SOU’WESTER EVENTS!

Portland’s Yaara Valey (formerly Indira Valey). No Me Tengas Miedo is an EP of textural surprises and casual wizardry. Four soundscape pieces that exist in the realm of artists like Julianna Barwick, Juana Molina, and Grouper.

Released on Antiquated Future Records and Spirit House. Limited edition second printing. Listen on Bandcamp.

“No Me Tengas Miedo feels in many ways like an exercise in surrender. It lulls us into an uncertain serenity, not tranquilized but clear-headed, before pulling us into a strange world with unfamiliar boundaries. It’s a transportive work, and one that you’ll find calling you back when you least expect it.” – Thrdcoast

** 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. **

Nina Yates: Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts

Nina Yates is a Portland, Oregon based singer songwriter who pulls you into her stories with thoughtful and distinctive songs. A slow, tender and delicate drag, yet fierce with lived emotion, the wisdom of a mother, the comfort of a sister and the heartbreak of a daughter.

It didn’t occur to Yates to start writing songs until the day she first met her mother, when she was twenty-three years old. Since then she has been using songwriting to redeem hard times by turning them into beautiful artifacts.

Mama’s Heart, Yates debut LP, features ten beautifully crafted folk songs, of which eight were written for a weekly open mic song prompt hosted by Taylor Kingman (of TK & The Holy Know-Nothings) at the Laurelthirst Public House in Portland. 

As someone who has always been drawn to the sound of something older, folky and rural, Nina feels that songwriting is about connection and community.

The two remaining songs on ‘Mama’s Heart’ were collaborations with legendary Portland based producer, songwriter, and multi-instrumentalist, Mike Coykendall. Last year Coykendall generously offered his old songwriting notebooks and tapes to members of his songwriting community to salvage and recycle aspects and parts of songs to build new, finished songs. A project called Coykendall called ‘Seeds and Stems’.  

For lovers of songcraft, Nina Yates delivers a dose of much needed medicine on her debut record. Heartfelt and true, Nina’s voice and songs are genuine and unique, yet evocative of important songwriting heroes like Joni Mitchell and Gillian Welch.   

Faustina Masigat : Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts

Frustrated by academia and emotionally raw from a breakup, Faustina Masigat stepped away from her peers in her mid-twenties. She had come to realize that her personal and artistic maturation had been stifled by her relationships and her overly angular traditional musical schooling. She knew she needed to spend more time alone, committed to a process of unlearning, before she could move forward. As she peeled back the rigid layers of her youth, she began to write the songs that, a few years later, would make up her debut record. Seeking honesty over perfection, her approach to composition became much more intuitive; seated in the natural expression of not only her emotional life, but also that of a spiritual life, an expression of her own femininity, and a means of self improvement through self reflection. She became obsessed with the old, forgotten, second-hand guitars she would find in the “As Is” section of local music shops, believing that magic and songs still lived in the beat-up wood. One album track, “Willie Nelson”, manifested, fully formed, from one of these guitars – an ancient, labeless individual that she called “Red”. 

The songwriting on her self-titled debut is all at once heartbreaking, intelligent, meditative and elegant – centered around a voice that is difficult to attach genre to. There is a quiet intensity running through the world that Faustina creates: sweet and heavy, a touch of angst, brutally honest, smoldering. The album is understated, arranged as to allow Faustina’s effortless rapport with pedal steel player Tucker Jackson (The Minus 5, The Delines) to shine clearest. It’s a spacious and lush debut, with all of her vulnerabilities laid bare in songs hemmed together with fragile intimacy. 

Faustina Masigat is out now on Mama Bird Recording Co. It was recorded by Rian Lewis, mixed by Ben Nugent and mastered by Timothy Stollenwerk, all in Portland, Oregon.

Tommy Alexander : Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts

“Tommy Alexander’s WAVES comes from the few important things we’re left with when illusions crumble: a chance at self reflection, the opportunity to be of service to others, and lived experiences that make good art.” – Sean Jewell at American Standard Time

** Currently, this is scheduled not as a public event, but a live stream from the outdoor stage at The Sou’wester (weather permitting). 

Jason McCue is an indie-folk artist based out of Seattle, Washington. After moving to the city for college, Jason gained musical notoriety for competing and placing first in the MoPOP Sound Off! Competition for Pacific Northwest artists who are 21 and under. He went on to perform his set at distinguished festivals such as Bumbershoot, Timber Outdoor, and Doe Bay Festivals, and put out two records PANGAEA and WASTELAND off Portland’s treasured Fluff and Gravy Records. 

** Currently, this is scheduled to 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. *

Jeffrey Silverstein is a songwriter living in Portland, Oregon. He has been making music for over a decade. Prior to relocating to Portland, Silverstein released music with Brooklyn-based duo Nassau and Baltimore’s Secret Mountains, projects who received praise from NPR, Stereogum and the New York Times. How On Earth (2019), his debut solo EP for Driftless Recordings, was developed as an artist-in-residence at the Sou’wester Lodge on the coast of Washington where Silverstein lived, wrote and demoed material inside a vintage Ford motorhome turned recording studio. 

In between solo tours, weekend runs and local performances, Silverstein laid groundwork for You Become The Mountain, his first LP for Arrowhawk Records (Spring 2020). Recorded and produced by Ryan Oxford (Y La Bamba, Matt Dorrien, Jacob Miller) at Color Therapy Recording, the nine songs that comprise YBTM are heavily inspired by the landscapes of the Pacific Northwest, meditation, long-distance running and Silverstein’s work as a special education teacher. Expanding on the minimalist approach (guitar/vocals/drum machine) heard on How on Earth, Silverstein invited pedal-steelist Barry Walker Jr. (Mouth Painter, Roselit Bone) and bassist Alex Chapman (Parson Redheads, Evan Thomas Way) to round-out anincreasingly meditative sound. Led by the spirit of late Detroit musician Ted Lucas, Silverstein was moved to create an album featuring both instrumental and lyric-based compositions. Silverstein casts a wide net in 40 minutes, offering fans of both traditional and experimental folk entry points into his universe. Primarily tracked live and void of heavily processed sounds, the LP serves as a proper introduction to a songwriter who celebrates patience and restraint in the highest regard. 

** Currently, this is scheduled to 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. *

Joshua Thomas : Live Stream presented by Sou’wester Arts