8 // COASTWEEKEND.COM
The Liberty Theatre
‘Astoria’s Living Room’
A gem of a concert hall
DAILY ASTORIAN/FILE PHOTO
Clark Foerster, a Steinway & Sons certified piano technician, straightens and aligns hammers in the Steinway D grand piano on stage in the Liberty Theatre in 2015.
By CATE GABLE
FOR COAST WEEKEND
he Liberty Theatre is a community treasure
that too many of us take for granted. Sev-
eral years ago Keith Clark, artistic director
for the Astoria Musical Festival, told a
story about his first trip into Astoria.
“I still remember driving on Highway
30 and coming over the top of the hill — the water,
the bridge, the town — it was beautiful. A movie
set. But the real surprise was meeting Steve For-
rester and walking into the Liberty Theatre.” Clark
continues, “The acoustics were amazing. The great
advantage was that the Liberty Theatre had never
been restored. There was no mucking it up, even the
seats were still original. I knew immediately — it
was a diamond in the rough.”
It was a labor of love to save the theater, to polish
that diamond. So, many years later, after our fine
theater has been lovingly restored, it needs only
visionary management to broaden its appeal and
reintroduce it to a wider audience.
Under new management
Enter Jennifer Crocket, theatre director, and Ber-
eneice Jones-Centeno, artistic director. This young
accomplished duo understand the passion for music
because they are musicians themselves. Crocket is a
clarinet playerg who has performed in many of the
Pacific Northwest’s best concert halls. Jones-Cente-
no is an opera singer and music educator. They are
bringing new sounds into our grand hall.
Crocket and her husband were living in Portland
before moving to Astoria, but as she says, “we were
unhappy with a lot of the direction Portland has
gone. It’s so huge, you feel you can’t really make
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