Calendar

As part of
2025 Corvallis Open Streets Festival
CFS is presenting a
Free Contra Dance

with The Nettles playing

and Noah Grunzweig calling.

The Nettles have been a premiere Corvallis contra dance band for years, having played here most recently at the March 1 dance.

Noah Grunzweig will have called here most recently at the June 21 dance.

Open Streets this year will be in Southtown

• Lilly Park in the north to
• Willamette Park in the south
  via
• SE Bethel St.
• SE Alexander Ave.
• SE Thompson St.
• SE Park Ave.
• SE Heron View St.

There will be dancing at Lilly Park and music at Willamette Park.  At Lilly Park:

• 11am   Swing Dance
• noon   Cuban Salsa
•   1pm   CFS Contra Dance
•  2pm   traditional dance performance by Corazón Oaxaqueño

For more information on the event, which runs from 11am to 3pm, go to
https://openstreetscorvallis.org/

Jim Page

JIM PAGE is an American singer and songwriter living in Seattle, Washington. He’s made 24 full length albums, been on a dozen compilations, done numberless tours, and written hundreds of songs.

He sings of politics and romance, adventure and comedy, tragedy, history, and meditations on life, death and the absurd. His improvisations are legendary, and if there’s anything to talk about that he hasn’t sung about it’s just that he was too busy singing about something else.

When he was 20 he hitched across country in the wintertime, 3 000 miles to New York City and the fabled Greenwich Village, looking to find his own voice. Living on rooftops, borrowing guitars, playing everywhere he could, he stayed for a year until life took him out west to Seattle where the whole city opened up. Carrying his guitar like a sack of tools he left his mark on every square inch of that town. Every theater, cafe, rock and roll bar, and sidewalk street corner was a stage, until a cop came by to shut him down. But he wouldn’t shut so easy. So in 1974 he sang to the City Council that street music should be free and legal and they should overturn an old backward law against it … and they did!

Mixing sounds and ideas like back in the old California days, the attitudes and the themes. Organic associations with jazz players, rock players, country, blues and folk. They fold around Jim’s songs to create soundscapes. His most recent project, THE TIME IS NOW, is the most solid and ambitious to date. The song writing is top notch, the music and performance too. After all these years Jim Page is still at the top of his game.

The concert will be at the Friends Meeting House on NW Polk.  “This room has fabulous acoustics so we will not use a sound system. It promises to be a great night. I haven’t played Corvallis is a long time, good to be back.”

Open the Door for Three

Open the Door for Three is a road-tested, audience-approved, laughing-out-loud trio of Irish musicians, including fiddle player Liz Knowles, uilleann piper Kieran O’Hare, and Dublin-born singer and bouzouki player Pat Broaders. Their music is a rare combination of unearthed tunes from centuries-old collections, newly composed melodies, fresh arrangements of songs old and new, homages to the musicians and bands they grew up listening to, and the unmatched energy of a trio of good friends playing great Irish music together.

Join us at 6 p.m. for a PRAxPRELUDE with local musicians Sharon and Dave Thormahlen on harp and mandolin, alongside a Lightbox Happy Hour. Corvallis Folklore Society members also receive a $2 discount on tickets.

CFS discount code: cfs2025

Kalos

Kalos is made up of three innovative interpreters and composers of Celtic roots music: Eric McDonald, Ryan McKasson and Jeremiah McLane. They are masters of tradition who purposefully explore the dark corners floating on its edges, delivering an alluring musical complexity full of spontaneity and joyful exuberance. They set the standard for traditional repertoire with an underlying drive and pulse charged with rhythmic electricity and integrity, forging a new musical path that draws on Celtic, Breton, American and other musical traditions on accordion, guitar, fiddle, and vocals. The title of their new album, Headland, which refers to a point where land meets sea, is a fitting analogy for the exploratory space Kalos inhabits — one that calls forth driving, heartfelt music journeying through unknown territory to seek and find its essence – the enduring, resilient experience of the human heart.

Rated: G

Breabach

Twenty years on from winning the Danny Kyle Open Stage Award at Celtic Connections, Breabach remain securely ranked amongst Scotland’s most skilled & imaginative contemporary-folk acts and at the forefront of the burgeoning traditional music scene. The band unite deep roots in Highland and Island Gaelic tradition alongside progressive musical influences and have cultivated a unique sound, anchoring double bagpipes, fiddle, whistle, step-dance and song with energetic double bass and guitar accompaniment.

Versatility, love of experimentation and a willingness to push the boundaries of Scottish roots music have endured as the core values of the band over the past two decades. They have embraced and pioneered many cross-genre collaborations, linking up with artists including Quebec’s Le Vent du Nord, BAFTA award-winning animator Cat Bruce, indigenous Australasian artist Moana & the Tribe, video game composer Big Giant Circles, Cape Breton powerhouse Beòlach and most recently the Scottish National Jazz Orchestra.

With 8 critically acclaimed studio releases to date, an extensive global touring schedule and having received recognition with 6 BBC ALBA Traditional Music Awards, a 2023 German Record Critic’s Award and as European Folk Group of the year finalists in the prestigious Songlines Awards, Breabach’s journey shows no sign of slowing. They continue their adventures throughout this special anniversary year with performances and festivals across the UK, USA and Europe.

Breabach are: 

• Megan Henderson (Fiddle/Vocals/Step Dance)
• James Lindsay (Double Bass/Vocals)
• Calum MacCrimmon (Highland Bagpipe/Whistle/Bouzouki/Vocals)
• Conal McDonagh (Highland Bagpipe/Uilleann pipes/Whistle/Vocals
• Ewan Robertson (Guitar/Cajon/Vocals)