Ken Vandermark (reeds) and the renowned Norwegian drummer Paal Nilssen-Love— one of the most prolific duos in improvised music today—join us once again on the CMG stage.
A Ken Vandermark and PNL pairing promises to be an exhilarating listening experience. PNL’s intensity on drums is matched by Vandermark’s on reeds; combining extreme and swift rhythms with deconstructed then reassembled melodic phrases, the duo represents the highest calibre of free jazz and improvisation, while often eschewing genres themselves. As is evident in their past efforts together, Vandermark and PNL’s programs vary greatly in texture and mood – ranging from lung-bursting ferocity to chamber-like solemnity, while also rarely failing to realize a good opportunity to get funky.
PNL grew up in a Norwegian jazz club that his parents ran, and from an early age was drawn to play the drums, as his father had been. By 20 he was a renowned percussionist, and from there his reputation has soared. He has for several years been among the most vaunted of instrumentalists in improvised music.
Ken Vandermark, a multi-reedist, composer, MacArthur Fellow, and community organizer, has poured his energy back into the vibrant Chicago jazz scene where he rose to acclaim. Yet despite his accomplishments as an organizational leader, it is Vandermark’s massive body of work as a composer and improviser that has earned him such widespread renown.
Vandermark did not play with PNL until 2000. Their lasting collaboration began with the formation of the ensemble School Days, and soon carried over to the trio FME, which also includes bass player Nate McBride. For Vandermark and PNL the chemistry was immediately apparent, and it was only natural to transition into the duo format. They first explored this setting in 2002, recording the powerful, Dual Pleasure, for Oslo’s smalltownsupersound label. For good measure they did it again a year later, releasing the two-disc set Dual Pleasure 2. Since then they have released several albums and worked together in several memorable contexts, including The Thing with Mats Gustafsson and Ingebrigt Håker Flaten, and The Peter Brötzmann Chicago Tentet.
Ken Vandermark and PNL photo by Claudio Casanova
bandcamp: illegalson.bandcamp.com
website: illegalson.cargo.site
Illegal Son is an interpretation of the Undocumented way of life through Sound and Music. day to day there is no promise of a tomorrow, there is only hope and fear – the revelry of another day is what i hope for.
to process life under the umbrella of being Undocumented consists of improvisation, constant back and forth of wondering what’s next; the music, the sounds, and ear of Illegal Son is improvisation. it’s insecure, it’s unstable, but hopeful.
the trombone is my voice and my path as an Undocumented Immigrant is to uplift the countless voices of those unheard like mine.
i am Undocumented, Unafraid, and Proud of it.
https://bluecranes.bandcamp.com
https://battletrance.bandcamp.com
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Since their formation in 2007, Blue Cranes have become a key player in the Portland, Oregon creative music/DIY scene and one of the most exciting groups to keep tabs on in the Northwest. They’ve developed a singular musical voice grounded in melody and explosive improvisations–marking off their unique microcosmic territory in post-jazz circles.
The members of the quintet–Reed Wallsmith on alto saxophone, Joe Cunningham on tenor saxophone, Rebecca Sanborn on keyboards, Jon Shaw on bass, and Ji Tanzer on drums–bring a unique array of experiences to their group-centered aesthetic, including work with AU, The Decemberists, Laura Veirs, Golden Retriever, Wayne Horvitz, Like A Villain, Rebecca Gates, Laura Gibson, Ethan Rose, Dirty Revival, Loch Lomond, and Portland Cello Project.
Blue Cranes’ latest full-length album, Swim (on the Washington, D.C.-based Cuneiform Records), is a departure from their previous, in some ways simpler, releases. Steered dutifully by producer Nate Query of The Decemberists, it is a window into the sometimes messy emotional space of a group struggling with and celebrating the ephemeralness of life. This work is the culmination of several between-album projects, including a 30-day crowd-sourced Amtrak train tour, and a seven day group composition retreat, supported in part by a grant from Portland’s Regional Arts and Culture Council. However, the heart of Swim lies in indelibly profound life events–the passing away of two dear friends, a serious injury, two weddings, and the birth of a child–events at tragic and uplifting extremes, both cathartic and celebratory.
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Battle Trance is a genre-defying ensemble of four tenor saxophonists: Travis Laplante, Patrick Breiner, Matthew Nelson, andJeremy Viner. They perform the compositions of Travis Laplante.
Sun 10.16
1905
830 N Shaver St
4pm Jack Radsliff’s Jam Session
7pm & 9pm
Miles Okazaki/ Dan Weiss Duo (NY)
Tix:
Mon 10.17 7pm
Blue Butler Studios
2400 SE Holgate Blvd
EXPERIMENTAL DISCUSSION
Building Community
w/ Honest Jams
& Roman Norfleet and The Be Present Art Group
Tues10.18 8pm
No Fun
1709 SE Hawthorne Blvd
Noah Simpson/ Domo Branch/ Mike Gamble
Space Jammerz
Wed 10.19 7pm
Speck’s
8216 N Denver Ave
Max Kutner (NYC)
Casual Decay
Lorin Benedict (SF)
Thursday 10.20 8pm
Holocene
1001 SE Morrison St
and/Or you
meroitic
Lorin Benedict / Machado Mijiga
Friday 10.21 8pm
Leaven Community
5431 NE 20th Ave
David Torn / John Niekrasz / Mike Gamble
Alexis Mahler / Lindsay Dreyer
Mike Lockwood’s Safe Travels
Late night
1905
830 N Shaver St
11:30 pm
Carpe Diem w/ Machado Mijiga/ Garrett Baxter/Matt Sazima and Special Guest Lorin Benedict
Saturday 10.22
Old Church
1422 SW 11th Ave
David Torn + Corzi și Arcuri “Tall Tales (direct translations from the lost tongue)”
(NYC)
viola
Michelle Alany
Isabel Damman
Chibia
Alexis mahler
Cello
Harlan Silverman
Guitar
Mike Gamble
Alex Callenberger
Ryan Miller
TIX:
Late night 11:30pm
1905
830 N Shaver St
GOOSH w/ Machado Mijiga / Milo Fultz / Dario Lapoma special guest Lorin Benedict
Sunday 10.23 8pm
Fixin to
8218 N Lombard St
Round Robin Hosted by Machado Mijiga
w/ Haley Heynderickx
Denzel Mendoza
Alexander Thomas
Matthew Holmes
Logan Strosahl
David Berry
Lorin Benedict
TICKETS:
Monday 10.24 8pm
TurnTurnTurn
8 NE Killingsworth St
Halfbird
Maxx Katz
Touch System
Tues 10.25 8pm
NO FUN
1709 SE Hawthorne Blvd
Matt Mayhall’s Sift
Logan Strosahl’s New Normal
WED 10.26 8pm
XHURCH
4550 NE 20th Ave,
Aesthetic.Stalemate
Vern / Vo
Crystal Quartez
Sat 10.29 – 8pm
Discordance
Hosted by Caspar Sonnet
Leaven Community
5431 NE 20th Ave
Gabie Strong
Ian Wellman / Caspar Sonnet
Leather Jester
Cody Bryant
THURSDAY, OCTOBER 20
Doors: 8pm
$15
PLEASE NOTE: For the safety of our customers, we will be requiring proof of full COVID vaccination to enter the venue, until further notice. More details at holocene.org/vaccine
Andrew Jones is a multifarious bassist, composer and songwriter who has recorded with folk and pop songwriters and modern jazz instrumentalists, performed with live hiphop and electronic bands and accompanied visiting experimentalists and theater productions via the Improvisation Summit of Portland and Time Based Art Festivals. Outside of town, Jones has had recurring work with artists from New York and Los Angeles- most recently a fourteen-month international touring stint with acclaimed songwriter/composer Julia Holter. However, among his closest musical compatriots he’s known mostly for his sometimes elusive solo-turned duo project The Crenshaw, whose full-length album features Jones singing poetic and sometimes tongue-in-cheek lyrics atop off kilter beats, warped synth samples and his own upright bass ostinatos. For his forthcoming record, Andrew is renaming that project ‘and/or you.’ Portland’s Creative Music Guild has invited him to assemble an expanded ensemble to bring his singular brand of dense and mysterious art pop to life for the 2022 Improvisation Summit of Portland, which will feature a rogue’s gallery of musicians:: Mike Lockwood (Drums), Max Kutner (NYC) (Guitar), Lily Breshears (Harp), Maxx Katz (Flute), Noah Bernstein (Alto Saxophone), Patrick McCulley (Tenor/other Saxophones).
meroitic is a sound & movement based project of black interdisciplinary artist & composer jamondria harris. Their work uses words, sounds, wires, instruments, textiles & what falls into their hands to engage with blackness, desire, spirit/source,narratology/folklore, & ontologies of liberation over& through sex, gender & embodiment.
Classically-trained, jazz-weathered, and eclectically inclined, Machado Mijiga left the proverbial creative “box” at a very early age, with access to many instruments and a diverse musical background brought about by an intercultural heritage.Mijiga is a musical polymath; composer, producer, bandleader, educator, gear fanatic, and audio engineer, to name a few.
Lorin Benedict is an improvising vocalist (scat singer, essentially) who works in the areas of jazz and related music. He co-leads several small groups dedicated to playing highly structured music in a manifestly loose and playful way.
Visual art by Francis Wong: Francis Wong is a Chinese-American, multimedia alchemist based in Southeast Louisiana outside of New Orleans. His primary mediums include mixed media painting, photo/video, music and puppetry.
5431 NE 20th Ave, Portland, OR 97211
100 NE Martin Luther King Jr Blvd, Portland, OR 97232
Discordance is proud to present Chris Cogburn’s festival NO IDEA. This event will feature noise legend Jeph Jerman and film “The Finger’d Removed” directed by Patrick Danse (director’s cut). The bill will also include local latent Caspar Sonnet and Doug Theriault. Thank you for your interest and we hope to see you all there!
Venue: Leaven Community
Doors: 7:30
Cover: $10
Further details about Jeph (FCA excerpt)
Jeph Jerman is a musician who began his musical career drumming and playing in bar bands. In the 1980s, he became aware of other sonic possibilities for his drum kit and started learning to improvise and record his own music. During this time Jerman was a frequent collaborator with other musicians who were also exploring improvisational techniques. In the mid-1980s, Jerman founded a cassette label for the distribution of music by himself and friends. The label released over 50 cassettes, several LPs, and a short-lived magazine.
After relocating from Colorado to Seattle, Jerman continued playing with local groups of improvisers and began giving solo performances where he improvised with mostly natural found objects, a practice he continues today. He founded the first animist orchestra dedicated to making larger scale works using natural object play. In 1999, Jerman moved to Cottonwood, AZ. He continues to investigate sound and recording in many forms including field recordings, the building of crude sound making devices, and the effects of age and other damage to analog tape. Jerman’s 2014 Grants to Artists award funded recording and touring with Tim Barnes. Jerman continues to collaborate with Dave Knott in a band collectively known as The Yes, Well, and with Tim Barnes, with whom collaborated on an FCA-supported record released in 2015 (Erstwhile Records.) Other CDs and works are available on Anomalous Records, Semperflorens, and Trait Media Works.
Chris Cogburn (bio)
Percussionist who works mainly in the field of improvised music. Current practices focus on the threshold between acoustic and electronic sounds, their differing timbral qualities, and their sites of resonance. The tension between just intonation and the unfettered resonances of objects is a burgeoning concern informing his most recent work.
Cogburn has performed around the world including: Anahuacalli Museum (Mexico City), James Turrell’s Roden Crater (Arizona, USA), Ausland (Berlin), Cinemateket (Oslo). His current music projects include: Resonance with Iván Naranjo (MX); Anáhuac with Ignaz Schick (DE) and Juan García (MX); A Spirale with Italian musicians Mario Gabola and Maurizio Argenziano; and Fear of the Object, an audio-visual improvisation ensemble with the Norwegian video artist Kjell Bjørgeengen and a rotating cast of guest artists including Ingar Zach (NO), Juan García (MX), Aimée Theriot (MX/NL) and Judith Hamann (AU). Chris has released recordings on several labels including: Astral Spirits, Another Timbre, INSUB, Simple Geometry and Balance Point Acoustics.
Since 2003, Cogburn has organized the annual No Idea Festival. Based in Austin, Texas, No Idea events have also been held in San Antonio, Houston, Marfa, Fort Worth, Dallas, New Orleans, Mexico City and Merida, Yucatán and have featured artists from around the world.
100 NE Martin Luther King Jr Blvd, Portland, OR 97232
100 NE Martin Luther King Jr Blvd, Portland, OR 97232
