It's another magical birthday for the Kennedy School-and you're invited to the party!

Plus a Passport Discovery Hunt & Special Birthday Stamp!

Live Music:

Tanner Cundy and Sean Hudson from 12 p.m. 'til 2 p.m.

Ruthie’s Moan from 2:30 p.m. 'til 4:30 p.m.

Maurice and the Stiff Sisters from 5 p.m. 'til 7 p.m.

Melville from 7:30 p.m. 'til 10 p.m.  

Facepainter & Balloon guy from 12 p.m. 'til 3 p.m.

Birthday cake

Special birthday beer - Courtyard Autumn Kölsch

Future unknown, the model currently on display, Melville is the combined effort of a band in the making since 2011. That's when, newly returned stateside from a four year stint living in Berlin, songwriter and vocalist Ryan T. Jacobs first debuted Melville at Portland staple the LaurelThirst Pub. Since then, the band has performed many shows and had several highlights including having single Heart debuted at halftime of a sold out Portland Trailblazers game, playing at SXSW and sharing the stage with the likes of 3 Doors Down, Wilco side-project The Autumn Defense, Minor Alps, Murder by Death and Eric Earley (Blitzen Trapper) among others.

Founded on openness and a collaborative spirit, there's a tangible longevity to Melville that begs the band to explore and discover new layers to its sound.

Melville's introductory offering, Maquette, was recorded at Type Foundry Studios with Adam Selzer (M. Ward, Sallie Ford, Blind Pilot, The Decemberists, Peter Buck of R.E.M., She & Him) and mastered by Gus Elg at Sky Onion (Typhoon, Nurses, Horse Feathers, Blue Cranes), and has garnered radio play on Portland stations like KINK, KNRK and KZME. For now, Maquette is the base layer-but Melville will be charting a fresh course from here.

Melville are currently in the studio with Gregg Williams (The Dandy Warhols, Blitzen Trapper, Sheryl Crow, etc) working on the full-length follow-up to Maquette, entitled The New Zero.

Website:

http://melvilletheband.com

Facebook:

https://www.facebook.com/melvilletheband

With their own blend of pure pop for now people, Maurice and the Stiff Sisters is made from only the finest local ingredients.  

Inspired by troubadours such as Nick Lowe, Robyn Hitchcock and Jonathan Richman along with horn-powered soul and rock 'n roll, Maurice and the Stiff Sisters push the boundaries in pursuit of fine songcraft. Filtered through the rose-tinted glasses of psychedelia and power-pop, the music weaves daring horn lines and serpentine guitar riffs through Merseybeat rockers and cheeky sambas. It's an undeniably upbeat, positively danceable affair.

The band's origins can be found in Chico, CA with frontman/songwriter Maurice Spencer and his lust for snapping audiences out of their navel-gazing slumber. His background in theater and music journalism was the spring-loaded platform that propelled him from curating song compilations and theatrical composition to an impresario fronting a bonafide live experience.

There's something rare in the grand cacophony of today's musical class: bands that provided a live experience. Not just a performance, not tuning for two minutes between songs, not offering excuses about why something sounded better in rehearsal the night before kind of affair, but a real experience. Something that people talk about afterwards; a group that melts faces, that puts on a show, and that never forgets the whole purpose is to entertain so that for one short hour people could forget about their long, boring, meaningless hours working at the vape store, the karaoke bar, or the Tatertot Taco cart (which is amazing, everyone should go there...) and have an honest to goodness thing happen.

Every band needs a story. The Maurice and the Stiff Sisters story is that they put on a ripping live show. Sometimes people need to be told it's okay to fucking dance.

From their headquarters in Portland, Oregon, to their rural compound in picturesque Hockinson, Washington, Maurice and the Stiff Sisters add accelerants to the fire, smoke life to its filter and dance through the ashes. 

Personnel:
Maurice Spencer - vocals/guitar
Michael Doherty - bass guitar
Dave Shur - drums
Aaron Mattison - tenor saxophone
Bryant Byers - trombone

Pedigree:
Future Historians, Ezra Bell, PWRHAUS, The Yule Logs, Salem Symphony Orchestra

When you happen across a Tanner Cundy show, you get the feeling from the moment he picks up his guitar that you're in for a unique experience - and you'd be spot-on, as the Cornish-born Cundy might say.

It wouldn't be out of place to assume that this guy has a novel approach to music; he's a self-described "hardcore lefty" who slings a right-handed guitar upside down, lays claim to having played a German bass lute on a pop record and has filled many a role for a wide variety of acts from Portland and beyond.   Check his journal and you'd come across entries like engineering a score for the 48 Hour Film Festival and fronting an Irish rock band.  Browse his setlist and you'd find gems from every decade - Floyd fans, those whose favorite band is The Band, even Tool aficionados would take note of familiar titles amongst the dozens of original tunes he's penned. 

This variety of experience gets blended on high to create some truly memorable sets, and it's clear that Cundy's time playing live with many local groups (Will West and the Friendly Strangers, The Druthers) has had the perfect seasoning effect.  If you enjoy a skillful, authentic performance, coupled with rapid-fire humour and a couple pints of local fare, then you would do well to catch the next Cundy performance.

website:

http://www.tannercundy.com/