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  • Montavilla Jazz Festival 2019

    Montavilla Jazz Festival 2019

    · Beyond Category

    Montavilla Jazz Festival 2019 was a few months ago, but hearing the voices of these artists brings back vivid memories of all the music we heard that weekend. Like we’ve come to expect, the music was incredibly diverse and the atmosphere was warm and inviting. You’ll hear why that is as you listen to the artists talking about their work and about the festival itself. Before 2019 comes to a close, please make a donation to Montavilla Jazz Festival and to Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble to keep this music community strong!

  • Gordon Lee

    Gordon Lee

    · Beyond Category

    On Saturday May 18th PJCE honors the late saxophonist and composer Jim Pepper in a concert at the Old Church. We’ll play music by Jim Pepper, Gordon Lee, and Glay Giberson, as well as music by our guest, hip hop artist and traditional singer and dancer 2 8 Tha Native, arranged by Farnell Newton and Stephanie Kitson.

    Jim Pepper, who identified with the Kaw and Creek tribes, was a Native American jazz innovator who is best known for a song that reached the Billboard charts, Witchi Tai To. Pepper’s was an incredibly distinctive voice on the tenor saxophone, and had fruitful collaborations with many other A-list jazz players, often on the avant-garde side of the spectrum—Don Cherry, Paul Motian, Charlie Haden and Mal Waldron, among others. He also worked extensively with Portland’s own Gordon Lee, who talked with me about how he met Jim Pepper, and the “supernatural” effect that this man—who Lee jokingly called “the older brother I never wanted”—had on his life.

    Tickets for the May 18th concert are on sale now at pjce.org. Get $5 off your purchase with the code “beyond” at checkout.

    Also you can learn more about Jim Pepper and our program honoring him at Oregon Historical Society on May 10th at noon. Jazz writer Rick Mitchell gives an introduction on Pepper’s role in jazz’s larger story, Gordon Lee will talk about Jim Pepper and perform with 2 8 Tha Native, who will also talk about his own work in hip hop and that of other native artists in Portland today.

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  • Ezra Weiss

    Ezra Weiss

    · Beyond Category

    I talked with composer Ezra Weiss as two big projects of his go out into the world. First the release the studio recording of From Maxville to Vanport, featuring his music, and lyrics by S. Renee Mitchell sung by Marilyn Keller; and second, a concert taking place this Saturday, December 8th, 2018 at the Alberta Abbey featuring Ezra’s latest composition, We Limit Not the Truth of God.

    The two pieces have a lot in common. They’re both concert-length jazz suites that tell stories about who we were as human beings in general and Oregonians in particular, and both say something about how the future can be better than the past. We talked about what it means to make music with a more socially-engaged perspective, and what the difference is between art and propaganda.

  • Montavilla Jazz Festival Recap - Part Two

    Montavilla Jazz Festival Recap - Part Two

    · Beyond Category

    This is the second installment of a two-part series recapping the 2018 Montavilla Jazz Festival. This time I talk with Neil Mattson, MJF Executive Director, about how the festival went in terms of ticket sales, budgets, and attendance, you know, the stuff you can measure. And then we get into the intangible measures of the project’s success—the gut feelings he has about whether or not it’s worth it to keep on doing what everyone thought was a fool’s errand five years ago. Fortunately for all of us, I think Neil is ready to be foolish for at least one year more.

  • Montavilla Jazz Festival Recap, Part I

    Montavilla Jazz Festival Recap, Part I

    · Beyond Category

    If you were at the 2018 Montavilla Jazz Festival on August 19th or 20th in Portland, OR, then you felt the excitement. But if you weren’t, I hope this episode will give you a taste of the music and the people that made the event special. Interviews with Shao Way Wu, saxophonist Idit Shner, KBOO radio personality Daniel Flessas, and the Saturday headliner saxophonist Nicole Glover in this episode.

  • Trio Untold

    Trio Untold

    · Beyond Category

    Trio Untold, with James Miley on piano and keyboards, Mike Nord on guitar and electronics, and Ryan Biesack on drums, is the thirty-third release on PJCE Records. It drops Friday September 14th. Stream and buy it at pjce.bandcamp.com.

  • Ryan Meagher's Evil Twin

    Ryan Meagher's Evil Twin

    · Beyond Category

    Ryan Meagher’s new album of “collective spontaneous composition” is called Evil Twin, and its the 32nd release on PJCE Records. You can hear the band perform live at the 2018 Montavilla Jazz Festival, on August 18th at 4:10 pm. Learn more and get your tickets at montavillajazzfest.com. The album drops August 17th. Stream and buy the album at pjce.bandcamp.com.

  • James Miley's

    James Miley's "Watershed Suite"

    · Beyond Category

    The Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble gives two world premiere performances of James Miley’s newest work “Watershed Suite.” This six-movement piece is inspired by distinctive bodies of water in the Oregon landscape, from the Tamolitch Pool to Oaks Bottom, capturing the spirit of each through music. James Miley joins PJCE Executive Director Douglas Detrick for a conversation about the piece taped at Sellwood Riverside Park, on the banks of the Willamette River.

    Learn more at pjce.org/watershed.

    Episode Transcript

    [Doug] Welcome to Beyond Category. I’m Douglas Detrick.

    The Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble gives two world premiere performances of James Miley’s newest work “Watershed Suite.” This six-movement piece is inspired by distinctive bodies of water in the Oregon landscape, from the Tamolitch Pool to Oaks Bottom, capturing the spirit of each through music. Head to pjce.org/watershed to learn more about this new piece and the performances in August, 2018.

    And stay tuned for the release of Trio Untold, with James Miley on piano and keyboards, Mike Nord guitar and electronics, and Ryan Biesack on drums. It’s the thirty-third release on PJCE Records, and it drops this September.

    Here’s the episode.

    [ambient tape: “I hear water”] ?

    [James] This is James Miley, I’m a composer/pianist.

    [Doug] Meeting near a waterway seemed appropriate.

    We are down along the Willamette River, this is Sellwood Riverfront Park. We’re looking at the Sellwood Bridge, listening to waves from a really noisy boat that just went by a little while ago.

    I’m doing two projects with PJCE this summer. First is a trio recording that’s going to be out in September with Mike Nord and Ryan Biesack, and that’s called Trio Untold. It’s all freely improvised music in the moment. And the second is a new piece for the ensemble and that’s called the Watershed Suite.

    Each section is inspired by a waterway here in Oregon. And I’m using watershed, the term, fairly loosely. I settled on it mostly because of the connection to the idea of a drainage basin, a large area that a river gives identity to. And, the concept of shedding, as musicians.

    [Doug] This is a bit of a musician’s joke. If you hear a musician say they need to “shed” a particular piece of music, that means they need to practice it. Shed is short for woodshed, which is where a musician would go, as the story goes, to practice away from an audience.

    [James] I wanted to write a piece about the Tamolitch Pool, the Blue Pool, down near Eugene up off the McKenzie River. Which is an extraordinary place. If you haven’t gone, you need to check it out. It’s a spot where the river goes under ground then bubbles up in this intensely deep blue color that doesn’t seem real at all. I wasn’t prepared when I saw it. I thought “oh it’ll be some water, and it’s blue, and it will be pretty” but it’s really really wild. It’s, I don’t know, thiry-ish feet deep, and you can see all the way down to the bottom, just a really deep, kind of intelligent kind of blue.

    I had all these sketches, all these ideas, and I just couldn’t come up with the thing that was working for me to elicit some sense of that place and how it makes me feel. In the process of doing this, we were editing the trio disc and all of this improvise music that we just kind of made up in the moment, and there’s a piece on there that really speaks to this place. So I went back into that and used that material to write a new large ensemble piece.

    Static is not the right word. It feels very serene. All the way through it feels like it’s got this flat sheen, there’s a feeling that you’re looking at something very deep but it never burbles to the surface. Which made me think of that pool, where you stand and you look at it and if you jumped in you wouldn’t be able to swim to the bottom of it. It looks closer than it is, but nothing is quite what it seems.

    The water is the connecting point but each one has a specific kind of sensibility to it. What I’ve always loved about Oaks Bottom is that you can get lost in there in a way after this crazy day in a big city. You can find yourself on a path in the middle of these wetlands, staring at a great blue heron, and then realize I’m sitting in the middle of this amazing place and I’m ten minutes from home. So, it’s the most urban of the settings, yet it has these qualities that it can transport you to a different place.

    [Doug] Finding inspiration in bodies of water is fitting for James Miley’s music. He crafts melodies with an amazing rhythmic lightness. The music dynamic and dazzling on the surface, but there’s always movement and depth underpinning it.

    He holds a doctorate in music from the University of Oregon, and currently is Assistant Professor of Music at Willamette University in Salem. He was born in California, but his studies and creative pursuits have taken him to Nevada, Virginia, Michigan, Arizona, Texas and abroad to Hong Kong and Kathmandu. He’s a master of composing for jazz ensemble, and that comes from a huge range of experience, including professional jazz bands, classical ensembles, and years spent teaching jazz in colleges and high schools all over the country.

    So it means something when he says about Portland and the Montavilla Jazz Festival that...

    [James] There’s more talent here per capita than any other place that I’ve lived. Even in Los Angeles, there are amazing musicians but there’s also ten million people and you drive two and a half hours between gigs. I think an opportunity to showcase what we have here and connect with the community on a grass roots level is fantastic.

    [Doug] If you’re in Eugene, come hear the ensemble play “Watershed Suite” at Roaring Rapids on Thursday, August 16th at 7 pm, free admission! If you’re in Portland, we play Saturday, August 18th at 5:30 at the Montavilla Jazz Festival. Go to pjce.org/watershed to get reserved or VIP stageside tickets. General Admission tickets are available at the door only, but your reserved seating ticket gets you General Admission access to see the whole festival. Learn more about rest of the festival lineup at montavillajazzfest.com.

    Have you heard the ensemble play a few times? Have you listened to some recordings on PJCE Records? Maybe you’re a subscriber to this podcast? If you enjoy this music and media, and you want to see us make more of it in the future, I encourage you to become a PJCE Sustainer. You can make a tax-deductible donation of as little as $60/year, or $5 per month, and get access to discounts on concert tickets and PJCE Records releases, and invitations to Sustainers-only events.

    We’re offering a $10 discount for Montavilla Jazz Festival reserved seating tickets, and you’ll be invited to a special reception with James Miley in September, available only to PJCE Sustainers. You’re going to have a million questions running through your mind after you hear his incredible music. Come to the reception and you can ask him all of them. Head on over to pjce.org/sustain to become a PJCE Sustainer and we’ll send you all the details.

    This has been Beyond Category, I’m Douglas Detrick, Executive Director and Podcaster-in-Chief of the Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble. Thanks for listening.

  • Other Barry

    Other Barry

    · Beyond Category

    The 31st release on PJCE Records is “Escape Route,” by Other Barry, a bionic power trio led by George Colligan on keyboards, with Micah Hummel on drums and Enzo Irace on guitar.

    Transcript:

    [Doug] PJCE Records artists Other Barry, a trio led by George Colligan, play at 2:50 pm, Saturday August 18th at the 2018 Montavilla Jazz Festival in Northeast Portland. Tickets available at montavillajazzfest.com, and you buy or stream the album at pjce.bandcamp.com. Here’s the episode.

    Welcome to Beyond Category, I’m Douglas Detrick. The 31st release on PJCE Records is “Escape Route,” by Other Barry, a bionic power trio led by George Colligan on keyboards, with Micah Hummel on drums and Enzo Irace on guitar. The music is adrenaline-drenched, electronica-infused, jazz music that doesn’t mind being a bit complicated, even nerdy in its complexity. Picture Superman in beast mode, alternating between a dapper Clark Kent sipping a latte while he scrolls through his Instagram feed, and maybe that gives you an idea.

    [Music: Thing 3]

    The energy of the album starts at ten, and goes to eleven more than a few times, but not without entering some ethereal, fragile spaces.

    [Music: Pad]

    [George Colligan] I’m George Colligan and I played keyboards on the record.

    [Micah Hummel] I’m Micah Hummel and I played drums.

    [Doug] George Colligan, the veteran of this trio by at least a few decades, picked two of his students who share an interest in this aesthetic approach, and who were ready for a challenge. There’s a long tradition of a more experienced bandleader hiring young players. The iconic drummer Art Blakey came to mind for George.

    [George] Art Blakey always wanted quality musicians, but at a certain point he went for young musicians, just like Betty Carter would go for young musicians. There’s different reasons for that...you can pay them less. But also to have the mentor/mentee relationship.

    [Doug] That kind of relationship was important to Micah Hummel.

    [Micah] George is basically why I moved here. Musically he’s just very inspiring, and open minded, willing to let me contribute to the conversation on the band stand.

    [Doug] There are different reasons for an established older musician to work with younger players. It could include real opportunities for the youngsters to give input, or it could just be about having someone to obey commands. Allowing for an equal exchange of ideas was critical to the formation of this band and this album.

    [Music Thing 5]

    [George] I want it to be open to interpretation. I don’t like to overthink it or overexplain it. And this ties into the teaching part of it. I would say that I’m teaching by giving an opportunity to these young musicians to find the interpretation by themselves, you know what I mean, rather than by saying this is exactly what you should do.

    [George] Here’s the thing generally about this project, is that there is a set component, but I always like to find that balance between written and spontaneity. Even though some of it is more quote unquote groove based, there’s still that spirit of interaction.

    [Micah] One of my favorite drummers is Lewis Cole from Knower, and obviously Mark Guiliana and Nate Wood. What I love about them is that they can emulate machines in such a natural way. And I love that, but it can also be very restricting. I feel like this project and this group allows me to do the best of both worlds. Almost exactly like George was saying about pre-planning and spontaneity. I can have an idea of what I want to do, but there’s a lot of flexibility and I don’t have to be tied down.

    [Doug] The last tune on the album, Revenge, is a rhythmic tour de force. Micah thought it showed the precision they achieved as a group. He thought...

    [Micah] ...it would fall apart if everybody wasn’t on the same page and if there wasn’t that precise element about it.

    [Doug] The last tune on the album, Revenge, is a rhythmic tour de force. Micah thought it showed the precision they achieved as a group. He thought...

    [Micah] ...it would fall apart if everybody wasn’t on the same page and if there wasn’t that precise element about it.

    [Doug] Finding musicians who can perform well in that environment can be a challenge no matter how experienced they are. George Colligan had more to say about Micah Hummel and Enzo Irace. Both young players have great technique, but there’s more to it than that.

    [George] It’s about how to play with some maturity, how to develop a sense of taste, how to not play sometimes, when to leave stuff out. And I think Enzo has a lot of that instinctually. When I watch him play I get the same feeling as I do from older guys, they have a thoughtfulness about what they play, it’s not just a million notes.

    [Music: Intro to Thing 5]

    [George] I think Micah really brought this balance that we were talking about before. A project like this won’t work if it’s all about precision, and it also won’t work it it’s totally organic, so there has to be that balance. Micah has his own grooves. I’m hearing other drummers in town imitate them, so that’s a good sign for Micah, that he’s already become a local icon for certain types of grooves. There was a young guy at PSU and I was like ‘that’s some Micah Hummel stuff you’re playing.’

    [Doug] The mentorship between George and Micah has been fruitful, but it almost didn’t happen.

    [George] When somebody really good auditions, you remember that. He had a really great audition and we were like ‘we need to get this guy here.’ It was a finance issue and he didn’t end up coming. Then a few years went by and ran into this trumpet player named Noah Simpson, at the Reno Jazz Festival, and Noah was like “I’m from Arizona,” and I said “there was this drummer who auditioned for us a few years ago. What was his name?” and Noah said “Micah Hummel?” and I said “yeah, what happened to him?” And he said “he’s just chillin’, he didn’t end up going to college.” And I was like “get him on the phone.”

    [Doug] The record comes out July 20th, 2018. Buy or stream the music at pjce.bandcamp.com. And you can hear this superhuman band play live at the Montavilla Jazz Festival, 2:50 pm, Saturday August 18th. Tickets are available at Montavillajazzfest.com where you can by a full-festival GA pass. You can buy a reserved seat for each set, which comes with festival pass. This festival is a gem of the Portland arts scene, and it’s the best opportunity for a Portland jazz fan to hear what Portland artists do when they have complete artistic freedom. It’s a special experience, and I want you all to be there.

    The Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble performs at 5:30. We’ll be playing Watershed Suite, a new multi-movement piece by the acclaimed composer James Miley. Finally, if you love what we do at PJCE and you want to get even closer, become a PJCE Sustainer. You’ll get a discount code for reserved seats at Montavilla Jazz Festival for our set, free tickets and discounts for other PJCE concerts, and exclusive invitations to hang with PJCE artists and more. Become a Sustainer at pjce.org.

  • Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill

    Lady Day at Emerson's Bar and Grill

    · Beyond Category

    Portland Center Stage is presenting “Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill,” from May 26 to July 1 at The Armory in Portland’s Pearl District. Use the discount code “PJCE” for $10 off your ticket to any performance of this incredible production.

    And, don't miss a special concert featuring Portland-based singer-songwriter Jimmy Herrod with a sextet of PJCE musicians. We’ll be playing a new song by Jimmie, and songs written or made famous by Billie Holiday arranged by Kerry Politzer, Clay Giberson, and Alex Koehler. It’ll be a bit like a live version of this podcast with musical performances, questions and answers with the artists, and more information about one of jazz’s most iconic masters using some of Billie Holiday’s own words from archival audio. Join us to get a deeper experience of “Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill” and a deeper appreciation of an American original.

    The concert is Sunday, June 24th at Portland Center Stage. There’s a reception at 6 pm in the atrium, and the concert starts at 7 pm in the Ellen Bye Studio. “Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill” does not perform that night. More information at pjce.org.

    And don’t forget to use the code PJCE for $10 off your tickets.

  • From Maxville to Vanport

    From Maxville to Vanport

    · Beyond Category

    “Nothin’ but white people and sheep,” is how one Maxville logger described the tiny town of Maxville, Oregon. Oregon's racist history is well-known, but we rarely hear from the people of color who thrived in spite of it.

    FROM MAXVILLE TO VANPORT celebrates the blue-collar African American experience in 20th century Oregon with new jazz, blues, R&B with a twelve piece band and two short films. Lyricist S. Renee Mitchell, filmmaker Kalimah Abioto, composer Ezra Weiss, and vocalist Marilyn Keller illuminate unheard stories of Oregon’s black history through a live performance with the Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble.

    This episode, first in a series about the most ambitious project ever undertaken by the PJCE, shares some if the community input we received at events in Portland and Joseph, Oregon. More information at http://pjce.org/maxville-to-vanport/.

  • Grasshoppers 2018

    Grasshoppers 2018

    · Beyond Category

    The Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble’s Grasshoppers Young Composers Program is now in its third year with six new students. Hear new music by these young artists March 25th, 2018 at The 1905 from 7 to 8 pm. An open composer’s jam session follows, and there’s no cover charge.

    Grasshoppers 2018 was sponsored by Vino Veritas wine bar in the Montavilla neighborhood, and the Lynne Detrick Memorial Fund.

  • Holler Sessions

    Holler Sessions

    · Beyond Category

    Frank Boyd's one-man show is a profane yet passionate "love letter to jazz." In this episode of Beyond Category, sponsored by Oregon Arts Watch, PJCE Executive Director Douglas Detrick interviews the show's creator, director and performer about this production staged as a live jazz radio broadcast.

  • Edna Vazquez

    Edna Vazquez

    · Beyond Category

    Edna Vazquez joins the PJCE’s 12-piece jazz ensemble February 15th at the Old Church in Portland, February 16 at Mt Hood Community College in Gresham, and February 17th at the Columbia Center for the Arts in Hood River. If you get your ticket before they all sell out, you’ll hear the incredible passion she brings to every performance. Her energy is unforgettable, and even if you don’t speak Spanish, you’ll understand every word.

  • Andrew Oliver

    Andrew Oliver

    · Beyond Category

    Andrew Oliver, co-founder of the PJCE, lives in London now, but back in 2008 he and a group of ambitious graduates of Portland State University staged the first concert in the group's history. Oliver didn't know what he was getting himself into, but we're glad he did.

    [Andrew] I was stupid enough to make a 501(c)3 without having any idea of what I was getting into


    [Doug] Welcome to Beyond Category, from the Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble. I’m Douglas Detrick.

    This season, we’re celebrating a big milestone: the PJCE is turning ten. Our first concert, in January of 2008, was a grand experiment. Co-founders Andrew Oliver and Gus Slayton wanted to produce a concert of new music for their own large jazz ensemble. They were passionate about the project, but they had no idea if anyone else would care. Fortunately for all of us, it turned people did care, a lot of them. The energy from that night powered the organization through its tenuous early days, and it’s still feeding us today.

    [music]

    Before the organization incorporated as a 501c3, the PJCE was just a group of friends, mostly recent graduates and members of the big band at Portland State University. They ended the school year with a disappointment that pushed them to take action. I talked with Andrew Oliver, co-founder of the PJCE, from Portland while he recorded his answers in London.

    [Andrew] It had to do with this big band festival in Notre Dame. We didn’t get marked that highly, because we didn’t play like a traditional big band. It was interactive big band playing...improvising, the rhythm section was really active, and the judges were like “well that was very traditional, the rhythm section didn’t support the horns very well” and blah blah blah. And Charley was kind of offended because that was his total aesthetic and he’d been working us all year to achieve that sound.

    [Doug] He’s talking about Charley Gray, the director of the PSU big band.

    [Andrew] There was a bit of momentum after that. We got back, and it was me and gus, and Kevin Van Geem and Kyle Williams, and we said we have this stuff to play, so why don’t we get together at the Union sometime, since that was the only big room we had access to, and play this stuff, you know. So, that happened on Canada Day
 I remember it was on Canada Day because that’s the password of all the


    [Doug] I’m going to jump in here and confirm that yes, all of the passwords for the organization’s online accounts were canadaday with some number after it—canadaday1, canadaday2008 with a capital C
 And yes, we’ve changed all of our passwords since then.

    [Andrew] So, first of July, ok. That happened in July, the next month after graduation.

    [Douglas] The idea turned into a rehearsal.

    [Andrew] We just played the tunes for fun, and that was basically it. We didn’t have any other ideas. But by the autumn we had that idea that we’d do this concert. So I think we had very many rehearsals, and then I got excited as usual, and I thought “let’s do this concert!”

    [Andrew] The first concert was my band and the PJCE. We had a mix of pieces, by Gus, and me, and Eric Allen, and stuff that we had written for the PSU big band that we repurposed. And then we had some other pieces. Matt Wiers wrote a piece, and John Nastos wrote a piece.

    [Andrew] KMHD was very loose in those days. So you could just go in and talk. I think it was Lynn’s show, and we didn’t have any time restrictions so we just kind of went and hung out for the whole show. We were just chatting about it for an hour, between all the songs. It was unbelievable. So many people came! People came from the Oregon Coast because they heard us on there, I remember. There was some sort of incredible momentum. We had no expectations, but the place was totally packed. It just seemed at the time that all of these people showed up out of the woodwork. Whether or not the music lived up to it at the time I have no idea. I don’t think the concert was very good, it certainly wasn’t very well rehearsed. It was just all vibe, basically.

    [Douglas (on tape)] Tell me about the vibe. What was it like to be there, when you think back about it now?

    [Andrew] It was one of the first things I did in Portland where there seemed to be interest because of the idea. When I think back about why I was so excited about it, I think that was why. The idea behind it was what drove it, was what drove the interest and was why there was such a good atmosphere in the room.

    [Douglas (on tape)] How do you think things changed over your tenure? How did you make a transition from something that was pretty informal to something that was a little bit more organized, more of a thing.

    [Andrew] I guess what happened, inevitably, was that once the high of that wore off, slowly—we did a few more concerts after that, another couple of concerts at the store and at the Old Church—it was getting a bit crazy because more people were getting involved, and more people were wanting to write more complicated music, myself included. And the we still didn’t really have any money. I think as all those things began to come together, it got to a point where the balance got off. The music was too hard to perform well based on the amount of time people were willing to rehearse without getting paid.

    [Andrew] It seemed easy in my mind. I didn’t realize how much of a monster it was going to be. Here’s an opportunity for us to get some more money, and that will allow us more time to rehearse and commission better music, or rehearse the music we had, or play in better venues.

    [Andrew] The reason for having a large group became a challenge. At first we didn’t have to have a reason for having a large group. We just wanted to do it, so we did. And there was no reason. The reason that we wanted to have a large group changed over time. At the time when we started and even when we became a non-profit, I mean it seems naive, but I didn’t think about why we had a large group other than that we wanted to have a large group. But later on when we were trying to do more conceptual projects, I thought, damn, I wish we just had a quartet, or we could have just a quartet.

    [Douglas (on tape)] Have you thought of an answer to that question now? About why it was that you guys did that, and why it was worth doing.

    [Andrew] Well, I think we were just young and excited. When we started to write for large group, no of us had done it before. I mean it was really excited from a compositional standpoint, to be able to have all those voices and textures at your disposal. I still think the original reason was valid. To have a large group for the sake of writing for a large group because you enjoy is great, it’s as good as doing any thing else. It was an innocent decision. Later on this stuff came as a result of having a large group because you need more money to pay more people and this kind of thing. The decision to have a large group was just an artistic decision, which was good.

    [Douglas (on tape)] I love the naivete


    [Andrew] Oh man, it would never have happened if it weren’t for that. I would never do something like this now. I would never start something like this now. At all.

    [Douglas (on tape)] And I wouldn’t have either. The fact that it was already there, and there was already a 501c3 and there was already a board. Even though there was tons of work to do, to try to make it into what I would want it to be if I was going to do it. If you hadn’t started it, I wouldn’t have done it, and it wouldn’t be here now.

    [Andrew] Yeah, but that’s why it’s’ good. We needed both me and you. I was stupid enough to randomly start a 501c3 without any idea of what I was getting into. But I never had the vision to make it work beyond just starting it.

    [music]

    [Doug] A few important ingredients came together when the PJCE began—some good luck, some support from the community, and a whole lot of youthful exuberance. The organization has changed a lot, but we’ve stayed true to mission that was established that night—new jazz music that is innovative, collaborative, and community-oriented.

    [music]

    Today with the PJCE, fundraising matters, ticket sales matter, budgeting and strategic planning matter. But, we still have the same twinkle in our eyes and flutter in our hearts that Andrew and his collaborators had. Those feelings guide us now just as much as they did in 2008.

    This episode is going live just before the end of 2017. But no matter when you’re listening, you can take the next step from being a podcast subscriber to being a PJCE Sustainer. Yes, you too can be one of the wonderful people that support us with contributions as little as $5 a month. Do it now at pjce.org/sustain.

    I’m Douglas Detrick, Executive Director and podcaster-in-chief at the Portland Jazz Composers Emsemble and you’ve been listening to Beyond Category. Music in this episode was composed by Andrew Oliver, from his PJCE Records album “Northwest Continuum” which you can purchase at pjce.bandcamp.com.

    Thanks for listening.

  • Montavilla Jazz Festival 2017

    Montavilla Jazz Festival 2017

    · Beyond Category

    This episode is a collection of interviews I did at the 2017 Montavilla Jazz Festival in Portland, Oregon, mostly August 20th. I talked to artists, festival leadership, and a few other members of the jazz community who helped make the event happen. And from what I heard, both in terms of the music and what people had to say about the festival, the Montavilla Jazz Festival is most definitely here to stay, and it has become an indispensable part of Portland’s jazz scene.

  • Jasnam Daya Singh

    Jasnam Daya Singh

    · Beyond Category

    Jasnam Daya Singh, a pianist and composer originally from Brazil, has composed a new piece for the Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble called “Ektah: The Unity Project.” When Jasnam begins a new piece of music, he begins not with a melody in mind, but with a word. This helps to give the piece a purpose, and help him focus his attention on that purpose. In this case, the word was "unity." We had a conversation about the new piece, and about how inspiration, respect, and gratitude combine with hard work in the process of writing music.

    The Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble performs Jasnam Daya Singh’s “Ektah: The Unity Project” with the composer on piano 7 pm, August 16th at Roaring Rapids in Eugene, OR, and 4:20 pm August 19th at the Montavilla Jazz Festival in Portland, OR. All the details are available at our website: pjce.org.

  • Montavilla Jazz Festival 2016

    Montavilla Jazz Festival 2016

    · Beyond Category

    The 4th annual Montavilla Jazz Festival is August 19th and 20th, 2017. Get all the information at montavillajazzfest.com. This year’s festival features headliner Essiet Essiet with Sylvia Cuenca, the Rich Halley Five with Vinny Golia, the Blue Cranes, the David Friesen Quartet, and us, the Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble playing new music by Jasnam Daya Singh.

    I had my headphones and my microphone out at last year’s festival, talking to pretty much everyone: artists, volunteers, listeners, and sponsors. These are some of my favorite interviews from last year, to get you excited for what’s coming up this year. Don’t miss this festival, it’s the jazz event of the summer.

  • Andrew Durkin's

    Andrew Durkin's "Breath of Fire"

    · Beyond Category

    Andrew Durkin's "Breath of Fire" is out now on PJCE Records! This pianist and composer, who led the firebrand Industrial Jazz Group in concerts around the world, releases his first album in seven years. The meditative music is inspired by Durkin's yoga practice, which he has started as way to keep his body flexible, and his spirit engaged.

  • Eddie Bond

    Eddie Bond

    · Beyond Category

    Eddie Bond makes the unheard sounds of the bridges of Portland audible in his new composition for the Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble's Oregonophony concerts April 13th at Willamette University in Salem, and April 15th at the Fremont Theatre in Portland.

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