Portland Center Stage

Classin’ up the Joint: Classical Revolution PDX Sounds.Like.Portland

Posted by Kinsley Suer | 19 March 2010 | Comments (0)

Tomorrow, Sounds.Like.Portland is peeling a cap back on “serious music” with Classical Revolution PDX . CRPDX’s String Quartet features the subversive string talents of Lucia Conrad, violin; Lauren Elledge, violin; Emily Packard, viola; Erin Winemiller, cello.

Classical Revolution PDX were tired (aren’t we all?) of the perception that classical music is the provenance of the high, mighty, fusty and dusty. CRPDX have lent their talents to locals like Rachel Taylor Brown, Sophie Lux, Loch Lomond and Matt Sheehy, and see no contradiction in playing everything from Bach, Bartok and Beethoven to Philip Glass and Queen. If you’re lucky you might even stumble off of Sandy Blvd. and hear them at the Hollywood Theater playing soundtracks to classic films or camp-classics like Plan 9 from Outer Space.

Classical Revolution PDX like any band of world-changing agitators has a Manifesto and they’re not afraid to whip it out:

WE LOVE CLASSICAL MUSIC—the manifesto

We love classical music. 

We love playing classical music. 

We love listening to classical music. 

We are tired of the elitist and inaccessible nature of the classical world. 

We believe that there are many that would enjoy classical music if they could access it in a setting that is comfortable for them. 

We believe classical musicians should be allowed to perform in a setting that is more casual – where the audience is allowed to have a drink, eat a scone, laugh a little, and clap a lot. 

We believe everyone can enjoy the music that we love.

Join us Saturday,  March 20, from 5-7 pm in the Lobby for a return to the basics—rich, sonorous music…the peoples’ music, back where it belongs —free for the taking!

“Have you ever noticed that whenever you hear live classical music, you’re wearing uncomfortable clothes, you’re in a concert hall or a church, and it costs money? Classical Revolution PDX noticed that too, and they’re doing something about it.”
— John Minervini, Willamette Week

Cosponsored by Music Millennium

Coming in March: Eric Stern and Skip Von Kuske (of Vagabond Opera)

PCS’s Community Programs made possible in part by grants from the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation and James F. & Marion L. Miller Foundation.