Eastern Oregon Goes to Brooklyn: Pendleton Round-up film at BAM

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Monday, December 15, 2014

Lee Weinstein, GoLocalPDX Guest MINDSETTER™

The Pendleton Round-Up is going to Brooklyn, NY in January. Alternative singer songwriter and multi-instrumentalist, Sufjan Stevens, has scored a slow-motion documentary entitled Round-Up, reports Stereogum. 

The documentary will premiere at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM), January 20-25, 2015, with a group of wayward Oregonians, called the Newyoregonians, planning on attending.

Stevens came across the world famous rodeo on a road trip and was “instantly smitten.”

He writes, “The footage was shot in slow motion by brothers Aaron & Alex Craig at the Pendleton Round-Up in eastern Oregon last year. I think this is going to look (and sound) stunning.”

Continues Stevens, “Pendleton’s rodeo is one of America’s best—it’s over 100 years old and goes to great lengths to preserve its tradition; all participants, press and staff members are required to wear traditional attire, cowboy boots, hats, etc. (Pendleton Woolen Mills is a local business that makes some of the best plaid shirts and blankets, by the way). All of the events take place outdoors on grass, and the confederated tribes of the Umatilla reservation participate with relay races, pageants and parades. The footage is incredible—Alex & Aaron are fastidious cinematographers. Let ’er buck!”

BAM, which commissioned the work, calls the Round-Up an “unabashed wonder at the world."

“With slow-motion footage shot by sibling filmmakers Aaron and Alex Craig at the 2013 Pendleton Round-Up in Oregon—and featuring Stevens on electronics and new-music ensemble Yarn/Wire performing piano and percussion—Round-Up is a musical and cinematic portrait of a classic American tradition.”

New Yoregonians

Former Metro COUNCIL President David Bragdon is organizing a group of Oregonians in New York City to attend. 

"We're rounding up the New Yoregonian gang for the Saturday night January 24th show and creating our own little Happy Canyon Night in New York City,” says Bragdon, who is now Executive Director of TransitCenter, Inc.

In 2013, Bragdon brought Pendleton Round-Up Queen Brittany Jean Doherty to Manhattan for the New Yoregonians Dinner in 2013. As part of the visit, he and wife Andrea Vannelli took Doherty, in full Round-Up regalia, on the subway and to Times Square.

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