Resonance Ensemble announces exciting new collaborations.
Resonance Ensemble announces additional partnerships for “Portland Protests” concert.
A concert reflecting on Portland’s racial justice protests and our collective hopes for this city
PORTLAND, OR — Resonance Ensemble announces exciting new collaborations in their upcoming “Portland Protests” concert, taking place at the Historic Alberta House on Saturday, March 18 and Sunday, March 19, 2023. Led by guest conductor Shohei Kobayashi, Resonance will offer an evening of vocal music and poetry in dialogue with film, visual art, and photography, joined by a string quartet from Portland’s Fear No Music, exhibits by Vanport Mosaic, and additional featured artists.
Works by Margaret Bonds, David Lang, and Joel Thompson will be heard alongside newly commissioned poetry and music by acclaimed local poets and composers. With texts from writer A. Mimi Sei, Resonance Ensemble Poet-in-Residence S. Renee Mitchell, and spoken word artist Vin Shambry set to music by Judy A. Rose, Kimberly Osberg, and Fear No Music’s Kenji Bunch, audiences will be invited to consider and intentionally remember our city’s past, collectively grieve, and dare to envision more just futures.
Also featured:
Vanport Mosaic presents four large-scale oil paintings by Portland-based Dutch artist Henk Pander, created in response to 2020’s racial justice protests. As part of the exhibit, visitors will also be able to watch The Stain, a short documentary by Jacob Pander about his father and his lifelong commitment to unmasking fascism, shaped by his childhood in Nazi-occupied Holland.
Images from the 2020 Portland protests by photographer Tojo Andrianarivo will be projected during the concert.
Documentary filmmakers and Portland-based media artists Jodi Darby, Julie Perini and Erin Yanke share an excerpt from their film Arresting Power: Resisting Police Violence in Portland, Oregon, documenting the history of conflict between the Portland police and community members.
A panel discussion will follow, inviting conversation and reflection.
“These artists have borne witness to major events in Portland’s history. In sharing their individual stories through their artistic disciplines, they remind us of the power of the arts to provide a layered, thought-provoking experience,” says Resonance Artistic Director and founder Katherine FitzGibbon. “This is Resonance’s mission in action, bringing powerful new music and art to life that makes us all think and want to create change.”
“To share these new works with this ensemble is an honor,” adds Shohei Kobayashi, guest conductor and co-artistic advisor for Resonance Ensemble. “These new choral works, their texts, and the visual and film media all speak to shared humanity, loss and being lost, the courage and fearlessness of the protesters, deep emotional exhaustion, and resilient, insistent hope.”
Vin Shambry, a frequent Resonance guest artist and Artistic Director for Historic Alberta House, reflected on this fifth season of collaborations between Resonance and the NE Portland event space.
Laura Lo Forti, Vanport Mosaic co-founder and co-director
“My relationship with Resonance is deep and rooted in our shared commitment to reaching and engaging voices from our community that have been disproportionately impacted by social, economic, and racial injustices,” says Shambry. “Portland Protests is a call to remind us all of the power of art to inspire change and heal our souls. I am grateful for the opportunity to add my writings to this experience and look forward to another incredible Resonance concert.”
"As memory activists," said Laura Lo Forti, Vanport Mosaic co-founder and co-director, "our work is grounded on the belief that artists are witnesses to history while offering powerful images of healing and possibility. We are honored to present the stunning artwork by Henk Pander and to be part of this unique collaboration with Resonance Ensemble and Alberta House."
Single tickets are now on sale at resonancechoral.org. For more information on Historic Alberta House, including transit and parking, visit resonancechoral.org/alberta-house
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PORTLAND PROTESTS
WHEN: Saturday, March 18 @ 7:30 pm | Sunday, March 19 @ 3:00 pm
WHERE: Historic Alberta House | 5131 NE 23rd Ave, Portland, OR
TICKETS: Single tickets are on sale now. click here
Single ticket prices: $35/adult, $30/senior, $10/student, and $5/Arts for All
Note to Journalists: Katherine FitzGibbon, Shohei Kobayashi, Damien Geter as well as the commissioned artists are available for print, online, and broadcast interviews. If you would like more information on our season or would like to schedule an interview, please contact Liz Bacon Brownson at liz@resonancechoral.org or by calling 971-212-8034.
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Resonance Ensemble Access Project (REAP) Providing free, online access to the music. Video access available on all concerts; donations gratefully accepted
We are proud to present the Resonance Ensemble Access Project (REAP), our initiative to ensure that all of our concerts are available to the world both in-person and online. Providing this vital accessibility also increases the expenses of producing our concerts, so we are asking our supporters to consider an additional donation to underwrite this access for those who cannot afford to donate.
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About Resonance Ensemble
In its fourteenth season, Resonance Ensemble, a professional vocal ensemble based in Portland, Oregon, creates thoughtful programs that promote meaningful social change. Resonance Ensemble works to amplify voices that have long been silenced, and they do so through moving, thematic concerts that highlight solo and choral voices, new and underrepresented composers, visual and other performing artists, and community partners. Under Artistic Director Katherine FitzGibbon, Resonance Ensemble has performed challenging and diverse music, always with an eye toward unusual collaborations with artistic partners from around the country: poets, jazz musicians, singer-songwriters, painters, dancers.
The Resonance Ensemble singers are “one of the Northwest’s finest choirs” (Willamette Week), with gorgeous vocal tone, and they also make music with heart. The groundbreaking work that Resonance Ensemble has been producing over the last few years has been noted by local media and national arts organizations. In Oregon Arts Watch, Matthew Andrews described Resonance as “Part social commentary, part group therapy, and part best damn choir show in town;” (June 2019) Chorus America honored Artistic Director Katherine FitzGibbon in the summer of 2019 with the Louis Botto Award for Innovative Action and Entrepreneurial Zeal for her work rededicating Resonance to promoting meaningful social change, and for the meaningful community partnerships she creates. For the tribute to Dr. FitzGibbon, please visit https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oaJMVozrcPo.
About Artistic Director Katherine FitzGibbon:
Katherine FitzGibbon is Professor of Music and Director of Choral Activities at Lewis & Clark College, where she conducts two of the three choirs and oversees the vibrant voice, choral, and opera areas. In 2014, she was an inaugural winner of the Lorry Lokey Faculty Excellence Award, honoring “inspired teaching, rigorous scholarship, demonstrated leadership, and creative accomplishments,” and in 2019, she received the David Savage Award for “vision and sustained service.” She has also conducted choirs at Harvard, Boston, Cornell, and Clark Universities, and at the University of Michigan and has served on the faculty of Berkshire Choral International.
Dr. FitzGibbon founded Resonance Ensemble in 2009, initially dedicated to thematic, collaborative vocal performances with artistic partners. In the last several years, she and Resonance have shifted their mission, using the same innovative thematic programming approach to amplify voices that have long been silenced, focusing on underrepresented composers and communities. In June of 2019, Chorus America honored Dr. FitzGibbon with the prestigious Louis Botto Award for Innovative Action and Entrepreneurial Zeal in recognition of her work with Resonance Ensemble. Chorus America’s press release noted, “As founder and artistic director of Resonance Ensemble, FitzGibbon has captained a bold organizational shift—from its original mission exploring links between music, art, poetry, and theater, to a new focus exclusively on presenting concerts that promote meaningful social change.”
With Resonance, she has collaborated with the Portland Art Museum, Third Angle New Music, Portland Chamber Orchestra, Thomas Lauderdale and Hunter Noack, poet/performer S. Renee Mitchell, the Chuck Israels Jazz Orchestra, and many actors, composers, visual artists, and dancers. Resonance has been described as “one of the Northwest’s finest choirs” (Willamette Week) and “the best damn choir show in town” (Oregon Arts Watch). She has commissioned new works from Melissa Dunphy, Renee Favand-See, Damien Geter, Joe Kye, A. Rose, Kenji Bunch, Kimberly Osberg, Freddy Vilches, Vin Shambry, Dr. S. Renee Mitchell, Mari Ésabel Valverde, and Jasmine Barnes.
Dr. FitzGibbon is President-Elect of the National Collegiate Choral Organization, and her choirs have performed at the NCCO, ACDA, and OMEA conferences. She holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in music from Princeton University, Master of Music degree in conducting from the University of Michigan, and Doctor of Musical Arts degree in conducting at Boston University. Her research has been presented and published internationally.
About Historic Alberta House
Is a Creative Community Center intended for all, with a focus that is committed to reaching and engaging voices from our community that have been disproportionately impacted by Oregon’s social, economic, and racial injustices. Surrounded by and intertwined with the reminders of a complex history marked by vibrancy, resiliency, and ingenuity, as well as racism, exclusion, and trauma, we open the doors of this historic building for the community to explore.
About Vanport Mosaic
The Vanport Mosaic is a memory-activism platform. We amplify, honor, and preserve the silenced histories that surround us in order to understand our present, and create a future where we all belong. Join our effort and help us fight historical amnesia. In 2022 the National Trust for Historic Preservation recognized Vanport Mosaic as one of 80 organizations nationwide using historic places as catalysts for a more just and equitable society, showcasing the multi-layered intersections of underrepresented communities of people.
GUEST ARTISTS
About Guest Conductor/Artistic Advisor Shohei Kobayashi
A multi-faceted musician, Shohei Kobayashi synthesizes their experiences as a conductor, ensemble vocalist, and art song interpreter with their insights as a solo singer/songwriter and bandmate to connect and collaborate with music lovers of all backgrounds. Shohei currently leads the choral program and teaches courses in music theory and musicianship at Reed College.
Shohei got their start as a conductor by assisting the choirs at Lewis & Clark College (led by Resonance founder Dr. Katherine FitzGibbon) and First Presbyterian Church of Portland for two years before going on to pursue graduate studies at University of Michigan in Ann Arbor with Jerry Blackstone and Eugene Rogers. While a student, Shohei served as assistant conductor for the UMS Choral Union, led by Scott Hanoian. From 2016 to 2020, Shohei helped prepare the 175-member auditioned symphonic chorus for collaborations with Budapest Festival Orchestra, New York Philharmonic, Detroit Symphony Orchestra, Minnesota Orchestra, Toledo Symphony Orchestra, and Ann Arbor Symphony Orchestra on works including Bernstein’s Symphony No. 3 (“Kaddish”), Sibelius’s Snöfrid, Mahler’s Symphony No. 2, Beethoven’s Missa Solemnis, and Benjamin Britten’s War Requiem. Highlights include directing a surprise Choral Union appearance in Taylor Mac’s Holiday Sauce and being called up to lead the musicians of the Budapest Festival Orchestra in vocal warm-ups.
Shohei has been selected conducting fellow for numerous workshops, festivals, and masterclasses including Chorus America’s 2018 and 2019 Conducting Academies, Hot Springs Music Festival, National Collegiate Choral Organization’s 2015 and 2017 Conference Masterclasses, Princeton Festival Conducting Masterclass, Interlochen Choral Conducting Institute, and Norfolk Chamber Choir and Choral Conducting Workshop. In previous years, they also attended the 9th Ithaca International Conducting Masterclass, participated in University of Illinois’s Choral Conducting Symposium in Urbana-Champaign, and received the Berkshire Choral International’s Robert Page Conducting Fellowship.
As a professional tenor and ensemble singer, Shohei has sung with ensembles including sounding light, ÆPEX Contemporary Performance, Helmuth Rilling’s Fifth Weimar Bach Academy Chorus, VIR, and Choro in Schola. Shohei currently sings with Resonance Ensemble, Big Mouth Society, and Jecca Jazz Ensemble.
Shohei holds a DMA and MM in Conducting (Choral) from University of Michigan and a BA in Music (composition focus) from Lewis & Clark College.
Since 2013, Shohei has been involved with Resonance in a number of ways from volunteering as a stage hand and sound technician to serving on their board and performing with the ensemble. They join Resonance Ensemble in the 2022-2023 season as a guest conductor and Co-Artistic Advisor.
For more information about Shohei Kobayashi: resonancechoral.org/shohei-kobayashi
About Composer Kenji Bunch
Kenji Bunch uses his work as a composer and performer to look for commonalities between musical traditions, for understandings that transcend cultural or generational barriers, and for empathic connections with his listeners.
Mr. Bunch draws on vernacular musical traditions, his interest in history, the natural world, and his classical training to create new concert music with a unique personal vocabulary that appeals to performers, audiences, and critics alike. After nearly three decades as a professional musician, whose work has been performed by over sixty American orchestras, by chamber musicians on six continents, and has been recorded numerous times, he considers his mission to be the continuing search for and celebration of shared emotional truths about the human experience.
Mr. Bunch maintains an active performing career, and is widely recognized for performing his own groundbreaking works for viola. In the ongoing search for fluency in other musical styles, he developed a deep interest in vernacular American music and improvisation. Mr. Bunch was the fiddle player and vocalist with the band Citigrass for over 15 years, and is a frequent collaborator with jazz, pop, folk, country, rock, and experimental musicians. He has also collaborated extensively with choreographers and filmmakers.
A graduate of the Juilliard School, Mr. Bunch left New York City after 22 memorable years to return to his native Portland, Oregon, where he currently serves as Artistic Director of new music group Fear No Music, and teaches at Portland State University, Reed College, and for the Portland Youth Philharmonic.
For more information about Kenji Bunch’s work: kenjibunch.net
About Composer Kimberly Osberg
Kimberly R. Osberg is a composer from Eau Claire, Wisconsin who specializes in interdisciplinary collaboration. Her projects have included dance, film, environmental sound installations, instrumental theatre, plays, opera, visual art, award ceremonies, and stage combat. Her music has been described as “brilliant,” “highly-engaging,” “wonderfully suspenseful,” and “intensely colorful,” and has received acclaim from academic, commercial, and public audiences alike. She is also an active writer, creating original text for over a dozen musical works—including a tone poem for projected text and chamber orchestra (Rocky Summer, Dallas Chamber Symphony), and an adaptation of Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart” for her operetta, Thump.
Other notable collaborations include projects with the Pittsburg State University Wind Ensemble, the New Voices Opera company, and the Indiana University Department of Theatre, Drama, and Contemporary Dance (including mainstage shows Macbeth and Prospect Hill, and works for dance and stage combat). Since moving to Portland, Oregon in 2020, Kimberly’s prolific output has exploded into a dynamic array of works—including collaborations with the Beau Soir Ensemble, the Merian Ensemble, the Grand Circle New Music Ensemble, the New Mexico Contemporary Ensemble, the Chaski duo, Whistling Hens Ensemble, Calypsus Brass Quintet, Pacific Brass Ensemble, the Bassless Trio, tuo duo, and SANS; duo; not to mention several middle school, high school, and collegiate music programs, as well as countless individual musicians across the country—resulting in over 80 new musical works since January of 2020.
For more information about Kimberly Osberg’s work: kimberlyosberg.com
About Composer Judy A. Rose
Judy A. Rose has a B.S. and M.Ed from Portland State University. She worked for Portland Public Schools as a music teacher for 20 years. She is currently the Upper School Music Teacher at The Catlin Gabel School. Judy is an active composer, music director, accompanist and singer in the Portland Metro area.
Her works have been performed across the country by student and professional singers alike, including performances by Pacific University Chamber Singers, Laude, Phoenix (AZ) Chorale, Grant High School A Cappella Choir, Grant High School Royal Blues, In Medio, Franklin High School Armonia Choir, West Linn HS Symphonic Choir, Portland Symphonic Choir, Willamette Master Singers, Tilikum Choir Community, The Delphian School Choir, Scappoose High School Choir, Newberg High School Choir, Lakeridge High School Choir, Des Moines Lincoln High School Chamber Choir, OSU Bella Voce Treble Choir, Forest Grove High School Choir, Choral Conducting Workshop with Rodney Eichenberger, Pacific Youth Choir and the Oakland Youth Chorus.
Judy’s choral compositions are published with Santa Barbara Music Publishing, and Pilgrim Press. Her latest choral original/arrangement of “Soon Ah Will Be Done” will be published in 2023 in the Gary Packwood Choral Series at Gentry Publications.
In addition to these ensembles, her works have been performed at a wide array of conferences including the various ACDA conferences (Montana, Ohio, Minnesota, Colorado, Oregon, Washington), the CCDA Summer Conference, NJMEA Conference, Northwest ACDA Regional Conference and the West Texas Choral Workshop. She has also been featured on the popular All Classical series “Thursdays at 3,” the Portland Tribune, Moveable Do Podcast, featured on JW Pepper New Sounds (Santa Barbara Music Publishing) and The Columbian. She received a GAP Grant from the Artist Trust in 2019, a composing residency at Centrum in 2020 and in 2021 a month-long composing residency at Hedgebrook on Whidbey Island.
Judy enjoys playing the Native American Flute, birding, wildlife photography, and spending time with her family. Judy & her spouse share their home with Naomi (a rescued Cardigan Corgi & Chesapeake Retriever mix).
For more information about Judy A. Rose’s work: judyarose.com
About Poet S. Renee Mitchell
Dr. S. Renee Mitchell is a published author, curriculum designer, community activist and multi-media artist. She also is a sur-thriver who has found her life purpose since disentangling from bullying, sexual assault, and domestic violence.
After 25 years as an award-winning newspaper journalist - where she was nominated twice for the Pulitzer Prize - Renee reinvented herself as a Creative Revolutionist; co-founded a culturally specific, drop-in DV resource center; and began gifting her talents to community as a poet, playwright, performer, speaker, teaching artist and self-taught graphic designer in order to create and contribute to empowering projects and programs, community healing ceremonies, plays, songs and books about healing from trauma.
Motivated by intention and heart, Renee’s deepest desire is to help others use their creativity to let go, gather up and move on in order to find themselves, their voice, and their place in the world. Her nonprofit, I AM M.O.R.E. centers youth voice, using culturally relevant, trauma-informed practices to help participants learn how to better serve their communities.
For more information about S. Renee Mitchell’s work: reneemitchellspeaks.com
About Poet A. Mimi Sei
Aminata R. Sei (Mimi) is a writer and social justice advocate. She is working on a creative nonfiction account, The Universe Calls Me Daughter, that will chronicle her experiences in Africa, America, and Asia. She graduated from the Anderson Schools of Management at the University of New Mexico. Mimi is reading for a Master of Liberal Arts degree concentrating in Creative Writing and Literature at Harvard University in Cambridge, MA. She has showcased essays and written for Huffington Post, and has penned several articles for Medium.
She is a 2017 inaugural writer for the Stanford University Alumni Writers’ Critique Group, Oregon Chapter. Mimi has also contributed to projects with renowned composers, Interim Music Director and Artistic Advisor for the Portland Opera Damien Geter, and the University of Michigan Director of Choral Activities Eugene Rogers. Her text, Breathe, written for A Cantata for A More Hopeful Tomorrow, premiered with the Washington Chorus in 2020. With Geter she authored the foreword for An African American Requiem, which premiered at the Oregon Symphony in May 2022. In March 2023, she will collaborate with Resonance Ensemble and famed Chicago Opera Vanguard Composer Matthew Recio.
On November 9th, 2016, she wrote “Unite Gather, Heal, Move On,” published by Huffington Post. In October 2018, she showcased two essays and was a featured speaker at Writing as Resistance, a forum discussion on the purposeful and effective use of writing for activism. In 2019, she wrote Sierra Leone - Influencing Change from a Distance. It was featured at the Model UN Forum at the Dalian American International School in Dalian, China. She is also a contributing writer for the quarterly Convent Scoop from St. Joseph’s Secondary School in Freetown, Sierra Leone.
She is the former President of the Catlin Gabel School Parent/Faculty Association, as well as the Trustee and Chair of the School’s Board Inclusion and Diversity Committee. She is passionate about Inclusion and Equity efforts, especially at educational institutions, and is vested in creating safe and welcome spaces to facilitate insightful dialogue and exchange.
Mimi is also a Board Member of the Northwest Chapter of the National Multiple Sclerosis Society and The Resonance Ensemble.
She is an avid reader and a lover of music and all things African. Mimi lives in Portland, Oregon.
For more information about A. Mimi Sei’s work: sei-mimi.medium.com
About Poet Vin Shambry
Vin Shambry, Artistic Director of Historic Alberta House, is a published writer, acclaimed storyteller, international actor and director, painter, and community builder. He grew up in Portland and has traveled the world as an artist and creator. He performed on Broadway as Tom Collins in "Rent" and recently wrapped filming on “Outdoor School,” a feature film based on his life growing up in Portland and his experiences with housing insecurity. He is passionate about creating a safe space for artists in the Black community in Portland to expand their artistic limits, to gather, to create, and to belong. Vin says, “When you create spaces like this, where artists don’t have to conform or change to fit a certain template, their ideas are free to flow and their creativity just expands in a really beautiful way. That is what Historic Alberta House is all about.
For more information about Vin Shambry’s work: vinshambry.com | www.outdoorschoolthemovie.com
About Henk Pander
The Dutch artist Henk Pander arrived in Portland in 1965 and, except for brief periods, has lived there ever since, creating works that challenge status quo modern art of the Pacific Northwest. In his drawings, watercolors, and oil paintings, Pander depicts subjects ranging from the death of friends to erotic fantasies, from the wreck of the New Carissa to the ruins of Ground Zero, and from the skylines of Portland and Amsterdam to abandoned airplanes and automobiles in the American West.
Henk Pander’s works are in many collections, including those of the Rijksmuseum (Amsterdam), Museum Henriette Polak (Zutphen, The Netherlands), City of Amsterdam, City of Portland, Jet Propulsion Laboratory (Pasadena), Portland Art Museum, Frye Art Museum (Seattle), Jordan Schnitzer Museum of Art (University of Oregon), and Hallie Ford Museum of Art (Willamette University), where a fifty-year retrospective exhibition of his work was shown in 2011. His public commissions are at Oregon State University, Oregon Public Safety Academy (Salem), Portland Center for the Visual Arts, and numerous other locations.
For more information about Henk Pander’s work: henkpander.format.com
About Tojo Andrianarivo
Tojo Andrianarivo has over five years of experience as a photographer specializing in portrait and live music. Though he was born in Madagascar, he has resided in the U.S. for the majority of his life—living in four different states—save five years spent in Nairobi, Kenya. Currently he lives in Portland, Oregon, and enjoys exploring all the amazing scenery and food the Northwest has to offer.
Follow Tojo on Instagram at @tojofotos and tojofotos.com to keep up with his latest work.
About “Arresting Power” and the filmmakers who created it.
Arresting Power: Resisting Police Violence in Portland, Oregon documents the history of conflict between the Portland police and community members throughout the past fifty years. The film features personal stories of resistance told by victims of police misconduct, the families of people who were killed by police, and members of Portland’s reform and abolition movements.
Utilizing meditative footage taken at sites of police violence, experimental filmmaking techniques, and archival newsreel, Arresting Power creates a space for understanding the impacts of police violence and imagining a world without police.
Portland-based media artists Jodi Darby, Julie Perini, and Erin Yanke are inspired by radical anti-authoritarian, anti-racist movements of the past and they are dedicated to engaging with and documenting current social movements. Their work covers the spectrum of film, video, installation, radio, web, music, and photography. Always excited to challenge traditional forms, they are committed to a fluid, non-hierarchical creative process that involves the sharing of skills and production roles.
For more information about the film: arrestingpowers.com
For more information about Resonance Ensemble:
Website: www.resonancechoral.org
Facebook: /resonanceensemblepdx
Instagram: @resonanceensemblepdx
Twitter: @resonanceensemblepdx
Hashtags: #JUSTICEFORALL? #resonanceensemblepdx #PortlandProtests