Summer Music Series: Debra Giannini

Debra Giannini to perform in the 2024 Summer Music Series at the Maxwell Park Library Stage at the Tillamook Main Library on Friday, August 2nd at noon.

A native of Chicago (Arlington Heights) and an interdisciplinary artist, Debra Giannini came to Portland, Oregon to work on the documentary film “Soleri’s Cities: Architecture for the Planet Earth and Beyond” beginning in 1990, and settled in the Mount Tabor neighborhood in 1992. A self-described “song catcher” she has used her voice and instrumental talents to support traditional and folk music, dance/movement arts, songwriting and performance art in all of the places she has lived, with an Honorable Mention/Arizona Songwriters Association (1990) and inclusion as a lead track on the Portland Folk Music Society’s complication CD “Portland Folk” (2003) She has produced recordings and supported Medicine Whistle Studios (Portland) and Waterbug Records (Chicago) and toured England, Ireland and Scotland. She holds a BA Psychology: Expressive Therapy with Dance/Movement Concentration (Marylhurst University) a Masters of Health Arts & Sciences (Goddard College) and is a proponent of life-long learning.

Debra works in health care, wellness and prevention by day, and calls the Rose City Book Pub her public “living room” where she regularly performs and presents Winter Solstice and St. Paddy’s Day concerts. Recognized for her civic and community work for spearheading “Safe Routes to Schools” and the Portland Pedestrian Plan, as well as Portland’s Sustainable Lifestyle Campaign EcoTeam, and City Repair Project, she is a founder of the North American Bioregional Congresses, and Debra is a long-time supporter of PFMS. She was partnered in life and music with Denny Mellor (d.2023) the multinstrumentalist, luthier and instrument designer as the duo “Deb n’ Denny” and now lives in the Laurelhurst neighborhood.

Debra offers a repertoire that includes her own new songs, which focus on a sense of place, and the best of contemporary folk music, with traditional works that display the interdisciplinary interplay of music and literature. For the summer tour in August 2024, suggested readings include the works of historian Robert Service and Tony Award winning composer and playwright Anais Mitchell’s “Working On A Song” which details her creative and writing process for the acclaimed “HADESTOWN” musical currently on Broadway and in London.