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Bio MarchFourth is a date, a command, and a band. Imagine Duke Ellington meets Sgt. Pepper in an international big-top Fantasia evoking a familial community reminiscent of the Grateful Dead. Imagine a 1920's speakeasy where Mr. Bungle meets the Shogun Warriors in a PG Clockwork Orange. Imagine running into this 35-person spectacle marching through a festival, down a street, or onto stage. The impact is immediate and infectious. MarchFourth Marching Band is a mobile big band spectacular, consisting of saxophones, trombones, trumpets and a 5- to 10-piece drum/percussion corps, anchored by electric bass (battery powered). The sound is huge, melodic, and dynamic, taking audiences on a musical journey around the globe. MarchFourth writes and performs its own material, and also draws inspiration from an eclectic range of worldwide influences, such as Eastern European Gypsy Brass, Samba, Funk, Afro-Beat, Big-Band, Jazz, and Rock music, as well as television, film, circus, and Vaudeville. Stilt-walkers, unicycles, fire eaters, puppets, flag twirlers, burlesque dancers, clown antics, and acrobatics are just some of the things you’ll see accompanying this eclectic big band. MarchFourth Marching Band’s stilt-walkers are world-class, performing acrobatics, dance routines, and even fire dancing on stilts—all in fanciful costumes. The other dancing beauties can fill the stage with mesmerizing original dance routines (inspired by styles such as bellydance, hip hop, jazz, cheerleading, burlesque, and ballroom) or spread out into the audience and get everybody dancing. The musical quality, the energy of the band, and the spectacle of the dancers all combine to create an original performance that appeals to everyone. Without guitars or keyboards, M4 "rocks" with the best of them, entertaining the audience with an over-the-top explosion of performance and charisma. To MarchFourth Marching Band, art is life. Aside from being performers, the members of MarchFourth are also full- or part-time artists, designers, and craftspeople. All their drum harnesses (welded from recycled bicycle parts), stilts, costumes, merchandise, audio, and visual propaganda are designed and produced by members of the band. The scope of appeal is almost universal: MarchFourth can fit in (and stand out!) at everything from weddings and school assembly concerts, to nationally known music festivals and top-level sporting events. From the hippest to the most down-to-earth, from conservative to liberal, from infant to elderly: all walks of life have been seen enjoying MarchFourth Marching Band. Clients MarchFourth Marching Band has played a huge variety of events. The list below includes a selection of organizations, festivals, parades, street shows, and corporate events. ~ORGANIZATIONS MercyCorps, Amnesty International, Africa AIDS Response, City Repair Project, Cascade AIDS Project, Oregon Bus Project, Oregon Museum of Science & Industry (OMSI), Code Pink, ORLO, SCRAP Iron Artist, Blues for Katrina Benefit, Equity Foundation / Pride Parade, PFLAG, Portland Center Stage, Portland Timbers Soccer Team, Reed College, Lewis and Clark College, the Evergreen State College, Reno Artown and the Oregon Tourism Board. ~FESTIVALS, PARADES, & CLUBS Hollywood Bowl (CA), Kennedy Center Millennium Stage (DC), Harvard Square Oktoberfest (MA), Echo Project Music Festival (GA), New Belgium Brewing’s Tour de Fat, Festival Internationale de Lousianne (Lafayette), Lotus Festival (Bloomington), Maple Leaf (NOLA), Antone’s (Austin), Arlene Schnitzer Concert Hall, Lightening in a Bottle (CA), High Sierra Music Festival (CA), Shambhala (Nelson, BC), Carnival de Culturen (Germany), Altonale (Germany), Burning Man (NV), Waterfront Blues Festival, Oregon Country Fair, Northwest Folklife (Seattle), Red Bull Flugtag, Rose Festival Starlight Parade, Knitting Factory (LA and NY), Paramount Theater (San Francisco), Portland Rose Festival, Music Fest NW, Reed College Arts Week, Sisters Folk Festival, Lake Oswego Concert in the Park, Portland Saturday Market, Alberta Street Parade, The Bite of Oregon, Surrealist Ball (Seattle), Portland Brewer’s Festival, and Star Spangled Sparks (NV). ~CORPORATE EVENTS Comcast, Volkswagen, Portland Trail Blazers, United Way, Outward Bound, Portland General Electric, Wells Fargo, Dr. Martens, Nike, Cricket Communications, Burgerville, 24 Hour Fitness, Art Media, Proctor & Gamble (ZIBA Design), National Lawyer’s Guild, Ankrom-Moison Architects, Willamette Dental Group, and Mario’s clothing store. History MarchFourth Marching Band got its name from the date of their first show: March 4, 2003. It all began when a handful of artists and musicians in Portland, OR decided to put together a marching band for a Fat Tuesday Mardi Gras party on March 4th, originally performing a 7-song set of tunes that included covers of Rebirth Brass Band, Fela Kuti, and Fleetwood Mac. The night was a smashing success and encouraged the group to book more shows. Playing a rally protesting the invasion of Iraq and opening for the Youngblood Brass Band and Pink Martini cemented the group that first year: they played a total of 34 shows in their first ten months as a band (mostly neighborhood street fairs and nightclubs). By 2004 MarchFourth Marching Band had been dubbed M4 by the local press (a nickname that sticks to this day), and was voted Best Local Band by Portland alt-weekly readers. Their first annual birthday party on March 4, 2004 was a sold out show. That spring saw a dramatic rise in interest among the black-tie fundraiser crowd, as well as the music festival circuit, which led to doubling their number of gigs. MarchFourth Marching Band released their first album in 2005, a nine-song self titled studio album featuring cover songs and originals that has sold 5000 copies to date. M4 was ready for a real challenge in 2006, so they planned a two-week trip to Germany for 35 people in conjunction with the World Cup. There they managed to beat out over fifty other performance troupes from around the world for the title of “Best in Show” at the Altonale Festival (at least the US won something that year!). By 2007, the band was becoming more well-known in Portland and beyond. They expanded their fourth anniversary party to two shows at the Crystal Ballroom (a family matinee and an adult evening show) and sold out both! Time to take the show on the road. They bought a 1984 MCI coach on eBay, then converted it to fit about 28 people comfortably with convertible bunk-beds, wi-fi, kitchen and roof rack. They planned an 8-week national tour (booked, paid for, promoted and organized entirely in-house!) of 35 shows in 22 cities and managed to pull it off. M4 also released its second album, Live, featuring eight new M4 originals and a few covers – all from live appearances in 2006 and 2007. Into our fourth year old, MarchFourth has played 100s of shows, including performances with Fleetwood Mac, No Doubt, Kiss, Blink-182, Pink Martini, Art Alexakis (Everclear), Southern Culture on the Skids, String Cheese Incident, Galactic, the Neville Brothers, Antibalas Afro-Beat Orchestra, Dresdon Dolls, El Vez, Pepe & The Bottle Blondes, The Yard Dogs Traveling Road Show, The Youngblood Brass Band, and DJ Doc Marten. MarchFourth has also appeared at the High Sierra Music Festival, MusicfestNW, Lightning in a Bottle Festival, Northwest Folklife Festival, The Oregon Country Fair, Waterfront Blues Festival, New Belgium Brewery's Tour de Fat, Meltdown Festival, World Cup Fan Fest (Hamburg, Germany), Altonale Festival of Cultures (Altona/Hamburg, Germany), Carnival of Culture (Bielefeld, Germany), Artown Reno, Rosie Awards, Salem Worldbeat Music Festival, Shambala Music Fest (B.C. Canada), PICA's TBA Festival, OMSI, Anon Salon's Sea of Dreams, Alberta Street Fair & Art Hop, First & Last Thursdays, and numerous street parades and benefits.
Current
Members |
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Jason
Wells -trumpet Katie Presley - trumpet
Andy
Sterling - drum major |
John Averill - electric bass, managment
Faith
Jennings - dance, fire |
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Former Members: |
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