I discovered this band while checking out First Friday at MilePost 5. The band wasn't actually there but they had some kind of presence at the venue so I left my KZME business card.
As I recall, Jessie (she sings and plays the cello in the band) dropped me an email after finding my card to find out who the heck I was and what the heck a 'director of organizational advancement does'. So I wrote back, we chatted a bit about the band and I asked to get more of the 'skinny' on who they are.
Meet Alameda!
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How long have you lived in the Portland area?
Stirling and I moved to Portland from Boulder, Colorado with our then current band, Strangers Die Every Day in 2006. I'm not sure how long Jenn has lived here, but certainly longer than Stirling and me.
Give us a brief history of your band/project:
After our previous band ended in 2008, Stirling switched from playing bass to guitar, and began composing folk tunes with lyrics. I stress the "with lyrics" part because our previous project was a post-rock instrumental group. Some time in 2009 we began playing as Alameda with a violist and a violinist. We started sculpting our sound into an orchestrated folk feel when Jenn (Jennifer Woodall) replied to an online ad looking for a violinist. The funny part is, she's a clarinetist. We decided to give her a try anyway. She is an incredible, classically trained musician and shortly thereafter became a core member of Alameda. Since then we have expanded our circle of guest musicians and occasional members to include a drummer, flutist, french hornist, oboist, another clarinet, varying numbers of violins, banjo and electric guitar; That doesn't include the numerous other instruments that we have on our album. Alameda's core consists of Stirling Myles (guitar/vocals), myself (cello/backup vocals), Jennifer Woodall (clarinet/bass clarinet), Kate O'Brien-Clarke (violin/backup vocals) and Tim Grimes (electric guitar/banjo).
What’s the first song you ever learned to play?
The first song I remember caring about learning to play on the cello was Bach's Minuet #2. It was the first song in Suzuki cello book 1 that seemed like actual music to me.
What’s your favorite local venue to play? To see other bands?
I love playing at The Doug Fir. They treat the bands that perform there really well. I also adore The Woods. Their sound engineers, and the room in general make acoustic bands sound excellent and warm. Both venues have very immersive atmospheres that make you feel like you're in another (cooler) world.
As far as seeing other bands goes, this town is thick with awesome venues: Valentines (for something more intimate), The Someday Lounge, Holocene, Mississippi Studios.
Speaking of other bands, who do you like on the Portland music scene?
There are too many good bands in town to name. Galviston, Pancake Breakfast, Ghosting, Point Juncture, WA, Ezza Rose, Red Fang, Nick Jaina, Run On Sentence, and Vagabond Opera are some of my favorites.
Tell us about a recent “Only in Portland” moment you might have had.
Last night I attended a dance performance on the PSU campus. After watching a variety of pretty standard style dances, there was this one piece with about 10 people in it. They all had very curious stripey, burlesque-ie , off-kilter costumes. The music was really disjointed and clunky, and the piece went on for about 10 or 15 minutes... There wasn't much dancing. It was more like running around the stage thwacking things with sticks, pretending to be driving a car (for some reason) and a bunch of other extremely random movements that left me giggling uncontrollably thinking "what the f is this?" Portland, that's what it is.
Finish this sentence: “I cannot live without_____”
High-fives.
Alameda is performing at Music on Main Street TONIGHT with another great band, Autopilot is for Lovers. Starts at 5 pm! Click here for details.
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