Cherry Extract Music presents a late-night, locally grown jazz music series, titled ‘Round Midnight, which showcases some of Portland’s world-class musicians, talented up-and-coming bands, vocalists and spoken word performers. ‘Round Midnight will be held every Saturday from 11:30pm to 1:30am at Curious Comedy Theater, 5225 NE Martin Luther King Jr. Blvd in Vanport Square. This Jazz series helps to support jazz and art programming at Jefferson High School.
Saturday, May 9: Cary Simms & Company, featuring smooth jazz saxophonist Cary Simms, whose music is full of emotion and funk. While growing up in Oakland, Cary developed an ear for melodies by spending hours listening to gospel, jazz and rhythm & blues. He was mentored by several Portland musicians, including Dennis Springer, Thara Memory, Janice Scoggins and Ricky Callier and Cary has played with internationally known gospel and vocal artists, including Yolanda Adams and comedian Jonathan Slocum and numerous talented local musicians, including Farnell Newton, Eddie Fontaine and Brian Ward

Saturday, May 16: Nae!Nay! & Friends, featuring spoken word poet, playwright and vocalist S. Renee Mitchell, who is a former award-winning columnist for The Oregonian. Renee developed her striking performance style after moving to Portland in 1998 and making a strong impression at numerous spoken word cafes. She has since started singing and has recorded three CDs and several iTunes singles with her business partner David Ornette Cherry, both co-producers of the ‘Round Midnight series. Renee has performed with many local jazz musicians, including Thara Memory, Linda Hornbuckle, Janice Scroggins, Ron Steen, Devin Phillips, Farnell Newton, Eddie Fontaine and Cary Simms.

See you Saturday ‘Round Midnight at Curious Comedy. To see a complete schedule of performers, go to http://www.roundmidnightpdx.com

Hi everyone,

The first organizational meeting for the King Spring Clean Up will be next Thursday, March 19th, 6:00PM, at the NECN offices (4815 NE 7th, behind King School). We’ll meet to discuss budget, timing and location. Please come with your ideas and inspirations! Let’s get King sparkling for Spring.

Charles

As the bad economy drives a resurgence of crime and gang activities in Portland, we want to know how the Neighborhood Associations and the Northeast Coalition of Neighborhoods can help. Questions posed at the last NECN Board Meeting:

1. What are your definitions of a safe place to live?
2. What are the steps we – as neighbors and neighborhood groups – can take to prevent or solve these issues (block watches, weekly trash pick-ups, etc)?

If you have a minute, join the dialog on neighborhood safety by answering these questions.

Thanks,

Charles

The Interstate Firehouse Cultural Center is seeking artists who live and/or
work in N/NE Portland to submit one to two pieces of work to our Do North
exhibition.

Submissions Deadline: March 13th @ 1pm.
Open House and Do North informational meeting: March 9th @ 5:30 pm

For more information or to submit art visit us at:
[http://www.ifccarts.org/gallery/calendar/2009/do-north-2009/]
or email Maria Grina at submissions@ifccarts.org

King Spring Bring-Thing Fling-Thing

Want to help organize the King Spring Clean Up? We’re planning on an early May event – we’ll rent bins from Metro for recycling, garbage, batteries, etc. This is for King neighbors to get rid of old couches, defunct washers, TV’s, and anything else that needs to leave the house after the spring cleaning. This has been a big success in the past and we need some neighbors to help the KNA organize the event. If you’re interested, go to this survey monkey to help plan a day to meet in March.

http://www.surveymonkey.com/s.aspx?sm=lr5iBrOjbFt1ZdPi0e02Tw_3d_3d

Take care,

Charles