C’mon down for a performance with the jazz quartet Megafauna. Featuring Galen Huckins on piano, Cole Robinson on guitar, Corey Kintzi on Drums and Jeffrey Grauzer on Bass

I just finished the trailer for the latest show with my live soundtracking ensemble Filmusik, check it out below. This show is even weirder than before. The Opera company we are working with has been wonderful and it’s thrilling to work with this crew. C’mon by!

This Thursday, Megafauna is again gracing the stage over at the East Burn bar and grill. Check out the new food menu, some of our new tunes and crowd surf as the mood dictates!

Megafuana is back at the EastBurn this month for a couple weekend shows. Come by to check out some local original jazz in a mellow atmosphere. We’ll be playing a bunch of new material.

Sat. April 3rd – 10pm – 12

Fri. April 16th – 10pm – 12

Megafauna is a contemporary Jazz group from Portland, OR. They draw influence from a wide musical cannon that they deconstruct and reassemble using the language of jazz.

http://www.myspace.com/dejanuband

Galen plays behind Deja Nu tonight.

Come for dinner or just cocktails! Reservations highly recommended (call: 503-517-8584). New songs, special guests!

As part of their ongoing Jazz Series at the French wine bistro, Sutton Sorenson and I will be performing Vinideus on January 8th at 7:30 – 10pm.  Vinideus is a great little spot that few people know about, a hole in the wall on NE Fremont that serves up fine wines and French films.  Come by and check out our set.

Sutton Sorensen and her accompanist entertain their audiences with a variety of melodies consisting of emotion filled ballads and standard jazz classics. Blues and pop tunes are also given fair treatment in their vast repertoire of songs, which are guaranteed to entertain groups with even the most critical interpretations. Music is arranged and performed especially to accommodate Sutton’s unique talent. Her exquisite tone and masterful style along with her accompanist’s professional touch makes this duo very exceptionally entertaining.

VINIDEUS JAZZ BISTRO
503 284 2795

4759c N. E. Fremont StreetPortland, OR 97213

www.vinideusbistro.com
www.suttonsorenson.com

Megafauna is playing at EastBurn next Thursday. A personal favorite hangout, I recommend checking it out. There’s no cover and the set goes 10pm – midnight.  Come listen to some original jazz and partake of the highly above average tap selection over there.

From Barfly Magazine -
Housed in the former Nocturnal space, East Burn comprises two levels: a restaurant upstairs and a casual bar downstairs.
Where else in Portland can you play 25-cent Skee Ball or race electric cars for free with a cocktail in hand? Please let us know. The patio here trumps almost all smoking patios with overhead heaters, swinging chairs and mini fire pits built into the tables. Bartender Tristin makes a mean Manhattan, which is fantastic as they are heavily discounted on Wednesdays.

At Burnside and 18th

www.theeastburn.com

The EastBurn
1800 E. Burnside St.
Portland, OR 97214

Performance by Red Sneaker Chamber Players as part of their “Tales and Scales” concert in their 2009 series.
Justin Mackewich, Tylor Neist, Justin Kagan and Vio Bejenaru premiere work by Galen Huckins to accompany a french animation by Rene Laloux from 1965.

Recorded at Glen & Viola Walters Cultural Arts Center
galenhuckins.com
redsneaker.org

Video courtesy of Tualaton Public TV.

Excerpt from the score: Bicycle Symphony – How I Came to Chicago and Why

Bicyclists perform symphony on Park blocks

By Casey Parks, The Oregonian
June 25, 2009, 3:47PM

Around 4:30, after practice, Jason Fromme climbed into the back of a pedicab and prepared to conduct a symphony. About 40 bicyclists stood parked before him, singing a “low, pleasing melody.”

“All right, let’s see if we can make something nice,” he told them, and they set off.

The event director, Mattie Kaiser, looked part bicyclist, part musician, wearing a white gown and a helmet as she led the crowd. Kaiser’s the head of Classical Revolution, a group of 20- and 30-somethings dead-set on making classical musical accessible for all. During Pedalpalooza, that means taking the music — by bike — to the streets.

The group performed “How I came to Chicago and why” while riding along the Park blocks.

Galen Huckins — a 22-year-old composer whom Kaiser calls “Boywonder” — wrote the piece after a cross-country bike trip two years ago. He woke up in Indiana one morning, determined to bike to Chicago by nightfall. The symphony is what the 144-mile trip sounded like, he said. It’s the sound of countryside giving way to urban sprawl, of a body long worn out, of a bike’s natural squeakiness.

Not that any of that sounds particularly gorgeous. Wednesday’s symphony was more Portland weird than orchestra pretty. But the musicians were smiling the entire time. And the onlookers who stopped to watch the noise-makers riding by seemed to like it.

The cyclists whooshed. They rang bells. They banged on their bike frames with silverware.

“I’m not getting a good sound out of this,” one guy said, clanking a fork against his frame. “I think it’s my bike.”

The street offered its own improvised melodies: Motorcycles blared by, birds chirped, a couple fought over a suitcase, a man asked for change.

To hear a snippet of the symphony, watch the video.

– Casey Parks; caseyparks@news.oregonian.com