Poetry and Music with Chris Lee and Colleen O’Brien
On Thursday, May 17 at 7:00 p.m., the Cannon Beach History Center & Museum will be putting on a free community concert. The museum would like to thank the community of Cannon Beach and beyond for its continued support by offering Poetry Music for all who may attend.
The program is called, “Where Words and Music Meet.” Chris Lee and Colleen O’Brien have presented this multi-media program in over one hundred fifty (and counting) venues throughout the United States. They combine the sound of a vibraphone, cello, and voice with the poetry. They have combined jazz with the works of Jack Kerouac, Walt Whitman, Robert Frost, Emily Dickinson, Rumi, and more. The world-class chamber jazz duo will include a slide of photographs and chosen portions of the poems. One reviewer had this to say about Lee and O’Brien, “A delightful meeting of music and poetry ranging from Shakespeare to Robert Frost and Maya Angelou. In the tradition of the classical art song, where composers wrote music for the poetry to be sung, the chamber jazz duo PoetryMusic combines poetry, exquisite music and visual images for a truly unique multi-media experience.”
“I can highly recommend PoetryMusic with musicians Chris Lee and Colleen O’Brien. If you like jazz and if you like poetry, this program is an incredible blend of the two. Chris plays the vibraphone, box drum and frame drum, while Colleen plays the cello and has a deep resonant voice perfect for jazz-style vocals. The lyrics are poems, everything from Maya Angelou to Robert Frost to Pablo Neruda to Shakespeare!! Beautifully rendered into song and music, and supported by words and photography cast on a screen behind the performers. My audience was transfixed. We all felt we experienced something very special and unique. The music and performance revealed new layers of meaning for the chosen poetry and literature. What a remarkable fusion of literature and music. ” Tina Smith, Stevenson/North Bonneville Community Librarian.
Lee and O’Brien have been performing together for over thirty years. They grew up about a mile from each other in Portland, Oregon, and met in 1980 when O’Brien asked Lee to play drums in a quartet she was forming. The meeting of kindred musical spirits is always a fortunate encounter and the two soon realized they had more in common as soul mates.
The Cannon Beach History Center & Museum would like to host this event as a thank you to the community of Cannon Beach and beyond! They are offering this event for free and open to the public, although we suggest getting there early because seating is limited and the doors will be closed promptly at 7:00 p.m. For more information you can visit cbhistory.org or call 503-436-9301