Chehalem Cultural Center celebrates MLK Jr. Day with music, film, and a call to action

Roughly 300 people gathered at Monday’s event in Newberg for a multi-media production by Denver’s Mizel Museum.
Members of "At the Table With Dr. King" from Denver's Mizel Museum perform during Monday's Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebration at the Chehalem Cultural Center. Photo by: David Bates
Members of “At the Table With Dr. King,” from Denver’s Mizel Museum, perform during Monday’s Martin Luther King Jr. Day celebration at the Chehalem Cultural Center. Photo by: David Bates

The audience of roughly 300 celebrating Martin Luther King Jr. Day on Monday night in the Chehalem Cultural Center got a little bit of everything: jazz, gospel singing, poetry, history, film, and personal reflections by performers. Of course, the voice of King himself was heard throughout the hour-long show, as images of the late civil rights leader and Christian minister, slain in 1968, flickered across two screens in the center’s ballroom.

An excerpt from King’s I Have a Dream speech was played, but the multi-media production brought to Newberg by the Denver-based Mizel Museum opened with a lesser known sermon: A Knock at Midnight, delivered by King early in the summer of 1967 at Mt. Zion Baptist Church in Cincinnati.

The 15th annual Newberg celebration coincided with what many in the crowd regarded as our own “knock at midnight,” a metaphor King used to characterize the “midnight in our world,” the darkness “so deep that we can hardly see which way to turn”: the inauguration of an openly authoritarian U.S. President.

It was only the second time since Ronald Reagan signed the holiday into law in 1983 that MLK Jr. Day coincided with an inauguration. On Jan. 20, 1998, Bill Clinton was sworn in for a second term.

Rick Muthiah, director of Learning Support Services at George Fox University, delivers opening remarks at Monday night's presentation. The Chehalem Cultural Center's 15-year-old MLK Jr. Day celebration was initiated by his father, a United Methodist minister, and Muthiah has been involved in the organizing committee since. Besides Muthiah, this year's committee included Rus St. Cyr, Bobbye Hernandez, Jody Jones, Lisi Jones, and JeanneAnn Faris Comiskey. Photo by: David Bates
Rick Muthiah, director of Learning Support Services at George Fox University, delivers opening remarks at Monday night’s presentation. The Chehalem Cultural Center’s 15-year-old MLK Jr. Day celebration was initiated by his father, a United Methodist minister, and Muthiah has been involved in the organizing committee since. This year’s committee included Muthiah, Rus St. Cyr, Bobbye Hernandez, Jody Jones, Lisi Jones, and JeanneAnn Faris Comiskey. Photo by: David Bates

Rick Muthiah, who heads the Learning and Support Services at nearby George Fox University and whose father, a retired United Methodist minister, was instrumental in starting the Newberg celebration 15 years ago, acknowledged that elephant in the room at the outset.

“I’ve been thinking of this reality for months, even before the election, what this day would be like and the potential feelings that might arise, depending on the outcome,” Muthiah said. “Many have concerns about the incoming administration and how it diverges from the message of Dr. King, his consistent challenge against the triple evils of racism, poverty, and militarism. I recognize some in the audience might feel some despair over what’s been promised in the coming days, months, and years.”

But, he added, he hoped those who are enthused by Donald Trump’s election were also in attendance, acknowledging their belief that the new administration “will be for the good of our communities. My hope is that individuals with both perspectives are found in this room, because if those of us from across the political and social spectrum do not inhabit the same physical and social spaces, then we indeed have cause for despair.”

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If there was any despair, none was visible Monday night.

At the Table With Dr. King was conceived in 2008 in Colorado, according to Dave LeMieux, one of the founders and the group’s creative director. Officials in Aurora, a Denver suburb, first asked his local church if they could use the building for their MLK Jr. Day celebration. That morphed into an invitation to help reboot an event that, after 18 years, some felt had grown stale.

“They were a little bit tired of their own idea, and they were open to creative suggestions,” LeMieux told me over the weekend by phone. He was in New England with one of At the Table’s teams, which do these presentations all over the country — more than 500 of them so far.

The group comprises professional touring artists from Colorado, Tennessee, Georgia, Washington, and California and has an international reach. Since its inception, tens of thousands of students in the U.S. and overseas have seen the show, which honors King by challenging the audience “to listen for and respond to the unique call upon their lives to serve others.”

Lisi Jones (left), Newberg High School junior and president of the school’s Black Student Union and Ayahna Bahati (second from right), a George Fox University senior and president of the private Christian school's Black Student Union, joined members of At the Table group on stage to read "The Hill We Climb," the poem written by Amanda Gorman for President Joe Biden’s inauguration on Jan. 20, 2021. Photo by: David Bates
Lisi Jones (left), Newberg High School junior and president of the school’s Black Student Union, and Ayahna Bahati (second from right), a George Fox University senior and president of the private Christian school’s Black Student Union, joined members of At the Table group on stage to read “The Hill We Climb,” the poem written by Amanda Gorman for President Joe Biden’s inauguration on Jan. 20, 2021. Photo by: David Bates

LeMieux is a musician, and his artistic instincts led him to lobby for a story-based production, a performance with a strong narrative. “I was thinking that would just honor his legacy more,” he said. “He was such a gifted orator, and he used the power of a plot curve every time he spoke.”

Over time, the group produced an hour’s worth of music, multi-media, and dialogue, some of it with the audience. Each performance is tailored to a specific audience; they visit a lot of schools, so the story is told in an age-appropriate way. 

The story is that of King himself, starting with the evening when he received a death threat telephoned to his home. LeMieux calls this a crucial turning point — a “call to action” that performers urge the audience to heed themselves.

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“He knew the threat was serious, and he had to make a decision to move forward or take a step backward,” he said.

More than a decade and many steps forward later, King was assassinated on April 4, 1968, at the Lorraine Motel in Memphis, Tenn. That ugly moment was represented on the screens with excerpts from TV news announcements.

Audience members attending the presentations find themselves brought into the story.

After one musical interlude featuring Colorado’s Derek Banach on trumpet, during which the audience spontaneously joined with snapping fingers, another musician drove the point home. “What just happened there,” she said, “was call-and-response, but that’s not just for jazz. It’s also in politics.”

Toward the end of the production, black-and-white images of young people flashed across the screen with a note indicating how they’ve chosen to make their world a better place: working on environmental restoration, caring for the elderly, building homes in Africa, even helping other students with their homework.

Muthiah returned to that theme — social justice and community service — after the show, directing everyone’s attention to resources in the printed program showing local groups that welcome volunteer support and involvement.

Sponsors of Monday’s event included the Oregon Cultural Trust, the Yamhill County Cultural Coalition, Rotary Club of Newberg, and George Fox University.

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David Bates is an Oregon journalist with more than 20 years as a newspaper editor and reporter in the Willamette Valley, covering virtually every topic imaginable and with a strong background in arts/culture journalism. He has lived in Yamhill County since 1996 and is working as a freelance writer. He has a long history of involvement in the theater arts, acting and on occasion directing for Gallery Players of Oregon and other area theaters. You can also find him on Substack, where he writes about art and culture at Artlandia.

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  1. Donna

    Great event. Inspirational and it really salvaged the day for me.

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