon-based nonprofit works to change attitudes by transforming ocean-killing garbage into sculptures

September 3, 2017 // COAST, CULTURE, FAMILY, VISUAL ART //

By DAVID GOLDSTEIN

Last month, as my wife and I entered Oregon on a cross-country journey, we wandered into what initially looked to be an unassuming art gallery in a little southern Oregon coast town. Huge sculptures filled the space. We looked at them closely — and suddenly realized that each was made from thousands of pieces of trash.

We had stumbled upon the Washed Ashore Project gallery in Old Town Bandon-by-the-Sea.

Flowering from the debris. Photo: The Washed Ashore Project

When Bandon artist Angela Haseltine Pozzi noticed the huge amount of plastic pollution on southern Oregon’s beaches, she wondered where all that garbage was coming from. So she did some research. Pozzi learned that plastic pollution has spread to every ocean and marine habitat in the world, and has entered every level of the ocean food chain, from whales to plankton. Turtles, fish, and other sea life ingest floating plastic bags, mistaking them for jellyfish. More than half the world’s sea turtles have eaten plastic, and partly as a result, almost all of their species are threatened or endangered. Other sea animals become ensnared in discarded fishing line, six-pack can holders, and other debris — more than 300 billion pounds of it, clogging Earth’s oceans and killing its creatures.

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What’s jazz got to do with it?

Darrell Grant: Art, environment and politics in the Elliott State Forest

April 10, 2017 // COAST, CULTURE, MUSIC //

By LYNN DARROCH

On April 1, pianist, composer and Portland State University Professor Darrell Grant led a collaborative performance with fellow Oregon-based musicians to celebrate the Elliott State Forest and advocate for keeping it in public ownership. Their effort came at the invitation of Forest advocates from Coos County in advance of a vote by the Oregon Land Board, scheduled for May 9, that will determine whether or not to sell the Forest’s 82,500 acres for $202.8 million to help fund public schools.

Grant wanted to find out if art can influence that decision.

Entering the Elliott State Forest/Photo by Lynn Darroch

“I want to publicly acknowledge the land as a source of creative inspiration for so many of us lucky enough to live here,” Grant said, explaining what moved him to haul a piano up and down 15 miles of logging roads. His latest album, “The Territory,” makes explicit that connection in nine movements that capture, in sound, the terrain and shared history from which he believes local art draws its flavor.

He had other reasons for going into the Forest, too. “As a person of color,” he continued, “I want the Land Board to know that this is my forest too … as much my legacy to future generations of Oregonians as anyone’s. And, as much as Oregon’s underserved children deserve a quality education, they also deserve to retain their rights to their forests.”

Darrell Grant – ” The Territory” World Premiere July, 6, 2013, Mvt 9: “New Land” from DGM Media on Vimeo.

In pursuit of those goals, he said, “I am compelled to explore the possibility that there are ways to achieve change other than…protest, resistance and political threat.”

And the Elliott State Forest has generated plenty of those political threats of late. Required by law to manage the Forest to produce revenue for public schools, the state has consistently failed to meet harvest goals—due to environmental and species protections that limited logging, some argue, though larger economic forces may have had a hand, too. In 2015, the Land Board set terms for a sale, hoping to bring in money the state could invest to ensure the Elliott Forest benefits public schools. Such a sale would mean the state would no longer own the land, and, despite protections and good faith efforts by timber companies, the Forest could become a tree farm managed for maximum harvest. Many of the attendees Saturday, on the other hand, believe the forest should be treated as legacy: a habitat for salmon, seabirds and other creatures that thrive in undamaged, diverse ecosystems.

Could a musical performance—and whatever publicity it generates—impact the Land Board’s decision? Could it inspire ideas for mechanisms to fund K-12 education besides selling the state’s remaining forests? Could it create a new way of approaching issues such as these?

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A death in the family: Rick Bartow

An Oregon giant dies at 69: "We’re made up as much of what we’ve lost as what we’ve gained"

April 4, 2016 // COAST, CULTURE, VISUAL ART //

The news came this Sunday morning, as news so often does, via Facebook. A mutual friend posted something sad and cryptic, about losing a good friend the previous night, but she named no name. I scrolled down a little more, and came on another post, from his longtime close friend and gallerist, Charles Froelick, along with a picture of Rick looking not lean and energetic and on the brink of sideways laughter, as I suspect I’ll always think of him, but gaunt and reflective, as if moving slowly to somewhere else, someplace private and unbreachable.

“I’m gathered with incredible people who have broken hearts and strong spirits,” Charles wrote. “Rick Bartow passed away last evening after bravely battling congestive heart failure. His family and close friends surrounded him with love as he exited Earth. His poetry and genius will live on. More info and service plans will be announced.”

Rick Bartow, 2015. Photo courtesy K.B. Dixon, from his book "Face to Face: 32 Oregon Artists"

Rick Bartow, 2015. Photo courtesy K.B. Dixon, from his book “Face to Face: 32 Oregon Artists”

So there it was. And I found myself responding not first as a journalist – here is news, and it needs to be told, and I must tell it – but viscerally. This wasn’t just a public loss, but a personal one as well. I had written about Rick, this extraordinary Oregon artist and man, several times, and I knew him, not well, but in certain ways deeply: He had told me things and shown me things that people don’t always tell and show when a stranger asks to step into their lives for a while, and that humility and generosity created some sort of bond.

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Astoria Music Festival’s St. John Passion: Dramatic effect

Performance of J.S. Bach’s choral-orchestral masterpiece takes an opera-worthy approach.

June 23, 2015 // COAST, MUSIC //

by BRUCE BROWNE

If you haven’t been to Astoria in while, you’ve missed some things. No, not the Goonies, but the changes all over the city and environs. Boutique hotels and vintage kitsch, fabulous restaurants and a riverwalk. And then there is passionate music.

Star-studded with nationally and internationally known singers and instrumentalists, the Astoria Music Festival has grown from its founding in 2003, with just a single work (The Marriage of Figaro) featuring university students, to this year’s cornucopia of diverse offerings over a period of 17 days. The total cast includes Northwest singers such as Amy Hansen, Richard Zeller and Angela Meade, and players Sarah Kwak (concertmaster of the Oregon Symphony Orchestra), organist Henry Lebedinsky, and stellar lutenist Hideki Yamaya.

Keith Clark led the Astoria Music Festival's performance of Bach's St. John Passion. Photo: Dwight Caswell.

Keith Clark led the Astoria Music Festival’s performance of Bach’s St. John Passion. Photo: Dwight Caswell.

Last Saturday night featured the first choral work of the Festival: J.S. Bach’s Johannes Passion (St. John Passion). Keith Clark, co-founder and artistic director of the Festival, staged the sacred offering for full dramatic effect and the overall effect was stirring.

This is one of Bach’s greatest “operas.” That is to say, the four Passions of Christ (only two of the four are left to us: St. John and St. Matthew) were written to use all the tools of an opera (aria, recitative, arioso, chorus) to portray the drama in the Passion story. They’re called Passions, because that genre is specifically from one of the synoptic gospels narrating the “Passion week,” leading to the crucifixion of Jesus. They are as dramatic as any opera.

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