Galileo Galilei (Portland Opera)

And yet it moves—backward.

Performance Like the movie Memento, the play Betrayal and the musical Merrily We Roll Along, Portland Opera’s new production of Philip Glass’ Galileo Galilei proceeds backward in time. Directed by Kevin Newbu   More

 

Wednesday, March 28, 2012 BRETT CAMPBELL

March Music Moderne

Bob Priest carpet bombs the city with new sounds.

Performance In 1980, young composer Bob Priest visited Poland to attend Warsaw Autumn, one of the best known annual festivals of contemporary “classical” music. He resolved to create a similar celebrati   More

 

Wednesday, February 29, 2012 BRETT CAMPBELL

Here’s Where the Strings Come In

A survey of jazz guitar from Django to the Portland Jazz Festival.

Music Stories There’s no official theme for this year’s Portland Jazz Festival. That’s fine: They’re often contrived anyway. Still, the presence of Seattle’s Bill Frisell and Berkeleyite-turned-Brookl   More

 

Wednesday, February 22, 2012 BRETT CAMPBELL

One More Round of Fertile Ground Reviews

Album Review: Bridgetown Sextet

New Old Fashioned (Self-Released)

Music Stories [THROWBACK JAZZ] The title of this spiffy new CD accurately describes the local retro-jazzers, who bring a relatively youthful exuberance to 15 concise takes on vintage pre-World War II hits by    More

 

Wednesday, January 4, 2012 BRETT CAMPBELL

Opera Theater Oregon, Opera vs. Cinema

Want to make Wagner fun? Add pirates.

Performance One of the city’s most innovative arts companies enters a new phase Friday, Nov. 25, with The Black Pirate vs. The Flying Dutchman, its first show under new artistic director Erica Melton, who’s b   More

 

Wednesday, November 23, 2011 BRETT CAMPBELL

Review: Portland Opera, "The Marriage of Figaro"

Arts & Books The brilliance of The Marriage of Figaro lies in its cheery dramatization of serious political conflicts in the guise of a Shakespearean bedroom farce. In Portland Opera's production of Mozart and da Ponte’s proto-feminist classic, when the bed is front and center, cheeky sex comedy hijinks dominate. Suitors skulk in, under a...   More

 

Monday, November 7, 2011 by BRETT CAMPBELL

Children’s Games (Seth Nehil)

Ling long bling a ling ling!

Performance The program for composer Seth Nehil’s new “sonic cinematic performance” lists 19 sources: “Phylogenetic Thinking in Biology and Historical Linguistics,” “On the Limitations of the Iconog   More

 

Wednesday, November 2, 2011 BRETT CAMPBELL

Electrogals

Bleeps and bloops aren’t just for boys.

Performance In 1995, Mills College student Heather Perkins was surprised to find herself one of the few women in a graduate electronic-music class. Mills, one of America’s most prominent undergraduate women   More

 

Wednesday, October 5, 2011 BRETT CAMPBELL

Fall Arts Guide 2011: Bring On the Rain

Dayglo landscapes, feral children, killer choruses and more art to keep you sane this fall.

Cover Story The day is coming, not long from now, when you will have to go inside.
   More

 

Wednesday, September 14, 2011 BRETT CAMPBELL, RICHARD SPEER, BEN WATERHOUSE, HEATHER WISNER