News
Race, Class, Music: PCS’s ‘Black Pearl Sings!’
By Lisa Loving
Of The Skanner News
Stunning Portland theatre fans with her incredible voice
and talent, Chicago-born actress Chavez Ravine stars
with Lena Kaminsky in “Black Pearl Sings!” The play by
Frank Higgins tells the story of a 1930s music scholar
who strikes up a relationship with an incarcerated
to be an academic in her profession, but not being taken
seriously.
And they find each other because one is a song collector,
she’s been a song collector for quite some years, and
she’s honed in on trying to find a song that links to
Africa. She finds Pearl – or Alberta Johnson – who may
be the link she’s trying to find because so much history
was lost in the transatlantic slave trade.
to know that probably 95 percent of them had never
heard that song before and now they’re singing it.
For tickets to Black Pearl Sings! Go to www.pcs.org, or
call the toll-free ticket line at 877-PCS-TKTS (877-727-
8587). Purchase tickets in person at the box office, at
128 NW Eleventh Ave. in the Pearl District.
Women and Race
TSN: What’s your favorite part of the show?
CR: The one part that was very daunting to me was the
Coopers Union part where the audience gets a chance to
sing along. And to hear the audience singing a song that
was a message song from the Underground Railroad, or
the auction block song, or the Kumbaya song, and to
have them know where these songs came from, I think
that’s quite moving.
We’re doing a call and response and I’m having the
audience sing, ‘Many thousand gone.’ Because there is a
song that goes, ‘No more auction block for me/No more
no more/No more auction block for me/Many thousand
gone.’ And to have them feel what that song means and
Lesli Mones of the August Wilson Red Door Project leads
talks on women and race at PCS Sunday, June 10 and
June 17, at 4:30 p.m. Panelists include Leslie Dunlop,
assistant professor of History, Women and Gender, and
American Ethnic Studies programs, Willamette
University; and Donna Maxey, retired educator and
creator/director of Race Talks.
The discussions are in the Ellyn Bye Studio immediately
following the Sunday matinee performances (tickets are
sold out for June 10). Admission to the discussions is
free. No RSVP or ticket is required.
Lena Kaminsky, at left, with Chavez Ravine,right, in
‘Black Pearl Sings!’
singer, Pearl, to mine her family history. The show is a
musical tour de force for Ravine, who is performing
with PCS for the first time.
In a related story, the Red Door Project is holding
theatre chat sessions on women and race, June 10 and
17, after the Sunday matinee performances; more
details are below.
The Skanner News spoke with Ravine about her career,
her music, and “Black Pearl Sings!” The show runs
through June 17, but you should get tickets as soon as
possible because the final two weeks are already starting
to sell out.
The Skanner News: Late last year Portland Center Stage
mounted an all-Black production of “Oklahoma!” Right
now, alongside “Pearl,” PCS is showing “It Ain’t Nothin’
but the Blues.” How is it that PCS seems to be squarely
raising issues of race these days?
Chavez Ravine: I think
(Artistic Director) Chris
Coleman has a lot to do
with that. He has a
wonderful vision.
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TSN: What is the play
about?
CR: “Black Pearl Sings!” is
about two women who find
themselves stuck in one
way or the other – one
who’s stuck in prison trying
to find her daughter; so not
only is she stuck by the
system, she’s stuck by
racism and being
incarcerated.
And the other, the white
woman, Susannah, is a
woman stuck in a man’s
world who can’t seem to
break the ceiling of wanting
to be an educator, wanting
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June 6, 2012 The Portland Skanner Page 9