Westside Music School

🎶 BBB has been featured in the Spring 2024 issue of !

😊 Dr. Anita Collins has written a brand new feature article titled 'There's more to learning music than sheer joy: it also makes happy and strong brains!'

In the article, Anita writes that 'One of the most remarkable things about learning music is its impact on our brains. Research consistently shows that children who study music do better overall at school. Not only does music education stimulate brain areas related to reading, language and emotional intelligence, but it helps develop better memory, attention and even math skills.'

Read the full article here on page 26 + 27: https://loom.ly/hKPZ_jk

A free online music history course. . .

Free online course. Enroll today! From ancient antiquity to the Romantic era, this course tells the story of how Classical music was developed and what makes it great.

Music brings us together.

Music helps in so many ways.

It’s never too late!

It’s never too late.

Research indicates that music training before the age of seven can positively impact academic achievement. 🎵

Do you need more like this? Our FREE BBB membership is full of helpful resources like this! https://loom.ly/8WqnF-A

Join us - let’s make music together!

New classes for beginners of all ages. Call 503-533-5100 or check our website for schedules: www.WestsideMusicSchool.org

Every single one.

Music is important. Fact.

Do you agree.....thanks to Vaughan Fleischfresser for sharing.....♫

The power of music.....thanks to Music with Mar.'s Brain Facts Page for sharing.....♫

Fun fact Friday! 🎶

via Keep Music Alive

Opera in the Park Portland presents LA TRAVIATA is this Sunday, August 4th!

MEET THE CONDUCTOR - Nicholas Fox

Described by Oregon Arts Watch as “…a flipping genius”, conductor NICHOLAS FOX has served as Assistant Conductor and Chorus Master at Portland Opera since the fall of 2013. During his tenure at Portland Opera, he has conducted five mainstage productions, numerous chamber opera performances, and countless concerts, in repertoire ranging from Gluck’s ORFEO ED EURIDICE to Philip Glass’s IN THE PENAL COLONY. In 2019, Fox stepped in at the last moment, without rehearsal, to lead a triumphant opening night performance of Portland Opera’s production of Puccini’s MADAMA BUTTERFLY.

Fox recently made his conducting debuts with the Siletz Bay Music Festival, where he stepped in with two days of notice to lead two major new works of composers Daniel Freiberg and Ethan Gans-Morse, and with the Portland Chamber Orchestra, where he curated and conducted the PCO’s New Year’s Concert, a warmly received evening of Viennese waltzes, arias, and tone poems.

A native of Los Angeles, Nicholas Fox began studying piano and composition at the age of twelve, and after a short time was performing both music from the standard repertoire and his own compositions. He gave numerous recitals in the Los Angeles area, and was a three-time gold medalist in the Southern California J.S. Bach Festival.

Fox received his degree in orchestral conducting from the Mannes College of Music in New York, studying with David Hayes. In his final year at Mannes, he received the N.T. Milani Memorial Conducting Fellowship, awarded to an outstanding conducting student each year. After graduating from Mannes, Mr. Fox remained an extremely in-demand pianist, coach, teacher, and conductor in the New York area.

In September, 2009, Nicholas Fox was appointed Assistant Chorus Master at New York City Opera, and then Interim Chorus Master for the 2011-2012 season. At City Opera he helped with the musical preparation for over a dozen productions, including the New York premiere of Leonard Bernstein’s A QUIET PLACE. For famed soprano Martina Arroyo’s Prelude to Performance program, Fox conducted the 2011 production of Puccini’s LA RONDINE, of which one critic wrote, “…Maestro Nicholas Fox, comparable to Yannick Nézet-Séguin both in stature and taste in brisk tempi, coaxed a truly outstanding and energetic performance from his superb orchestra.”

At Portland Opera, Fox has prepared the chorus for over thirty productions and concerts, including the Opera’s recent season-closing Puccini: In Concert, a monumental evening of arias and orchestral and choral excerpts at the Keller Auditorium that Fox curated, prepared, and conducted. He served as the principal coach of the Opera’s Resident Artist program for many years, guiding the company’s apprentice singers in their advancement and training. Fox continues to serve in that capacity with the program’s resident pianist.

Upcoming engagements include Fox’s debut with Oregon Ballet Theater, where he will conduct OBT’s annual Christmastime production of Tchaikovsky’s THE NUTCRACKER, and his debut at New Orleans Opera, where he will conduct its April, 2025 production of Donizetti’s L'ELISIR D'AMORE. He will then immediately return to Oregon to conduct Portland Opera’s May, 2025 production of Verdi’s FALSTAFF, the opera after which Fox named his beloved cat.

Opera in the Park will take place at a NEW VENUE this year: the beautiful Peninsula Park Rose Garden, at 6pm on Sunday August 4th, 2024. The concert is open to all, and is offered FREE of charge as a partner of Portland Parks & Recreation's SUMMER FREE FOR ALL! For more information, please visit https://operaintheparkportland.org

Throw Back Thursday!

This photo is from 2009, which is the last time Opera in the Park Portland presented LA TRAVIATA!

Opera in the Park will take place at a NEW VENUE this year: the beautiful Peninsula Park Rose Garden, at 6pm on Sunday August 4th, 2024. The concert is open to all, and is offered FREE of charge as a partner of Portland Parks & Recreation's SUMMER FREE FOR ALL! For more information, please visit https://operaintheparkportland.org

Music helps young people become the best they can.

Music and art are essential 💜

That’s what music is.

Happy !

Happy Star Wars Day!

Welcome Adam!
We are happy to announce that Adam Eccleston will be our guest conductor for our season finale May concerts on May 17 and 19.

You may remember Mr. Eccleston from his phenomenal flute performance last year! Rehearsals have already begun, and we are excited to conclude our season under his baton.

The program will include Arturo Marquez’s “Danzon No. 2,” the Robert Schumann Cello Concerto, and Jean Sibelius’s Symphony No. 1 in E minor, Op. 39

Tickets are available at www.beavertonsymphony.org

Friday, May 17, 7:00 p.m. and
Sunday, May 19 at 3:00 p.m.

Village Church, 330 SW Murray Blvd., Beaverton.

Today is the Birth Anniversary of Bach.

Johann Sebastian Bach (31 March [O.S. 21 March] 1685 – 28 July 1750) was a German composer and musician of the late Baroque period. He is known for his orchestral music such as the Brandenburg Concertos; solo instrumental works such as the cello suites and sonatas and partitas for solo violin; keyboard works such as the Goldberg Variations and The Well-Tempered Clavier; organ works such as the Schubler Chorales and the Toccata and Fugue in D minor; and choral works such as the St Matthew Passion and the Mass in B minor. Since the 19th-century Bach Revival, he has been generally regarded as one of the greatest composers in the history of Western music.

The Bach family already counted several composers when Johann Sebastian was born as the last child of a city musician, Johann Ambrosius, in Eisenach. After being orphaned at the age of 10, he lived for five years with his eldest brother Johann Christoph, after which he continued his musical education in Lüneburg. From 1703 he was back in Thuringia, working as a musician for Protestant churches in Arnstadt and Mühlhausen and, for longer stretches of time, at courts in Weimar, where he expanded his organ repertory, and Köthen, where he was mostly engaged with chamber music. From 1723, he was employed as Thomaskantor (cantor at St Thomas's) in Leipzig. There he composed music for the principal Lutheran churches of the city, and for its university's student ensemble Collegium Musicum. From 1726, he published some of his keyboard and organ music. In Leipzig, as had happened during some of his earlier positions, he had difficult relations with his employer, a situation that was little remedied when he was granted the title of court composer by his sovereign, Augustus III of Poland, in 1736. In the last decades of his life, he reworked and extended many of his earlier compositions. He died of complications after a botched eye surgery in 1750 at the age of 65.
Bach enriched established German styles through his mastery of counterpoint, harmonic, and motivic organisation,[4] and his adaptation of rhythms, forms, and textures from abroad, particularly from Italy and France. Bach's compositions include hundreds of cantatas, both sacred and secular. He composed Latin church music, Passions, oratorios, and motets. He often adopted Lutheran hymns, not only in his larger vocal works, but for instance also in his four-part chorales and his sacred songs. He wrote extensively for organ and for other keyboard instruments. He composed concertos, for instance for violin and for harpsichord, and suites, as chamber music as well as for orchestra. Many of his works employ contrapuntal techniques like canon and fugue.
Throughout the 18th century, Bach was primarily valued as an organist, while his keyboard music, such as The Well-Tempered Clavier, was appreciated for its didactic qualities. The 19th century saw the publication of some major Bach biographies, and by the end of that century all of his known music had been printed. Dissemination of scholarship on the composer continued through periodicals (and later also websites) exclusively devoted to him, and other publications such as the Bach-Werke-Verzeichnis (BWV, a numbered catalogue of his works) and new critical editions of his compositions. His music was further popularised through a multitude of arrangements, including the Air on the G String and "Jesu, Joy of Man's Desiring", and of recordings, such as three different box sets with complete performances of the composer's oeuvre marking the 250th anniversary of his death.

April 27-29 | Beethoven's Eighth A testament to Beethoven’s sly wit, the Eighth Symphony finds the revolutionary composer transforming beloved 18th-century dance forms with new dramatic possibilities. And violinist Baiba Skride displays a “soaring, incisive tone” (Strad) in Britten’s Violin Concerto, an emotionally charged ...

Happy World Piano Day....88th day of the year.....thanks to Claire for sharing.....♫

Happy World Piano Day - the 88th day of the year!

Today marks the 88th day of the year, a fitting occasion to celebrate our favorite 88-keyed instrument! This , we take a moment to recognize the players and the makers, the students and the teachers, the composers and the listeners of the piano and its music. 🎼 🎹 🎶

How are you celebrating today?

Oregon Symphony

✨ MAGAZINE RELEASE ✨

Let the games begin at Oregon Symphony's Musical Olympics! Perfect for music lovers and sports fans alike, this concert is a guaranteed home run. Featuring John Williams’ Olympic Fanfare, Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony, and many more epic tunes, this concert is sure to be a slam dunk! Bring your competitive spirit as you help the Oregon Symphony cross the finish line.

Read the magazine and learn more here: https://artslandia.com/oregon-symphony/

It’s never too late.