Gregg Lavender usually can be found laughing with neighbors on bicycles near trees. Gregg has taken playback workshops and classes at Vasser College in NY and Laney College in Oakland. He performed with the Living Arts Playback Theater Enselmbe in Oakland, CA for 2 1/2 years. He loves listening to people's life changing stories- especially around campfires.
Jason began playing guitar at the age of sixteen. After two years of private guitar lessons, he taught himself to play the drums and bass guitar. Jason enjoys all musical styles and has played and performed in many bands. Through improvisation and experimentation with sound, Jason found an outlet for his overwhelming imagination. Using homemade instruments, contact microphones, circuit-bent sound generators, tape cassette decks and samples, Jason can create audio soundscapes that range from soft ambiance to jarring noise. Jason’s improvisational creativity and Playback Theatre are a perfect fit. The recreation of stories using actors, metaphor, narration, movement and sound is particularly intriguing to Jason. Many of Jason’s past and present musical projects and short videos are on his website at www.jasonpferris.com.
A jazz-steeped guitarist and pianist, a classically trained vocalist, a recovering folk songwriter, a big-band inspired vocal arranger and a sacred choral composer, Owen James has been dubbed "the fuzziest man in show business," for blurring the boundaries between genres, and for never sitting still! He has written music for dance, theater and the church, including Aileytudes, choreographed and performed in New York City in 2007 by the poet and dancer RiShana Blake, and incidental music and underscore for a productions of Edward Albey's Three Tall Women and Shakespeare's Much Ado About Nothing. Owen has also performed extensively with the poet Barry Wallenstein, and served as Music Director for productions of West Side Story and Phantom of the Opera. Owen James lives, performs, composes and teaches in Portland, Oregon with his partner and their children www.owenjamesmusic.com
Wendy Spurgeon (BFA) hails from Ashland, OR, home of the Oregon Shakespeare Festival where she worked as part of the Acting Company for 2 years. She also worked as Actor, Director, Choreographer, and Performing Arts Teacher for many theatres in the Rogue Valley including Oregon StageWorks, Camelot Theatre Company, Oregon Cabaret Theatre, Rogue Music Theatre, Rogue Opera, and the Oregon Conservatory of Performing Arts. Here in Portland, Wendy has recently directed for PCC Sylvania, is teaching with StageCoach Theatre School in Lake Oswego, and has an upcoming production with Mt. Hood Repertory Theatre. She is excited about stretching her improv skills with Playback Theatre, and collaborating to provide a valuable service to the Portland Community!
The group was started and trained by Jackie Paris, who studied with Jonathan Fox, the creator of the Playback form, and Armand Volkas, Director of the Living Arts Counseling Center in CA.
Jackie is a registered Drama Therapist and relocated to the Portland area, after establishing and running a successful Playback Theater troupe in Hawaii for six years. Jackie worked as a professional actress since the age of 20, and has generated many original socio-political theater performances. More about Jackie can be found at www.jackieparis.net jackieparis@comcast.nt
About Playback Theater, Portland, OR
The Playback Theater Company of Portland, Oregon, is comprised of a mix of actors, dancers, singers, musicians and skilled group facilitators. We are a professional theater troupe who enjoy playing for a variety of audiences and in different venues. We value creativity and authenticity in human interactions, and are committed to the power of the personal story in building bridges between people and a enhancing a sense of interconnectedness.
Dino Paris is a corporate consultant and a licensed marriage family therapist specializing in: Transforming Business and Personal Relationships, and Enhancing Athletic Performance. He has counseled individuals couples, groups and corporations for over 25 years. As a Playback Theater conductor Dino lives his passion, helping people express their stories for the purposes of personal and global transformation . For more information follow these links: www.dinoparis.com or www.breakthroughtransformation.com
Anna Schaum leads a multifaceted professional career in the performing and healing arts. A graduate of the New England Conservatory of Music, she has been a symphony viola player with such conductors as Leonard Bernstein, Michael Tilson Thomas, and Carlos Kalmar; she has performed with the improv comedy troupe ComedySportz ("Anna One, Anna Two"); and having earned her MA in Counseling Psychology from the Pacifica Graduate Institute, she currently enjoys collaborating with clients in private practice as a Licensed Professional Counselor and Certified Psychodrama Practioner. Bobby McFerrin once told her, "You have the most musically expressive face I've ever seen." In Playback Theater Anna loves offering those expressions in service to peoples' stories. www.annaschaum.com
Rick Tangeman is a Licensed Clinical Social Worker in private practice. He works with individuals as well as couples and specializes in couples sexuality. Rick enjoys the opportunity to honor people's stories and the healing that can occur. This opportunity is what drew him to join the group. To find out more about his practice use this link http://www.baurassociates.com/therapists/tangeman.asp
Marisol Goodman is an attorney specializing in estate planning and estate administration. Prior to launching her legal career, she worked with at risk families and disenfranchised adults and youth providing crisis counseling and case management. She holds a Juris Doctorate from Cleveland-Marshall College of Law and a dual Bachelor of Arts Degree in Psychology and Anthropology from the University of Oregon. As a counterbalance to her career and in search of deepening her relationship to her community, Marisol first developed an affinity for Playback as a troupe member of the Pulse Playback. As a troupe member of Playback Theatre, she is excited and honored to listen to your stories and play them back to you!
Zhaleh Almaee is a full time artist, organizer and Playback Theater practitioner with Iranian-American heritage. Involved in theater since age five, Zhaleh went on to acquire a Bachelor's degree in Theater Arts Directing from Emerson College, Boston. For many years she has done national organizing to support arts activism, and currently works with Arts Rising to grow the Playback Theater movement in North America (www.ArtsRising.net). Her creative background includes Theater of Oppressed, Contact Improv, Ritual Theater, Drama Therapy, Non-Violent Communication and Laughter Yoga, among many others. By applying "theater of compassion" and other powerful approaches, Zhaleh intends to inspire connection, healing, and laughter to recover our humanity and find a new language of change.
