Post-Tour Reflections, part 1

An overview of the 2017 Oregon Tour

Hi folks,

I'm back home in Seattle and settling into post-Chautauqua life. There are some perks (real bed, curtains that block out 6am sunshine, dishwashers, dog), but I'm also missing the feeling of constant community that Chautauqua brings. Since I wasn't too consistent with updates over the past week of the tour, I thought I'd take a look at the schedule and retroactively try to describe some of what went down town-by-town. Photos are all by me unless otherwise indicated.

MADRAS

First memory of Madras was baking approximately 40 pizzas at Sophie's house. She had pre-made the dough, but it still took an intense assembly line between me, Phina, and Nate. Chautauquans arrived, and we had a band rehearsal with a brief break to enjoy one of the finest sunsets I've ever seen.

(Photo by Michelle Bates)

Headed over to camp, which was at the county fairgrounds. Not a lot of shade to be had, and it got pretty hot. Most folks went to bed on the early side.

Tuesday we did shows and workshops for the Madras Kids' Club. Then we headed over to the Desert Inn for a just-for-us band jam. "Just-for-us" means that it's not a public performance per se, but as it turns out, a woman was celebrating her 30th birthday in the bar we had chosen to jam in. She seemed skeptical at first, but by the end of the night she was dancing, shouting out requests, and thanking us for an unexpectedly musical birthday celebration. James Andrews, a new Chautauquan and fabulous saxophonist, brought down the house with a couple soul tunes and funky solos.

(Marimba/violin jam at the campsite)

Wednesday we got up early for a 3-show day: Parade and show at Culver City Park (a celebration of their summer reading program), shows and workshops at the Warm Springs Reservation, and finally a performance for the Oregon Child Development Coalition. 

Here's me being slightly overwhelmed during one of the workshop sessions:

Next day had a community show (Crooked River Ranch, great audience of kids), then a "Big Show" at the Madras Performing Arts Center. I remember this feeling like one of the most successful stops on the tour - we had been to so many places around the community that by the time we did a formal theater show, everyone in town was there. Nothing makes me happier than seeing familiar faces in a crowd during a Chautauqua show - people had come from various social circles and communities to be a part of the craziness that we bring.

While in Madras, we hosted a pot luck, in which I got to meet several local members of the community. There's a lot of excitement in town about the upcoming total solar eclipse - NASA is in town and they're expecting a huge influxes of tourists coming to experience the eclipse. A couple girls I talked to were sharing stories about their plans for the temporary population spike. Lorene, the amazing librarian who served as our organizer for the Madras portion of the tour, is super on it - the library is full of books about astronomy and there's a big beautiful wall display. After workshops, a few of us hung out in the library ("hung out" = talked for a while, then fell asleep - it was very cozy and we were very tired). One kid who took the ukulele workshop was excited to check out a loaner uke from the library - so cool that that's an option! 

Side post that I'm going to steal directly from something I wrote on Facebook at the time: