Palaver Strings
Palaver Strings is an ensemble of classically trained string musicians who take music beyond the walls of the concert hall. Now a non-profit organization with the intent of creating community through music, they run educational programming through the Palaver Music Center in Portland, and perform a mix of classical and genre-bending orchestral music when on tour. We connected with Lysander, a violist and co-artistic director, to discuss why the group moved to Maine, and hear about their recently released album and tour. Enjoy!
Photo by Christina Wnek
Maine the Way — Introduce yourselves!
Palaver Strings — Hi! My name is Lysander and I'm a violist and Co-Artistic Director in Palaver Strings. I've been in the group for about 7 years now, and I live in Cambridge, MA where I freelance and teach full-time.
MTW — How did Palaver Strings get started?
PS — Palaver's musicians started playing together informally in 2012, when most of us were in music school in Boston. Some of our friendships go even farther back, to summer camp or youth orchestra. We were excited to rekindle these connections, and we founded Palaver out of a desire to create more meaningful chamber music experiences for ourselves and our community, and to feel more artistic agency over our musical lives than many of us felt in school or in more traditional classical career paths. Our earliest performances were in packed living rooms, bars and coffeeshops, public parks such as the Arnold Arboretum, and even a couple of yoga classes. In 2014-2015 we incorporated as a nonprofit and launched our first formal concert season, and we've continued to formalize our structures, clarify our values, and broaden our reach ever since.
Photo by Yoon S. Byun
Photo by Yoon S. Byun
MTW — What is something fun people may not know about Palaver Strings?
PS — Sometimes people ask us how we coordinate our outfits for the concert. Rather than all wearing the same thing, we choose from a palette of colors that our Programming Director (and fashion quality control officer) sends us in advance. Usually the color palette works really well, complementing the music and encouraging us to come up with creative outfits, but sometimes it backfires. For our California tour in 2018, most of us only brought salmon pink shirts, and that tour has lived in infamy as the "salmon tour" ever since.
MTW — The group started in Boston, what inspired the move to Maine?
PS — A few of our founding musicians are from Maine or have strong family connections there. After spending a few years in Boston and experimenting with different kinds of performance and educational partnerships, we wanted to deepen our connection with a specific community and create more permanent educational programs that could serve students over the course of several years. We spent a couple years doing feasibility studies about possible locations and became very interested in Portland. Besides being close to many of our families, Portland is a very vibrant city with a high demand for quality, affordable string instrument programs. We ran a few pilot programs in 2018, partnering with existing social service organizations to provide early childhood music and string instrument lessons, and the response from the community was very positive. We officially launched our educational programs and our first Maine-centered concert season in fall 2019.
Photo by Christina Wnek
MTW — How does being based in Maine influence your work?
PS — We've been so inspired by our physical and cultural surroundings here in Portland, and have been fortunate to work on several Maine-specific projects with some amazing collaborators. In 2019, we toured the state with the Welcome Home project, a multidisciplinary performance celebrating Maine's cultural diversity and featuring guest artists of Burundian, Iraqi, and Quebecois heritage. Last year we presented Witnessing Change, a virtual performance featuring two place-based compositions by Maine composers, based partly on interviews with Portland residents as they reflected on ecological and demographic change in the Munjoy Hill neighborhood. We've also enjoyed a wonderful relationship with Bay Chamber Concerts for many years - they've been hugely supportive from the beginning, hosting us regularly for season concerts and summer festivals and helping us reach wider Maine audiences. In particular, their Screen Door Festival has introduced us to amazing musicians that we've continued to work with; it's such a warm and collaborative environment. In the educational sphere, we've partnered with Portland-based organizations such as The Opportunity Alliance, Youth and Family Outreach and the Greater Portland Immigrant Welcome Center to offer music instruction on-site, and these partners have helped us understand the needs of the community and shape our programming with that in mind.
MTW — What is something you’re proud of?
PS — We are very proud of our latest album Ready or Not, available on all streaming platforms. This album features music written by women from the renaissance to the present day, including two local fiddlers, Liz Knowles and Elizabeth Moore. Ready or Not has been two years in the making and we are thrilled to share it with the world.
Photo by Christina Wnek
Photo by Christina Wnek
Photo by Christina Wnek
MTW — Tell us a little more about your upcoming tour!
PS — Welcome Here is a multidisciplinary performance celebrating the resilience, wisdom, and stewardship of Maine's communities, presented in partnership with the Abbe Museum, Indigo Arts Alliance, and the Greater Portland Immigrant Welcome Center. The performance will feature musicians and storytellers of Wabanaki, Congolese, and Puerto Rican heritage, accompanied by Palaver and directed by Sherri Mitchell, and will also feature an interactive digital mural that audience members can contribute to. Welcome Here will be performed in Caribou, Rockport, Bar Harbor, Eastport, Portland, Farmington, and Lewiston, April 28 — May 7.
Our album release tour (May 31 — June 5) celebrates the release of our newest album Ready or Not, with music written by women from the renaissance to the present day. We will be joined by Sophie Michaux, mezzo-soprano, for concerts in Portland, Vermont, New York, Rhode Island, and Cape Cod.
Photo by Christina Wnek
MTW — What are you looking forward to in the months and years to come?
PS — We have several exciting projects coming down the pipe in the next year, including a yearlong residencies at the Portland Children's Museum and the Longy School of Music at Bard College and collaborations with Chris Patishall, Kinan Azmeh, Kebra-Seyoun Charles, and Nicholas Phan. The year after that will be our tenth anniversary and will feature some very big celebratory projects.