- Hi, I am Mark Lee Stephens.

I'm the founder and musical director of the Masterclass Big band here in Spokane, Washington.

(upbeat music continues) Well, lemme tell you a little bit about the Masterclass Big Band, started 2008, so we're in our 15th year.

It is a program for the youth of our community to showcase their musical talents and give them a chance to perform on a professional level around the community above and beyond what they normally do in a high school setting.

Now tonight we are rehearsing outside.

(upbeat music) - I am Jim Swoboda, I am the front man for Masterclass Big Band.

I have been the lead singer for quite a while there.

The lead male singer, I suppose, started with the Spokane Symphony in the chorus and I have sung tenor in the chorus and baritone in the chorus.

From there, I have been a soloist now as well as a chorus member.

♪ Rock this town, rock it inside out ♪ ♪ We're gonna rock this town ♪ Make'em scream and shout ♪ Let's rock, rock, rock, man, rock ♪ ♪ We're gonna rock till you pop ♪ ♪ We're gonna rock till you drop ♪ ♪ We're gonna rock this town ♪ Rock it inside out - Rick Lillemon on the guitar.

(Rick playing guitar) - Hello I'm Rick Lillemon and I play guitar with the Masterclass Big Band.

I've been doing it about two years now and normally I play with a rock band and I'm doing the jazz thing.

I enjoy playing with these high school and college students.

They inspire me and make me wanna play better.

It's a blast.

(Rick playing guitar) - Through these last 15 years we've probably had over a hundred kids go through the program and many of them have gone on to become band directors in their own right and now they're sending kids to this program.

They want to expand their musical talents and gain additional experience by playing side by side with some local professionals here in the Spokane area.

- Hi, I'm Ryan Coles and I play lead trumpet for Masterclass.

I'm one of the mentors, it feels good to pass on some knowledge to the younger generation.

I try to lead by example and lay the music down and demonstrate how it should feel to be in a big band and hopefully they learn enough and head on to bigger and better things.

- Hi, I am Chris Moyer.

I'm the assistant director of Masterclass Big Band.

I play keyboards and saxophone and do a lot of the arrangements for the band as well.

And of course I enjoy this band so much because my kids play in the band.

Three of my boys are in the band and we just enjoy making music together here.

♪ Oh as long as I'm singing ♪ There's a bell up in my brain ♪ ♪ That is ringing ♪ Making a crazy ding dong ♪ And if this band don't desert me ♪ ♪ Then there's nothing in the world that can hurt me ♪ ♪ As long as I'm singing my song ♪ - The masterclass rehearses every week all year long, we do performances all around Valentine's Day.

We do a a big dance event.

We play New Year's Eve with a big huge event in cooperation with the Spokane Symphony, Halloween parties, Thanksgiving parties, we've done 4th of July parties, a lot of performances, a lot of fun.

- Hi, my name is Whitney Bertholic and I am here with the Masterclass Big Band where I use my mouth to the best of my ability as I'm one of the vocalists with the band.

I've always been interested in music always been interested in singing, and I am now attending Eastern Washington University where I'm getting my bachelor's in vocal performance and hopefully I can become a voice teacher someday.

♪ Oh I'm living it up and I like it ♪ ♪ Yes I like it ♪ Hey you, give me a clue ♪ What's love doing to you ♪ It looks like you got me liking it too ♪ - Hi, my name's Jesiah Le and I've been with the Masterclass Big Band for about two and a half years now.

I was invited by some friends and haven't turned back since.

I started playing music at a young age.

My grandma was helping me with piano and then in fifth grade I picked up the saxophone and I've loved it ever since.

Made some great friendships and great memories with it.

- Hi, my name is Conlin Moyer and I'm the bassist for the Masterclass Big Band.

I've been part of this band for now five years.

I started playing the electric bass back in sixth grade at Centennial Middle School and I've been doing it I mean until now, as a senior at Mount Spokane High School with my jazz one in the band.

- Hey, I'm Carson Moyer.

I'm the percussionist for the Masterclass Big Band and I'm also a vocalist but tonight I'm gonna be doing a little bit more.

I'm gonna do a little drumming.

(Carson drumming) - We've warmed up for some big name acts.

The one that comes to mind is we warmed up, we were the opening act for Tony Bennett a few years back when he came to Spokane, I think he'd just turned 80 then.

(upbeat jazz music) (upbeat jazz music continues) We are looking to expand and kind of spread our wings in the summer months where we can go and do a little tour around the Northwest, joint concerts with other community big bands like in the Greater Puget Sound area, in Seattle, down in the southern Idaho area where Boise is and other places like that including across the border into Canada.

(upbeat music) The Masterclass Organization is a non-profit organization open to foundation grants and donations from community supporters, all tax-deductible.

We hope to expand this program, this cultural program into other cities as well.

If you'd like to find more information about us, we have a website, masterclassbb.com and we also are on Facebook, Masterclass Big Band all one word.

Find out more information about us or how to get ahold of us for a possible performance.

Then those are the places here that you can call us.

We'll play anytime, any place, anywhere.

(upbeat jazz music) (upbeat music) - Welcome to Century Publishing Company in Post Falls, Idaho.

My name is Craig Rogers, co-owner of the company and this is where Art Chowder is produced.

Let's go inside.

(upbeat music) Century Publishing was started in 1971 in Kalispell, Montana and then in 1978, the company moved to Post Falls Idaho into this facility.

The original owners had their own publications called Homes Seekers and they grew it from there.

Did a lot of real estate publications.

In 1999, a company called Homes and Land Magazine bought a controlling interest to have a West Coast printer.

And then along comes the Great Depression in 2007 and 2008 and the original owners sold to two employees myself and my business partner and we're doing great and we love Art Chowder publication, it goes through here beautifully.

(upbeat music) Here at Century Publishing we have a client base that covers the entire United States and we produce and ship from hundreds of thousands to millions of copies every month.

We are a print service provider that provides a full range of services for our customers.

In one door and out the next, you don't have to see anybody else.

(upbeat music) In our warehouse and in Spokane, Washington, we have miles and miles of paper hundreds of thousands of pounds, 13 different types of products from uncoated, from matte stocks, gloss.

Each roll weighs 3000 pounds.

This gives our customers an opportunity to choose what kind of finishes they want for their publications.

Now you're in our pre-press area here at Century Publishing Company.

You're watching our two technicians.

They are receiving files, they're loading them into pagination software and communicating with customers.

And adjacent to this area is our technical representative, Ed Dunphy.

He works directly with our customers helping them to correct their files and he does a great job of helping to educate some of our customers on how to produce a magazine.

What you're looking at now is one of our newest pieces of equipment.

It is the plate setter for a pre-press department.

It images these aluminum plates that go onto the press and that's what creates the image onto the paper.

Once the plate is imaged it's put through an inspection process and it takes eight plates to make a section and those are sent out to the press room to be mounted on the press.

What you're looking at now is our heat set web offset press.

It's got four printing units to add the colors together.

Then it goes through a heat set oven that bakes the ink onto the sheet and flashes off all the oils and chemistry that goes up through an afterburner.

It goes through a system of chill rollers that shock the ink onto the paper and and finishes the drying process.

Then it goes through some compensating rollers into the folder and you have a finished signature that goes to the bindery for binding.

Now we're in our finishing department, which is a full service bindery department that puts all the pieces and parts together of the magazine.

What you're looking at now is our perfect binder.

This piece of equipment takes the signatures that collates them, it preps the spine for the cover with glue and then delivers it to a three knife trimmer and final boxing for our customers.

What you're looking at now is our folders.

These take the flat sheets off the press, fold 'em into many different types of configurations.

This machine here is a UV coder.

We're adding an ultraviolet layer onto these covers that is shocked by ultraviolet light and it gives a very high gloss finish and protective cover for our customers.

And this piece of equipment you're looking at is a poly bagger.

It allows us to deliver to our customers' mail list, these magazines in a protective cover with an addressed label.

I'm very proud of this company.

Been here a long time.

We plan on being here for quite some time in the future.

It's a great place to work.

We have great employees, lots of good craftsmen.

I really enjoy being part of Art Chowder's success.

We like to partner with our customers, not just to provide them something but to help them, which helps us and we've helped many startups.

It's a really a good company.

We know that printing goes back hundreds if not thousands of years and we believe that the printing industry has a bright future even in this digital age.

(upbeat music) (upbeat music) (bright flute music) - [Tamara] The Columbia Gorge Hotel was built in 1921 cliff side in the beautiful Columbia River Gorge National Scenic Area.

This historic hotel on the National Registry is surrounded by seven acres of lush landscaping as Velp Creek winds its way under scenic stone bridges to the hotel's dramatic 208 foot hawkwind way waterfall.

Guests enjoy the charm and romance of the hotel, a favorite destination wedding, anniversary and special events venue.

(bright flute music continues) - Well, welcome to our beautiful Columbia Gorge Hotel and Spa here in Wood River, Oregon.

Well, let's start with the room we are in right now.

It's the room that we call Valentino Lounge.

And rightfully so, it's named after the famous silent movie days of 1900s, Rudolph Valentino and you may see later on a few of his pictures around here.

And he was a frequent visitor here in the hotel.

And then actually there's a picture back there that I'll tell you a little bit about it which is Valentino's on a horse, which he used in the movie Lawrence of Arabia, was actually shot in deserts of California where Rudolph Valentino had a ranch.

And that was given to me by a lady who claimed to be her granddaughter.

I took her word, I think she was.

Going back to the days of the 1900s, the hotel was built by Simon Benson.

Simon Benson is a gentleman who was heavily involved in the business world of the Oregon in those days.

He was a investor or he was the one who built the Banson Hotel in downtown Portland actually about six seven years prior to this one.

So he was involved heavily actually with the building of the Highway 30 at the time.

And it came to a point that he was in Hood River and then hey, we are building all these roads and no place to go for people to stay.

So he decided to build this hotel.

It took about a year, 102 years ago.

A lot of little things goes on to the building.

Like one of the things I always tell people it's very noticeable to the date.

If you travel on Highway 30, you're gonna notice this old mason work.

At the time, they were all Italian stone masons brought in to do the work in on the highway 30.

Well, he was so impressed, Mr. Benson.

He brought them in and if you walk around the property, you're gonna notice the bridge that you drive in or all the stone work that done on the sides from 1920s done by the Italian masons, stone masons.

So that's pretty impressive, I think.

(bright music) We have 102 years old elevator that is still functioning and that's what we use, it's the only elevator in the hotel, actually, it's manual.

So that's why we have to operate it for our guests.

But it works.

It's a great experience for people and definitely worth the visit just for that even, 'cause not many people has seen an elevator that is 102 years old.

(upbeat music) - My name is Martina Jealous and I'm the founder of Spa Remedies.

We're a holistic spa located in Hood River Oregon inside of the historic Columbia Gorge Hotel.

We specialize in spa treatments.

One of the services we offer is couples room services such as massages and body treatments.

And then we have single room where we perform facials, body treatments, massages.

We also can provide for guests natural nail services, manicures and pedicures.

We often help brides prepare for their special days by doing hair and makeup services for them.

One of our guests come in that are staying directly at the hotel, but we also welcome local guests or guests that are just coming up and visiting for the day.

And we just love making them feel special, getting them to relax and enjoy themselves and taking care of them.

(upbeat music) (upbeat jazz music) - We have 42 rooms in the hotel.

We just went through a major renovation within the last two winters actually.

We closed down the hotel for a month month and a half both years.

Visit the rooms in one session and then the general public areas, the restaurant on the second time around and it worked out great.

We are doing quite a bit from painting to new furniture to wallpapers to carpeting.

A lot of people appreciate what we got going.

Well here at the Columbia Gorge Hotel, we have hosted so many celebrities and famous artists and singers and football players to presidents to anything else we can think of.

Shirley Temple is one of 'em to Lawrence of Arabia, famous Rudolph Valentino comes to mind.

Tom Cruise was one of the fellows who visited the place and stayed with us.

So there's quite a bit.

Olivia Newton John was once here.

Rest in peace.

(upbeat jazz music) We'll going to continue to grow.

We have seven acres of land here, so our owners, the A1 Hospitality Group out of Tri Cities have decided to build another hotel actually right next to this one on the other side of the cliff right over here.

And it's gonna be a Tapestry brand by Hilton.

It's gonna be 90 key room all facing the beautiful Columbia Gorge.

So hopefully within a few years you'll be enjoying that part too.

(upbeat jazz music) (upbeat jazz music continues) (upbeat jazz music continues) (upbeat music) (upbeat music) - We thank the following partners for funding this episode, BECU, people helping people, www.becu.org.

The Liberty Building in the heart of downtown Spokane, a unique offering for your next office address, www.spokanelibertybuilding.com.

The MAC, Northwest Museum of Arts and Culture, presenting experiences that enrich and inspire, www.northwestmuseum.org.

(upbeat music)