PJCE “From Maxville to Vanport” @ Eastern Oregon University

A live performance of the The Portland Jazz Composers Ensemble’s (PJCE) “From Maxville to Vanport” featuring poetry by Renee Mitchell, music by Ezra Weiss, and video by Laura Lo Forti.

This piece of community-guided music incorporates the stories of two unique towns in Oregon’s history, Maxville and Vanport, in songs for Marilyn Keller with our 12-member jazz ensemble. Maxville and Vanport both had significant multicultural populations at a time when Oregon was particularly unfriendly to non-white residents, and their histories deserve to be heard and better understood by all Oregonians.

The Portland Jazz Composers’ Ensemble is a 12-piece jazz chamber orchestra which commissions and performs original works by its members and by other jazz composers in the Portland music community. The PJCE has received support from the OCF’s 2015 Creative Heights and Small Arts programs, the Regional Arts and Culture Council, and the Oregon Arts Commission. Now in its tenth year, the PJCE has commissioned more than 50 composers, and produced more than 30 concerts of original works.