Singing and the Art Happening

“Without music, life would be a mistake.” -Friedrich Nietzsche

What’s a girl to do alone in a new city? Well, I know that friends usually don’t just fall in your lap, and I resolved to take the pursuit of fellowship into my own hands. I decided to try to find some group to join or some regular event to attend, and I discovered just what I was looking for at another one of Portland’s many festivals. The Bite of Oregon is a celebration of local food, drink, and music. While I was enjoying grilled Moroccan spiced prawns and an Organic Tree Hugger Porter and grooving to a Grateful Dead cover band, a choir stepped onstage.

“This is it!” I thought. “A choir like this is the perfect thing for me to join.” So I did some research and contacted the director, and now I am a member of the Flash Choir. It’s a small community choir that formed a year ago to perform at an art festival associated with the Portland Institute for Contemporary Art. And unbeknownst to me, I joined the choir at just the right time because this annual festival was just about to begin again, and the choir was involved in a couple different performances. This festival called T:BA (Time-Based Art) features dance, theater, visual art, film, video and things that cannot be easily categorize. Watch the following video to learn more. Happenings like this are the reason I moved to Portland.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_Frk2OYJHM

We performed both opening and closing nights of the festival at a nightclub-type space called The Works. The building, called the Leftbank Project, is an industrial building converted into a venue for T:BA:08, and soon to be a community gathering spot.

The first night we sang a six-part song entitled “Caesar’s Gate”, which was written by one of the directors of the choir. And then on the closing night we sang “After the Goldrush” by Neil Young and “For Today I am a Boy” by Antony and the Johnsons, as well as another song written by our directors about the festival itself.

I’m at the end of the top row on the left.
Photograph by Gordon Wilson

It was a great experience, and I’m really looking forward to more performances. It feels so good to sing again! I love being a part of something so quintessentially Portland. I love the camaraderie of my fellow singers. It seems as though I’m thriving in my new environment.