SOU’WESTER EVENTS!

Discover what’s happening during your next stay or plan a visit around our free live music, workshops, wellness offerings and more!

Jul
18
Sat
The Hackles: Outdoor Concert presented by Sou’wester Arts
Jul 18 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm

The Hackles: Outdoor Concert presented by Sou’wester Arts

The Hackles are guitar/banjo duo Luke Ydstie & Kati Claborn from Astoria, Oregon. They met at a band practice in 2008, and have played together most days since.

“Highly refined songwriting and awe-inspiring harmonization.”
– Rough Trade

About as authentic PNW folk as you can get.”
– Susan Varnes-Newland Seattle Wave Radio

This event is free, all ages, and open to the public.

Jul
25
Sat
Tommy Alexander, Kassi Valazza & Taylor Kingman: Outdoor Concert presented by Sou’wester Arts
Jul 25 @ 7:00 pm – 9:30 pm

Tommy Alexander, Kassi Valazza & Taylor Kingman: Outdoor Concert presented by Sou’wester Arts

This show is going to be live-streamed from out outdoor stage. Check our IG feed! It is no longer a performance that is open to the public. It may be audible to folks staying here. 

It’s not as if Tommy disrespects genre lines. It’s as if he doesn’t know (or care) that they exist. They’re not pertinent to his survival. He’s a cross between poet, arena rocker, and dive bar star. His voice plunges deeply, then rises high, and the band follows him faithfully through tempo changes, and wall of sound string movements, adding electric guitar and in-pocket backbeat to his work.

Making it as a musician today can require a heavy helping of DIY spirit, and Tommy Alexander has that in spades. It carried the California born musician all the way to Burlington, Vermont, where he founded Jenke Arts, a nonprofit artists’ collective and record label, and eventually all the way back west, where he found a new artistic home (at least for the moment) in Portland, Oregon. Once in Portland, Alexander connected with producer Mike Coykendall, who has worked with a slew of indie darlings, including M. Ward, She and Him Bright Eyes and Blitzen Trapper. Alexander’s creates a unique, infectious indie rock style all his own. His honest and heartfelt lyricism come to life in his songs which will strike a chord with you the very first listen.

“A phenomenal talent.”
Michael McDonald
(Legend)

“Thought provoking music in an age of glib imitation.”
No Depression

“Wicked Indie rock.”
Brett Lanier (Barr Brothers)

“Kassi Valazza has a viscous, light gold voice. It swirls around in your head like whiskey in a snifter; vaporous, and intoxicating. For most of Dear Dead Days pedal steel and electric guitar lope along at half time, the in pocket rhythm section booming from deep in the low end. Its frequencies penetrate your flesh. The songs reverberate off your bones. Her lyrics drip down the inside of your skull. Kassi will be your peyote coyote; a guide through these psychedelic vistas. Here she’s found a way to trap the world of cheaters, drifters, lovers and leavers in amber. Wander from your own woes, and come walk with Valazza’s.” -Sean Jewell American Standard Time

Taylor Kingman makes music that resets the clocks. You know the feeling of standing beneath a trestle on a hard day, a can of cheap beer, flicking a lighter and dreaming up wild ideas until a heavy train comes thundering overhead and you scream and scream until your voice gives out and you feel lighter? That’s the thing that lives deep in Taylor’s songs. There’s something so rubbed-raw honest and drunken-truth about them. You can’t help but be transfixed and transformed.

Born in Portland, OR and raised in Marion County, Taylor picked up a guitar and started writing at 12. In high school, he formed The Hill Dogs, a raucous, powerful band that hit hard beneath his explosive lyrics. After graduating, he wrote like a madman, played out heavily with the band, and taught guitar on the side.

In 2015, Taylor packed up and headed to Portland where he played anywhere and everywhere with The Hill Dogs until he blew out his voice and had to halt the band. The restrictions of his healing vocal chords gave way to a deluge of new writing. Taylor joined multiple projects around the city with some of Portland’s finest and recorded his debut solo album Wannabe at the great Mike Coykendall’s studio, due out November 17th on Mama Bird Recording Co. He recently formed ‘TK and the Holy Know Nothings’ with Lewi Longmire, Jay Cobb Anderson, Tyler Thompson, and Josh Simon as a vehicle for a growing ocean of new material.

Of writing songs, Taylor says, “Each word is a world waiting to swallow me whole. I get drunk off the pitter patter poetry of lines that root me to the cold, unforgiving ground, all at once, drowning me in the violent beautiful futility of humanity, yet, also, set fire to my eyes, sending me swirling and whirling, floating blind and thoughtless through the maze of the mind. I want the words to explode bloody in all their truth, for better or worse. Vivid images dripping with feeling bursting like lightbulbs in the back of the head.” Enough said. Train thundering. Sparks raining down.

This show is going to be live-streamed from out outdoor stage. Check our IG feed! It is no longer a performance that is open to the public. It may be audible to folks staying here. 

Aug
1
Sat
DJ Papi Fimbres: Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts
Aug 1 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm

DJ Papi Fimbres: Outdoor Concert presented by Sou’wester Arts

 

Join us for DJ PAPI FIMBRES * cumbia / afro funk / boogie

David “Papi” Fimbres creates sound out of thin air that feels familiar at first, but at a second thought, is nothing you’ve ever heard before. As a percussionist and multi-instrumentalist Fimbres wields an arc of pure infectious energy, and a rare and cosmic control over the rhythmic and melodic spectrum.Born & raised in the Pacific West Coast, his Latino culture is immersed in not only his music, but his way of life as he sees it. Everything is here for a reason, and within that, everything has a sound that can be curated and understood.

This event is free, all ages, and open to the public.

Aug
8
Sat
Dead Lee: Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts
Aug 8 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm
Dead Lee: Outdoor Concert presented by Sou’wester Arts
 
In 2018, Brian Koch (current and founding member of Blitzen Trapper) started cosmic-americana-folk duo Dead Lee with his partner, singer-songwriter Kara Harris. They first started singing together for each other in their apartment, for friends at parties, special events and tribute nights before deciding to take their love of singing and playing together on the road.
 
 
For the last two years they’ve been playing all over the Pacific Northwest (Oregon, Washington, Idaho, Montana) as well as Puerto Rico, Ireland and Western Europe. They’ve been described as “Elliott Smith meets Dolly Parton in space” and they’re ok with that.
 
www.deadlee.bandcamp.com
www.instagram.com/dead_lee_duo
www.facebook.com/deadleeduo
 
This music is free, all ages, and open to the public.
Aug
12
Wed
Stelth Ulvang: Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts @ The Sou'wester
Aug 12 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm
 
(Live Stream) Stelth Ulvang at The Sou’wester
Stelth Ulvang is an American musician, singer-songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, best known as the touring member of the folk rock band The Lumineers. He is also the co-founder of the Front Range-based band The Dovekins. In February 2015, Ulvang released his debut album And, as Always; the Infinite Cosmos.
** Currently, this is scheduled to not a public event, but a live stream from the outdoor stage at The Sou’wester (weather permitting). If you are a guest staying with us, the show may be audible. *
Aug
15
Sat
Sallie Ford & Kathy Foster: Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts @ The Sou'wester
Aug 15 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm
(Live Stream) Sallie Ford, Kathy Foster at The Sou’wester
Sallie Ford grew up in Asheville, North Carolina before moving to Oregon.According to singer Seth Avett of The Avett Brothers, Ford’s songs have that “rare quality of somehow combining fun with emotional and artistic integrity” and she “fills the room with it” and reminds him of the “energy of early rock ‘n’ roll.”
 
Kathy Foster is an American musician best known as the bassist for the indie rock band The Thermals and drummer for the All Girl Summer Fun Band.Foster was raised in Sunnyvale, California and moved to Portland, Oregon in 1998. With Thermals bandmate Hutch Harris, she was in Haelah, Hutch and Kathy, and Urban Legends. With Foster on bass guitar, the Thermals became a mainstay of the Portland indie rock scene beginning in 2003. They have continued to tour and record since then. They are known for exploring new styles while remaining within the general confines of punk/indie rock. She also performs under the name Butterfly Transformation Service. She is the owner of the T-shirt company Daydream Factory.
** Currently, this is scheduled to not a public event, but a live stream from the outdoor stage at The Sou’wester (weather permitting). If you are a guest staying with us, the show may be audible. *
Aug
22
Sat
Nick Delffs + Phone Voice: Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts
Aug 22 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm
Nick Delffs plus Phone Voice: Outdoor Concert presented by Sou’wester Arts
Nick Delffs creates music that straddles the divide between modern and retro, an intriguing union of classic and contemporary.
Nick is a seeker. He’d never identify himself that way. He’s unassuming and self-effacing, careful to discuss song meanings and biographical details without indulgence or melodrama. Delffs cut his teeth playing basement shows in Portland a dozen years ago, just before that city’s cover was irreversibly blown.
He’s an old-school rustler of the human condition; a tireless navigator of social and spiritual landscapes; a genuinely curious and wide-eyed, mankind-enthusiast. Soon after meeting him, one gets the impression that Delffs could be dropped in some far corner of the Earth and he’d not only survive, but he’d make a lot of friends—maybe even start a new band. In both casual conversation and his songwriting, Delffs gravitates to the universal. That’s his search. His life’s work is in the identification and removal of our shared illusions. And that is, largely, what Delffs writes songs about. Songs come to him when he’s “feeling detached from the world but totally in love with it at the same time,” he says. “Mostly they come when I am patient and I don’t need them or care about them too much.”
 
This is what you can depend on from Nick Delffs. In a world of noise and madness, he will use his music to try and scratch at something human and real. Something helpful. Nick Delffs is a seeker. He shares his discoveries. Redesign is his greatest gift yet.
 
*
Phone Voice is Portland-based lo-fi bedroom angst led by singer and songwriter Chitra Subrahmanyam. From grungey swells to gentle melodies, their sound will leave you washed clean, the silence after a heavy rain.
 
www.phonevoice.bandcamp.com
 
** Currently, this is scheduled to not a public event, but a live stream from the outdoor stage at The Sou’wester (weather permitting). If you are a guest staying with us, the show may be audible. *
Aug
29
Sat
Barna Howard: Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts @ The Sou'wester
Aug 29 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm

 

ARTIST WEBSITE

BARNA HOWARD was born and raised in a quintessential Midwest town. His youth in Eureka, Missouri was pure Americana – the sort of childhood that inspired E.T.-era Spielberg – baseball cards in his bicycle spokes, flying freely down Main Street and through neighbors’ backyards.

However, much of Barna’s story is not unique to his hometown, and, like most of small town America, Eureka has lost some of that charm over time. Main Street has changed, kids don’t run around quite so carelessly, and in an almost laughably cruel twist, his childhood home was knocked down in favor of a Walmart parking lot.

After high school, Howard moved north to study animation in one cold and windy city and then east for love in another. Years later, he blindly followed two friends to the Northwest, crossing the Rockies for the first time, in search of inspiration, opportunity and a fresh start.

Barna’s self-titled debut chronicled these moves as he struggled with the contrast between his small town upbringing and these big city wanderings. The album was met with critical acclaim and underground success, partly thanks to an opportunely placed song in the hit indie film, Drinking Buddies. One critic even likened him to some “lost genius of the 60s.”

The songs on Barna Howard’s second album, Quite a Feelin’, ruminate on his relationship with home. Now entrenched in Portland, Oregon, many of the album’s tracks immortalize and reflect on the Eureka he once knew, while others focus on the relationships that define his new home out west. Small town life has long been celebrated in country and folk music, but Barna’s knack for capturing his own deeply personal nostalgia resonates in a rarely universal way.

 

** Currently, this is scheduled to not a public event, but a live stream from the outdoor stage at The Sou’wester (weather permitting). If you are a guest staying with us, the show may be audible. *

Sep
5
Sat
Alexis Mahler & Hanna Haas: Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts @ The Sou'wester
Sep 5 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm

(Live Stream) Alexis Mahler, Hanna Haas at The Sou’wester
 
Alexis Mahler explores her softness through the dark and earthy colors of the cello, a somber strum comforted by delicate lyrics and playful melodies. Her debut EP, Low Moon, innocently reaches for the most tender and heartful listener, while following intricate, moving layers of cello, violin, and distant vocal harmonies that seem to fall exactly where they should.
Hanna Haas is a songwriter drawn to the dance of light and dark. Currently based in Portland Oregon, she has come to call the entire West Coast her home. Hanna describes her music as “contemplative folk,” identifying with artists Nick Drake, Joni Mitchell, and Feist for their alternate tunings and mesmerizing melodies. Inspired by environments in which she has inhabited, Hanna sings of the dramatic landscape of Big Sur, the California sun, and the vast and open Pacific Northwest sky. Hanna loves to engage her audiences in sweet story telling and laughter, leaving her audience in a state of heart-felt introspection.
Hanna has played countless shows in Portland, OR and has become a part of the close knit community of West Coast artists. Hanna recently returned from touring overseas with the music agency Blue House Music which manages artists such as The Shook Twins John Craigie, Marty O’Reilly, Jeffrey Martin, Anna Tivel, and several others. She plans to record an album this Autumn.
 
** Currently, this is scheduled not as a public event, but a live stream from the outdoor stage at The Sou’wester (weather permitting). If you are a guest staying with us, the show may be audible. *
Sep
12
Sat
Ezza Rose: Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts @ The Sou'wester
Sep 12 @ 8:00 pm – 9:30 pm

 

(Live Stream) Ezza Rose at The Sou’wester
 
About 10 years ago, singer/songwriter Ezza Rose hitchhiked to the Pacific Northwest from Los Angeles, riding with semi-truck drivers the whole journey north. After graduating, Rose decided to make Portland her permanent home.“It seemed like a really accessible town for a creative person to live in,” Rose says.She’s currently getting ready to release her fourth LP, No Means No, which draws inspiration from the disconnect between language and intention. Growing up, Rose says her mother would use contradictory expressions like “no means no” and “sorry isn’t good enough” (which is also the title of a song on the record). These phrases were confusing to her, since one reinforces the power of words while the other implies that sometimes, they aren’t enough to merit forgiveness.In her own life, Rose feels like her words haven’t always been taken seriously. “When we disconnect the meaning from a word, it holds no value anymore and communication is gone,” she explains.No Means No is moodier than Rose’s earlier albums, like 2014’s Poolside and 2015’s When the Water’s Hot, which pull from her bluegrass influences. The driving force of Rose’s music, though, is still her voice, which sounds fit for a smoky jazz lounge.
 
** Currently, this is scheduled not as a public event, but a live stream from the outdoor stage at The Sou’wester (weather permitting). If you are a guest staying with us, the show may be audible. *