Willamette Radio Workshop

The unofficial “Audio Theater Month” begins with a preview of Willamette Radio Workshop’s Halloween spectacular, “Tales From St. James Infirmary.”  A special sampler of four of these original stories will be presented this Friday evening, Oct 2nd, as part of the “mediartZ: Art as Experiential, Art as Participatory, Art as Electronic” Kick Off Party @ North Bank Artists Gallery (http://www.northbankartistsgallery.com/), 1005 Main St., in downtown Vancouver.  This event is free and open to the public.

Willamette Radio Workshop will be doing these Halloween themed audio drama presentations starting at 6pm and then periodically during the evening.

All original stories from a collection of national and local radio dramatists are loosely based around the Jazz classic “St. James Infirmary Blues”. Friday evening’s plays will include “The Legend Of Old Doc Haggard” by David Ian, “In This Cornered” by Craig Kenworthy, “Leaving You is Hell” by Frederick Greenhalgh and “The Reason Why” by William S. Gregory.

The performance will include live Foley Sound Effects by David Ian and Dino de AElfweald Music and Ableton by Martin John Gallagher and Special Effect SFX by Marc Rose.

Our cast includes Mark Loring, Keith Cable, James Dineen, Bill Barry, Bryan Mackey, Mark Homayoun, Lindsae Klein, Sybil Johnson, Mary Thomas and is directed by Sam A. Mowry.

More “Tales From St. James Infirmary will be presented Halloween night at McMenamins Kennedy School at 4 and 6pm.

The Filmusik presentation of “Plan 9 From Outer Space” was a smashing success, with a full house for the Friday night show!

The show also got some great press coverage, from the Oregonian and KATU! Check it out:

Live performances add polish to Ed Wood’s ‘Plan 9′ (Oregonian)
Arts scene: ‘Plan 9 from Outer Space’ (KATU.com)

The Filmusik presentation of another 1950s sci-fi B-movie, “Missile to the Moon,” with voices by the Willamette Radio Workshop, is tonight and Friday, June 3 and 5, at the Hollywood Theatre in Portland. Don’t miss it!

FILMUSIK: Plan 9 From Outer Space
May 27th and 29th, 7pm
Hollywood Theatre
Tickets $10 – $8 Students/Seniors
www.filmusik.com

On the 27th and 29th, teams of musicians, composers, voice actors and sound designers are congregating in the pit at the Hollywood Theatre to premiere a new soundtrack to Ed Wood’s botched masterpiece of sci-fi cinema: Plan 9 From Outer Space. The original strings + electronica score is performed live to the film by the Classical Revolution PDX string quartet and Sugar Short Wave. The film is dubbed in the pit by a cast of voice actors from the Willamette Radio Workshop including Todd Tolces, Alyson Ayn Osborn, Mark Homayoun, Chris Porter, David Ian, Scott Jameison, Mary Thomas, Lindsae Klein, James Lawrence, David Loftus and Sam A. Mowry with sound effects and foley by Heather Perkins.

Vampires, UFOs and purple pajama-wearing Aliens loom on the screen as the musicians bow, pluck and pound away furiously at the collaborative composition of Portland based composers Galen Huckins and Sugar Shortwave. Our restored and colorized print of the film provided courtesy of Legend Films. Filmusik promotes live performance over prerecorded media by presenting new venues for musicians and composers.

Praise for Filmusik:

“The effect is surreal and magical, like being inside Disney’s Fantasia. The live voice actors blend their dialog with the orchestra and the visuals to create a once in a lifetime performance”
-Portland Sentinel

“An Absolute Blast”
-Portland Mercury

“Delightful”
-Willamette Week

Also part of our 2 film mini series of sci-fi goodness is Missile to the Moon. We are performing this drive-in classic with an original piano quintet soundtrack composed by Scott J. Ordway, putting serious new music chamber music in the ring with space exploitation cinema. More info about the show at our website.

FILMUSIK: Missile To The Moon
June 3rd and 5th, 7pm
Hollywood Theatre
Tickets $10 – $8 Students/Seniors
www.filmusik.com

Filmusik aims to create opportunities for live music and musicians by supporting performers and composers in new venues. Live film accompaniment was once as commonplace as films themselves, and orchestras like our own could be seen in every major city. In the silent film era, Americans had an exposure to live music unrivaled in history. The industry accounted for nearly half of all musician employment and created more original music than ever before (or after). Although the film and music industries have changed dramatically since then, all of us recognize the vibrancy of live music over prerecorded sound, it’s something time and technology will never replace. Our Plan 9 project is one way to reexamine an art-form and look at how we experience live music today. Coincidentally, it’s also the only reasonable way to watch a Flying Saucer zapping a Vampire with its “decomposure” ray.

WRW is working with Filmusik on a new presentation of the Ed Wood classic, Plan 9 From Outer Space. It’s playing next week at the Hollywood Theatre.

There’s more coming up in June. Check out the trailer!

WRW’s performance of “The War of the Worlds” played to a packed house at the UFO Festival last Saturday.  Kevin Cooke was kind enough to shoot some pictures!

Read more »

The 2009 McMenamins UFO Festival will feature a live radio presentation by the Award winning Willamette Radio Workshop of H.G. Wells’ The War of the Worlds. One performance only will be in Mattie’s Room at the Hotel Oregon, 2 p.m. Saturday May 16th, 2009.

The War of the Worlds is regarded as the classic radio drama. The Willamette Radio Workshop has performed this timeless tale on numerous occasions. We have always presented it in the classic Old Time Radio style (OTR), with live sound effects and music. This year we give it the WRW treatment. Creating a blend of the best of the old and new. Our matchless Foley team of David Ian and Martin John Gallagher joins forces with Marc Rose of Dry Smoke and Whispers fame, to create a unique production, true to the original, but original in its own right.

Following in the path of our award winning adaptation of Archibald Macleish’s Fall of the City, join us for a glimpse into radio’s past and future. See what panicked America, launched the career of Orson Welles and proved the devastating power of mass media to an unsuspecting world.

The cast includes Chris Porter, Bryan Mackey, James Lawrence, Todd Tolces and Matthew Richards. Our stage manager is Autumn Lawrence and live sound is by Lori Day-Reynolds.

Original music and sound design by Marc Rose.

Live Foley by David Ian and Martin John Gallagher.

Crowd direction by Martin John Gallagher.

Special thanks to Pat Janowski.

The production is produced, directed and features Sam A. Mowry.

Cindy McGean, WRW’s Dramaturge, writes:

Willamette Radio Workshop is looking for original scripts for the 2009 Halloween show which will be the same format as our MURDER OF CROWS program from some years back. The show will be 2 one hour programs made up of about 8 original scripts all in some way inspired by the blues/jazz classic “St. James Infirmary Blues.” No script should be longer than 15 minutes, but short takes are fine. I am sending along a link to some information about the song and some great examples of the myriad different versions of it (see below). WRW is looking for pieces that are scary, suspenseful, eerie, haunting or otherwise Halloween appropriate. ER meets the X-Files meets EC Comics is how Sam sees the format. We would like first-draft scripts submitted by June 30, 2009. This will allow time for readings and rewrites.

This summer, in place of the summer Writers On-the-air Workshop, WRW will be organizing readings of the scripts submitted for this project. Director Sam A. Mowry will choose from those scripts for the live performances in October.

If you are thinking of submitting a piece, send a short description of your idea to Sam (SAMowry@aol.com) or me (cjmcgean@aol.com) so we have a feel for the ideas folks are working on and can prevent overlap (e.g. multiple zombie scripts). Cindy is also available on a limited basis now and more fully come June to work with any writers who’d like support.

We’re looking forward to the rich and varied stories that we know will spring forth from your imaginations for this project! Here’s the link I mentioned earlier: Honey, Where You Been So Long?

Come join the Willamette Radio Workshop as we make another journey to Middle-earth with “The Hobbit’s Greatest Hits,” our one-of-a-kind adaptation of the J.R.R. Tolkien classic. The performance is set for 2pm Saturday, January 17, at the McMenamins Kennedy School, part of the annual J.R.R. Tolkien Birthday Celebration. The performance is absolutely free, but remember: when you come to Middle-earth, you too may be called into service!

The Island of Dr. Moreau presented for Halloween at McMenamins Kennedy School by the award winning Willamette Radio Workshop. 2 performances at 5 pm and 6:30 pm. Admission is free, all ages welcome, children must have an accompanying adult. Food and beverages available. The show will be performed in the Gymnasium. The Kennedy School is located at:

5736 N.E. 33rd Ave, Portland, OR 97211  (Click here for map/directions!)

This Halloween WRW tackles the classic novel of terror and imagination, The Island of Dr. Moreau by H.G. Wells. We are lucky to have the illustrious and talented William S. Gregory to adapt this classic novel for us. As with his past work with us, Mr. Gregory brings a spin to the classics of the past, his Ogle Award winning version of Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde is a case in point. Mr. Gregory re-imagines this classic story of science and biology and the limits of both. This story, From the Case Files of Dr. Moreau , uses the point of view of the manimals (as we like to call them) as opposed to the usual human point of view. The questions of freedom, nature, man’s rights and animal rights all come into play. The genius of Dr. Moreau takes on new depths and the story of his children, created by his own hand, follows new leads with classic results.

WRW has once again collected an amazing group of artists to help bring the jungles of Moreau’s island and the horrors of his laboratory to life. Sound designers with out peer, Martin John Gallagher, David Ian and Marc Rose (winners of s\a shelf full of national and local awards) are taking care of music, sound design and Foley that will fill your imaginations. The cast includes Mark Homayoun, Cindy McGean, Megan Murphy, Scott Jameison and Sam A. Mowry, who also produces and directs.

You can buy original audio drama at the show from WRW members Jamie Lawson (web mistress) and Joe Medina (Associate Producer). There will also be work from Afterhell, an audio horror series and the long running epic story of Emil Song, Psychic Detective from Dry Smoke and Whispers.

Writers On-the-air Workshop 2008: Building Character

Willamette Radio Workshop announces its 5th annual Writers On-the-air Workshop (WOW) starting July 15 and meeting every Tuesday evening(7-9 pm) through August 12. Writer and educator Cynthia J. McGean, recently returned from presenting a series of writing workshops at the National Audio Theatre Festival, will lead writers in a collaborative, peer-driven process using the audio theater medium to explore their craft. This year’s focus will be on developing strong characters. Participants will meet for 2 hours every week to examine how audio theater changes and informs the writer’s process for developing characters and conveying character traits to actors and the audience. Willamette Radio Workshop will select scripts developed during WOW 2008 for readings and future productions. Previous WOW scripts have received multiple national awards, been produced and aired around the country and evolved into stage productions as well. WOW is offered at no charge to anyone committed to the process and interested in exploring writing through the audio medium.

The Willamette Radio Workshop is a professional theatrical organization based in Portland, Oregon, and dedicated to the creation of original material for radio, internet, compact disks and other audio venues. We produce our shows both in studio and at live performances. We seek to acknowledge the influence and preserve the history of radio theater as we work to create its present. To this end, our work also includes re-creations or re-imaginings of classic radio programs. WRW is the proud recipient of four Ogle Awards, two Mark Time Awards and a Crystal Communicator Award for excellence in the audio medium. For more information, check out our website at www.radiowork.com.

For more information or an application, please contact WOW Director Cindy McGean at�cjmcgean@aol.com.