VANPORT’S GOT JAZZ

THE VANPORT JAZZ FESTIVAL CARRIES THE TORCH OF THOSE MUSICIANS WHO MOVED TO OREGON FOR WORK AND FILLED THE AIR WITH ART.

BY MICHELE DARR PHOTOGRAPHY FLOSSIN MEDIA

Boasting world-class jazz in a vibrant festival atmosphere, the Vanport Jazz Festival(VJF) is celebrating its 6th year of regaling audiences with a full spectrum jazz experience. Established in 2017, the festival was created to honor the history of Vanport, once the nation’s largest public housing project and the second-largest city in Oregon.

Built in 110 days in 1942, Vanport was constructed on a floodplain just outside city limits in order to meet the needs of newly arriving shipyard workers, including thousands of African-Americans who were restricted by a so-called “real estate code of ethics” which limited them to living in just one area. 40,000 people called this makeshift community home until Memorial Day, 1948, when the Columbia River broke through the nearby levees, unleashing a historic flood that displaced 18,000 people from their homes—a quarter of whom were African-American.

Newly homeless and looking for work in racially segregated Portland, Vanport’s uprooted Black community opened jazz clubs in their designated neighborhood. These clubs attracted the biggest names in jazz, and the vibrant culture soon established Portland as a true jazz city.

More than 8 decades later, the Vanport legacy is still alive and well as the Vanport Jazz Festival carries the torch of those musicians who moved to Oregon for work and filled the air with art. Storms of ongoing displacement and a worldwide pandemic be damned, the event prevails to this day, and is carving out a unique niche on the national jazz scene.

Against a backdrop of sumptuous world cuisine and rich offerings on display from local vendors selling their goods and services, The Vanport Jazz Festivals musical lineup is impressive to say the least. World renowned saxophonist, Mike Phillips and Joseph Lewis Thomas (known mononymously as Joe) kick off the event on Friday. Grammy-award winning Jazz/ R&B saxophone player, Boney James, gets the party started on Saturday, followed by chart topping artist, Julian Vaughn, indie artist role model and paragon of female empowerment, Goapele, composer and band leader, Adam Hawley, and the Average White Band, a top Soul, R&B, and Jazz-Funk group rounds out the day’s festivities.

The Vanport Jazz Festival will be held at The Colwood Golf Center, 7313 NE Columbia Blvd., Portland, OR 97218 (Approximately 1 mile from Portland International Airport). While VIP tickets and ticket packages are currently sold out, you can still experience the revival by purchasing general admission tickets at vanportjazzfestival.com/packages.

In 2007 Leslie Goodlow was the First Ever Black Rose Festival President in the event’s 100 year history. She loves ALL things Rose Festival Catch her Story on YouTube/Flossin MediaTV The Portland Rose Festival 2023 Black Entertainment Experience PDX Black Rose Podcast.