It’s Music Director Martin Majkut’s 15th year with the Rogue Valley Symphony and he’s pulling out all the stops for a transcendent 2024-25 season. There will be two Grammy Award winners, epic works and an encore holiday concert at Oregon Shakespeare Festival’s Angus Bowmer Theatre that promises a unique and spirited twist.
In March, the Ashland Schools Foundation reached out to a national nonprofit organization, Free Guitars 4 Kids, which responded quickly. Within a little over a week, 85 of the guitars were taken home by the students. Electric guitars even came with their own amps and other accessories.
Southern Oregon Repertory Singers, in preparation for their last concert of the current season this May, recently announced the details of their 2024-25 series at a reveal party for donors. The Rep Singers will perform four concerts in the 2024-25 season, with new starting times for some of the programs.
Returning for its 11th year, the Oregon Fringe Festival will present its grandest and farthest reaching event ever in late April, with close to 100 different performances and demonstrations from artists in a variety of veins.
Community members from a variety of backgrounds will gather Saturday and Sunday for the 31st annual Southern Oregon University Powwow, widely regarded as the largest student-led event on campus. The event, hosted by the school’s Native American Student Union, is expected to draw thousands of visitors to Lithia Motors Pavilion in its second year back on campus after a COVID hiatus.
Soon-to-retire Jefferson Public Radio’s classical music director Don Matthews: “I’m most proud of expanding the conversation to include contemporary composers of color and women composers. … I put Florence Price right up next to Beethoven.”
The Rogue Valley Symphonic Band is one of 53 arts organizations awarded an Arts Build Communities grant from the Oregon Arts Commission, bringing in $5,000 for the Ashland-based nonprofit musical group.
A live pit orchestra is returning to the spring musical after being on hiatus since the pandemic. Ashland High School Theater is preparing for its opening weekend of its spring musical, Roald Dahl’s “Matilda,” which opens officially on Saturday evening. A “pay-what-you-will” showing is available for the community at 7 p.m. Friday.
Lucie K. Scheuer: The concert contained the poetry, angelic voices and visions of several local and Oregon-based artists and composers, evolving into a transformational experience.
In March, the Jefferson Baroque Orchestra will present “Donne Barocche: Women of the Baroque,” a series of concerts in Medford, Grants Pass and Ashland which will feature the music of women composers, played by an all-female ensemble.
Ask Strider: A reader asks whatever happened to Woody the Puppy Intern? Strider has news! Woody has landed on all four paws with a new gig. And Steve, the Ashland.news crossword editor, has a new canine crossword up for solving. The excitement is pupable!
The Oregon Legislature is meeting this week to consider some major cuts to current spending levels as a large revenue deficit looms. That’s because the state’s tax code automatically replicates new federal tax cuts, including ones passed by Congressional Republicans this summer that will reduce state revenue
Michael O’Looney: Trump and the Texas Legislature are responsible for a partisan power grab that has unleashed bitterness and partisan vindictiveness, all in an effort to subvert an electoral system for partisan ends.
Councilor Bob Kaplan: While the cost of delivering kilowatt-hours to our homes has risen, Ashland Electric has been able to hold our rates steady with just one increase of 5.1% in 2021. I’m sorry to say we’re due for an increase, but fortunately it’s not likely to match recent increases elsewhere.
An estimate for the cost to abate asbestos found in the shuttered Lincoln School recently should be available as early as sometime this week, according to Steve Mitzel, operations director for Ashland School District. The cost to remove asbestos would be separate from the as yet-unknown cost for structural repair.
“We are still here” was the theme for Saturday’s Native American Heritage Celebration at Southern Oregon University, hosted by the SOU Native American Student Union (NASU) and SOU Native Nations Liaison Kenwanicahee (Kenwani) Kravitz (Madesi Bandi, Pit River Nation Winnemem, Nomtipom and Nomsus Bands Northern Wintu).
(It’s free)
