Thursday, 19
Curtis Monette and Twisted Snout Brewery Tasting, Bombs Away Café, 2527 NW Monroe Ave. 6 p.m. Free
“Curtis Monette got more loops than a toucan!” is what I heard a sassy teen fan of his saying one time… in my head. But seriously, Monette is a big deal in the local scene for a reason. His live show with a liberal dollop of looping and jamming is great, and Twisted Snout brews a mean…brew. Crap. That sassy teen is the best writer here…
https://myspace.com/curtismonette
Rough Jazz, Calapooia Brewing Company, 140 NE Hill St. 7 p.m. Free
If you’re anything like me, you like your jazz like you like your cats’ tongues. Rough. I want my jazz to get so rough we need to agree on a safe word. So I think you’ll know what I mean when I say Rough Jazz at Calapooia will sate your thirst for the hard stuff. Okay, that was all a false buildup. These guys are pretty smooth. And great.
http://www.reverbnation.com/roughjazz
Friday, 20
Dennis Monroe Blues & Funk Jam, Meet‘N’Place Tavern, 1150 Main St., Philomath. 8 p.m. Free
The name makes it sound like a memorial, but I assure you that Dennis Monroe is very much alive and kicking. And the MnP Tavern is, as the kids of 2006 might have put it, “my jam.” I seriously love this place, plus it’s a surprisingly excellent spot for live music, which they don’t do often enough. I’m not going to go so far as to endorse the food here, but they do have tater tots which can make up for a lot. I once allowed Jehovah’s Witnesses into my house because they had tater tots.
The Diary of Anne Frank, Oregon State University Theatre, 2921 SW Campus Way. 7:30 p.m. $12 ($10 for seniors, $8 for youth, $5 for OSU students)
This story is well-known by all, but this is a new adaptation of it by Wendy Kesselman and the OSU drama kids are normally excellent. So I have high hopes for this strong and emotionally exhausting piece. This production is directed by Elizabeth Helman, who also helms the strong Shakespeare in the Quad series, which bodes well, and it has music composed by OSU students as well, so this is a truly unique look at the classic true story.
Saturday, 21
Funk-N-Roses, Bombs Away Café, 2527 NW Monroe Ave. 10 p.m. $5
Do I really need to explain this one? It’s funk musicians covering GNR. What’s not to like? Aside from Guns N’ Roses, of course. This sounds like a combustible combination waiting to be unleashed, and it has been tried before by these seasoned funk circuit pros, back in 2012. Supposedly the house was brought down. Bassist Brett McConnell and vocalist Aniana Hough, both out of Portland, are the mad geniuses behind this experiment, which is easily worth $5. Now Chinese Democracy, that was another story…
The Music Man, Corvallis High School Theatre, 1400 NW Buchanan Ave. 7 p.m. $10 ($8 for students, $5 for youth)
If you were hesitant to give the OSU thespians a chance, this will likely not be for you either. But the CHS kids really know how to get after a musical, and The Music Man is ripe for their talents. If, unlike me, you don’t have an order from the court mandating you stay 100 yards away from school grounds stemming from an ugly heckling incident at graduation last year, you could do a lot worse for a Saturday night in Corvallis.
Sunday, 22
Majestic Reader’s Theater, Majestic Theatre, 115 SW 2nd St. 3 and 7 p.m. $10 ($8 for seniors, members, students)
The Majestic Reader’s Theatre will tackle Dead Man’s Cell, a 2008 play by Sarah Ruhl. Under the eye of director Pat Kight, a veteran of the Majestic stage, Reader’s Theatre does a fun, stripped-down version of the play that makes it fast and accessible. Dead Man’s Cell is about a young woman who picks up the phone of a newly deceased man and starts answering messages left on it. I feel like there was a movie sort of like this starring Reese Witherspoon, and if not, you’re welcome for your Oscar-winning idea, Reese Witherspoon.
http://www.majestic.org/february-readers-theatre/
Blues Jam!, Calapooia Brewing Company, 140 NE Hill St. 4 to 6 p.m. Free
I never really had the blues blues in my life. I once lost a Swatch watch at an amusement park, but I wouldn’t describe what I felt with the soulful music of the heartland. These guys at Calapooia clearly have lost their fair share of Swatches at amusement parks, ’cause the blues in the air is palpable. Also none of them show up on time. Zing…
https://www.facebook.com/calapooiabrewing
Monday, 23
Bryson Skaar, Imagine Coffee, 5460 SW Philomath Blvd. 7:30 p.m. Free
Duke Ellington once described the jazz pianist as like a grasshopper in the spring rain. They have to dodge and jump and scrape to survive, and the thing that threatens them the most, the rain, is what they need to raise the crops that they’ll eat to survive. Bryson Skaar captures that struggle every time he suits up at Imagine Coffee. And if any of that nonsense were true or if Duke Ellington had ever said something so stupid, I bet you’d be more inclined to go see Bryson play. I bet you feel pretty bad now. Maybe just go see him ’cause it’s Monday, and not because he’s some bizarre mutated Grasshopper Man. Jerks…
http://www.reverbnation.com/brysonskaar
Traditional West African Dance Classes, Oddfellows Hall, 223 SW 2nd St. 7:15 p.m.
If Fefafe doesn’t make you want to learn to dance, than it’s just possible you’re already clinically dead. In which case this is sort of like Beetlejuice, and I’m the old lady at the agency who tells you what the afterlife is like. It’s completely devoid of Traditional West African Dance, so if you want to feel alive again, check out this lil gem at the Oddfellows Hall. Didn’t think I’d be able to bring that one back around, did ya? You were all, “Wait, what, Beetlejuice?” And then boom. Writing.
https://www.facebook.com/pages/Fefafe/511049845683731
Tuesday, 24
Community Movie Night with Ygal Kaufman, Darkside Cinema, 215 SW 4th St. 7 p.m. Free
Ygal is just not letting up with the parade of stars in February. Fire Over England (1937) may be the most star-studded CMNYK screening yet. Laurence Olivier, Vivien Leigh, James Mason, Flora Robson, Raymond Massey, and in his third Community Movie Night appearance, Leslie Banks, light up this Elizabethan adventure that has political intrigue and romance splashed all over it. My dad used to refer to movies like this by saying, “Nobody stayed home!” Of course, he’d say that if the movie starred George Kennedy and Slim Pickens, so his bar may have been somewhat lower. Better show up early; the seating options, like my dad’s taste in movies, will feature slim pickin’.
https://www.facebook.com/freemovienightcorvallis
Celtic Jam, Imagine Coffee, 5460 SW Philomath Blvd. 7 p.m. Free
Not everyone loves Irish music played by nice people for free. A good example would be vampires, IRS auditors, and people who brag about not owning TVs. For the rest of us, Imagine Coffee has a free weekly Irish music hootenanny that will put the Erin back in your Bragh. If you’re a huge fan of “Greensleeves,” I have a feeling you’re in luck.
Wednesday, 25
Music Between Two World Wars, Corvallis-OSU Symphony Orchestra, La Sells Stewart Center, 875 SW 26th St. 7:30 p.m. $20 to $32
The symphony tackles the work of Benjamin Britten in this meditation on war they describe thusly: “Of the three works on our program, one explicitly refers to war, one powerfully evokes the anxiety and violence of war, and one responds to violence by creating a kind of musical safe haven.” I’ll just choose not to snark about it. Go.
http://www.cosusymphony.org/tickets/
Berto Boyd, Bombs Away Café, 2527 NW Monroe Ave. 7:30 p.m. Free
This guy plays flamenco guitar, which is objectively awesome. He’s also related to Brandon Boyd, from Incubus, which is objectively not. Still, if we held it against everyone who was related to a douche-goon, we’d all just hate each other. Flamenco guitar, when done right, is one of the nicest things you can hear. If you’ve only heard it piped over the speakers at a tapas joint… you probably have a pretty good idea of what it’s like. They usually play the good stuff.
http://www.bertoflamenco.com/about-us.html
Thursday, 26
Wild Hog in the Woods, Calapooia Brewing Company, 140 Hill St. NE, Albany. 7:30 p.m. Free
It’s that time of the week when you want to get sauced on White Lightnin’ and wear overalls. Wild Hog’s got your back, as they have for like the last thousand years. They’re like a ghost jug band that you see playing every week and never realize has been playing since 1927 and never age. Am I right? Or is this totally in my head? I had a country bumpkin version of The Shining going… All work and no play make Zeke a dull boy.
Stiff and Restless (featuring members of Floater), Bombs Away Café, 2527 NW Monroe Ave. 9 p.m. $7
I take it you all know Floater? They’ve played here a bunch, and this is one of their spinoffs. There’s a free Ninkasi tasting going on before the show, from 6 to 8 p.m., but the music is still a bargain at only $7. Rob Wynia is a staple of the scene, so I think you owe it to him, or at the very least me. Right? Or am I misreading our relationship?
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