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Sunday, July 28, 2019, 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM
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Sunday, July 28, 2019, 3:00 PM – 4:00 PM
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Saturday, July 27, 2019, 8:00 PM – 9:00 PM
Resident Advisor: twenty four / seven NY
MUSIC
SATURDAY, JULY 27, 2019
8:00 PM
Nowadays
50-06 Cooper Avenue, Ridgewood, Queens
$20-$30 per shift
https://www.residentadvisor.net/events/1276937
Or, you can hear Actress in the course of this all-night-and-all-of-the-day 24-hour electronic dance music marathon. Among the multitude of artists also appearing are such big List faves as the trancey and psychedelic Aurora Halaland the wide-ranging, fascinating stud1nt. Admissions are sold in timed shifts, and the prime shifts are unsurprisingly sold out. But stuff happens.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: You're in Nowadays. Come on.
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Saturday, July 27, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
Actress / Susie Ibarra / Speaker Music
MUSIC
SATURDAY, JULY 27, 2019
7:00 PM
ISSUE Project Room
22 Boerum Place, Downtown, Brooklyn
$20
https://issueprojectroom.org/event/actress-susie-ibarra-speaker-music-deforrest-brown-jr
A dynamite triple bill. Actress is Darren J. Cunningham's experimental electronic pop/dance project, always compelling and fascinating for listening and moving. Susie Ibarra is not just a first-rank jazz percussionist; she's also a first-rank musical conceptualist, coming up with seemingly endless combinations of great interest (and making musically cohesive use, when she feels like it, of the forms of her ancestral Philippines). DeForrest Brown Jr.'sSpeaker Music project is a campaign to reclaim techno for African-Americans, who invented the form; Speaker Music's music, though, is a good deal more abstract than what was coming out of Detroit on the cusp of the '80s/'90s (and none the worse for that).
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Let's go to Saint Julivert Fisherie for eclectic, brilliantly conceiveded and well-prepared seafood.
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Saturday, July 27, 2019, 6:00 PM – 7:00 PM
Alceu Valença / Cordel do Fogo Encantado / LaBaq / DJ Grace Kelly
MUSIC
SATURDAY, JULY 27, 2019
6:00 PM
Brasil Summerfest
SummerStage
Rumsey Playfield, Central Park, Manhattan
Ex-lawyer Alceu Valença is too peppy and poppy even for me. But the supporting acts are gold. Cordel do Fogo Encantado does highly theatrical rock very heavily influenced by Afro-Brazilian drum music; their stage shows are really something to see. LaBaq does Brazilian alt rock -- but, because she's Brazilian, it has the extra spring and lilt that her country's music just can't lose. Bahia-to-Berlin DJ Grace Kelly puts that Brazilian lilt and spring into her EDM and techno spins. Afterparty at Nublu 151 ($25).
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: If you opt against the afterparty at Nublu 151, you can get excellent cocktails and bar snacks at Daniel Boulud's Bar Pleiades.
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Saturday, July 27, 2019, 1:00 PM – 2:00 PM
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Friday, July 26, 2019, 10:00 PM – 11:00 PM
Nora Fischer & Marnix Dorrestein
MUSIC
FRIDAY, JULY 26, 2019
10:00 PM
A Little Night Music
Mostly Mozart Festival
Stanley H. Kaplan Penthouse, Rose Building, Lincoln Center
165 West 65th Street, Upper West Side, Manhattan
$50
http://www.lincolncenter.org/mostly-mozart-festival/show/late-night-nora-fischer-and-marnix-dorrestein
In theory, there should be nothing I'd like more than Nora Fischer's project of singing Renaissance and Baroque vocal music in a pop style with electric-guitar accompaniment. In practice, I find it kind of middle-brow: too much coffee house, not enough punk. (It's still better than Sting's, though.) Tonight she adds some Ravel and (duh) Mozart to the mix. Go, with trepidations (if any tickets become available).
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Again, that late, gotta be P.J. Clarke's.
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Friday, July 26, 2019, 8:30 PM – 9:30 PM
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Friday, July 26, 2019, 8:00 PM – 9:00 PM
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Thursday, July 25, 2019, 8:00 PM – 9:00 PM
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Thursday, July 25, 2019, 7:30 PM – 8:30 PM
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Thursday, July 25, 2019, 7:30 PM – 8:30 PM
ICE: Fure & Thorvaldsdottir
MUSIC
THURSDAY, JULY 25, 2019
7:30 PM
Mostly Mozart Festival
David Rubinstein Atrium, Lincoln Center
61 West 62nd Street, Upper West Side, Manhattan
Free
http://www.lincolncenter.org/mostly-mozart-festival/show/fure-and-thorvaldsdottir
The nonpareil International Contemporary Ensemble plays music by two of the absolute best and most interesting composers of the current generation: sonic architect Ashley Fure, and Anna Thorvaldsdottir, whose music takes you outside time without ever getting vague or mushy. As a lagniappe, there's a welcome chance to get to know the work of an up-and-comer from Thorvaldsdottir's fertile Icelandic music scene (and now Brooklyn, too!), Bergrún Snæbjörnsdottír.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Bar Boulud is in the almost unique -- indeed, positively peculiar -- position of having a Restaurant Week prix fixe menu that's more interesting than its à la carte menu. How'd THAT happen?
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Thu, Jul 25, 2019, 7:00 PM – Fri, Jul 26, 2019, 9:00 PM
AMOC: Veils for Desire
MUSIC
THURSDAY & FRIDAY, JULY 25 & 26, 2019
7:00 PM THURSDAY
8:00 PM FRIDAY
THURSDAY: Spanish Courtyard, Caramoor
149 Girdle Ridge Road, Katonah, Weschester
FRIDAY: Guild Hall
158 Main Street, East Hampton, Long Island
THURSDAY: $30-$56; $15-$56 children
https://www.caramoor.org/events/american-modern-opera-company/
FRIDAY: $40-$85; free Student Rush tickets
https://www.guildhall.org/events/american-modern-opera-companys-veils-for-desire/
The American Modern Opera Company presents co-Artistic Director Matthew Aucoin providing pianist accompaniment to the fantastic countertenor Anthony Roth Costanzo and tenor Paul Appleby in a program of songs in which unspeakable desires are hidden. So of course there's some Britten (although probably not what you'd expect). Monteverdi, sure -- and of course there are gonna be some pieces by Aucoin himself. But wait a minute: Bach? Unspeakable desires hidden in Bach?????? Wayne Koestenbaum's poetic narration should reveal all.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: At Caramoor, picnic! In East Hampton, kick it Old Old Skool at Bostwick's Chowder House (or, better yet, travel a little bit more -- I'm assuming if you're out there that you have a car -- to Bostick's waterfront mothership, Bostwick's on the Harbor), or New Old Skool at Nick & Toni's.
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Thu, Jul 25, 2019, 6:00 PM – Sun, Jul 28, 2019, 2:00 PM
Risa Puno: The Privilege of Escape
PERFORMANCE
THURSDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 25 - 28, 2019 (continuing through AUGUST 11)
6:00 PM THURSDAY
7:15 PM FRIDAY
1:00 PM SATURDAY & SUNDAY
Onassis USA
645 Fifth Avenue, Midtown, Manhattan
Free (by registration)
http://creativetime.org/the-privilege-of-escape/
Installation artist Risa Puno puts the audience in a series of "escape rooms" that they can only get out of by solving a series of puzzles. But over the course of the event, the rules start subtly changing, revealing (SPOILER ALERT) truths about social inquality. Another event whose entire run sold out virtually as soon as it was announced; as usual, look for cancellations.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Let's keep the social inequality thing going. Evenings, the wealthy or profligate can go to the new highly-seasonal French/Japanese fusion place, Shun. Those of more modest means -- or greater frugality -- can go to the Bar Room at The Modern (which remains open during the closure of MoMA, in which it's housed). Lunch, the blow-out crowd can go to The Grand Salon at the Baccarat Hotel. Everyone else can go to the Halal Guys cart.
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Thursday, July 25, 2019, 5:30 PM – 6:30 PM
Caique Vidal & Batuque / Trio Rasteirinho
MUSIC
THURSDAY, JULY 25, 2019
5:30 PM
Brasil Summerfest
Archway Under Manhattan Bridge
80 Pearl Street #58, DUMBO, Brooklyn
Free
https://dumbo.is/hosting/7-25-live-at-the-archway-caique-vidal-and-batuque
Afro-Brazilian dance music with Caique Vidal & Batuque. Trio Rasteirinho plays Choro, the 19th Century urban music of Rio de Janeiro -- some of the most infectious music you can ever hope to hear. (It always struck me as emblematic of something that Lisbon's 19th Century urban music, Fado, is about the most depressing music there is, whereas Rio's is some of the happiest.)
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: High Summer is the best time for Celestine, with its bright Mediterranean food and fabulous river views.
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Wednesday, July 24, 2019, 10:00 PM – 11:00 PM
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Wednesday, July 24, 2019, 8:00 PM – 9:00 PM
Sessa
MUSIC
WEDNESDAY, JULY 24, 2019
8:00 PM
Brasil Summerfest
National Sawdust
80 North 6th Street, Williamsburg, Brooklyn
$15
https://nationalsawdust.org/event/sessa/
São Paulisto/New Yorker Sessa is known in Brazil for playing with the psych-funk band Garotas Sueca, and in New York for playing with psych-post-rock shredder Yonatan Gat. But on his new solo album he's gone all acousticsamba on us -- and I've got to tell you I love it! Opening act Ilya, on her excellent debut album of last year, was unafraid to go full-out in-your-face electric-guitar on some cuts (interspersed with bubbly Brazilian pop). I'll be she's great live, too.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Fresh accomplished Middle Eastern/Mediterranean food at Seven Seeds.
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Wed, Jul 24, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sat, Jul 27, 2019, 9:30 PM
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Wed, Jul 24, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sat, Jul 27, 2019, 8:30 PM
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Wed, Jul 24, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sat, Jul 27, 2019, 8:30 PM
Halley Feiffer: Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow
THEATER
WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 24 - 27, 2019 (continuing through AUGUST 17)
7:30 PM WENESDAY - SATURDAY
2:30 PM WEDNESDAY & SATURDAY
MCC Theater
511 West 52nd Street, Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan
$64-$84; $30 rush tickets under 30 years/65 years and over; $30 people residing between West 34th & 59th Streets and 8th & 10th Avenues
https://mcctheater.org/tix/moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow/
A reimagined update of Chekhov's Three Sisters that takes the comedy in the seriocomedy and runs with it. Former Rookies will want to know that Tavi Gevinson plays Irina. (SPOILER ALERT: they never get there.)
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Excellent cheese, excellent snacks, excellent sweets, EXCELLENT wine at Casellula. For the Sunday matinée, go to longtime (albeit peripatetic) Theater District standby Mont Blanc 52 for utterly charming Swiss (have the Emince de Veau).
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Tue, Jul 23, 2019, 8:30 PM – Sat, Jul 27, 2019, 9:30 PM
Adam Rudolph Residency
MUSIC
TUESDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 23 - 27, 2019
8:30 PM
The Stone at the New School
Glass Box Theater, The New School
55 West 13th Street, Greenwich Village, Manhattan
$20
http://thestonenyc.com/calendar.php
Percussionist Adam Rudolph's world music is avant enough that it rarely seems appropriative. Here, he goes full-out avant on Tuesday, playing pieces for percussion and electronics. Wednesday and Thursday, he indulges his world side with a large Indian-inflected ensemble. But the main event is Friday and Saturday's duo with Tyshawn Sorey, who bestrides the current percussion/composition world like a colossus.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Fabulous wine, undistracting food at Corkbuzz.
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Tue, Jul 23, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sat, Jul 27, 2019, 9:00 PM
Chen Shi-Zheng / Jonathan Aibel & Glenn Berger: Dragon Spring Phoenix Rise
THEATER
TUESDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 23 - 27, 2019
8:00 PM TUESDAY - SATURDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY
The Shed
545 West 30th Street, Hudson Yards, Manhattan
$25-$99
https://theshed.org/program/5-dragon-spring-phoenix-rise
Go see this, and turn your skepticism about The Shed into hatred.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Momofuku Kāwi -- the most explicitly Korean of all the Momofukus (which is not to say it's anything like straight Korean) -- makes it impossible to say that there's nothing good about Hudson Yards. But it's not good enough to justify a visit to this example of naked oligarchic overreach.
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Tue, Jul 23, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sun, Jul 28, 2019, 8:30 PM
Jackie Sibblies Drury: Fairview
THEATER
TUESDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 23-28, 2019 (continuing through AUGUST 11)
7:30 PM TUESDAY - SUNDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY & SUNDAY
Theater for a New Audience
262 Ashland Place, Fort Greene, Brooklyn
x
$55-$115; $20 students & 30 and under
https://www.tfana.org/current-season/fairview/overview
Most people who saw Fairview (SPOILER ALERT: DON'T READ THAT LINKED REVIEW IF YOU'RE PLANNING TO SEE IT) during its run at Soho Rep. thought it was the best theater they saw last year (the Pulitzer Prize Committee certainly agreed). Now there's another chance. A canny, biting, laugh-till-you-think-about-it exposition of racism, stereotyping, and enforced social stultification. The only question is how well the famous (and, as has emerged in the months since the initial run, extremely influential) ending will translate to this much bigger theater.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: There's now a Bolivian Llama Party in the Gotham Market at the Ashland!
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Tuesday, July 23, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
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Sunday, July 21, 2019, 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM
Caroline Shaw: Blueprint
MUSIC
SUNDAY, JULY 21, 2019
4:00 PM
Aizuri Quartet
Venetian Theater, Caramoor
149 Girldle Ridge Road, Katonah, Westchester
$10-$57; free 18 and under
https://www.caramoor.org/events/3rd-annual-chamber-feast/
The unaugmented Aizuri Quartet -- an ensemble that's been as ubiquitous this year as bassist Nick Dunston (and as welcome!) -- plays Caroline Shaw's marvelous Blueprint, a piece as marvelous -- as listenable yet surprising and distinctive -- as just about everything this marvelous composer writes. Augmented configurations then play two of the best pieces of chamber music in the canon: Mozart's final String Quintet (one of those very late pieces that make you realize Mozart died just when he was getting good) and Brahms's Piano Quintet -- pieces you never ever tire of hearing. Nice!
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Picnic!
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Sat, Jul 20, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sun, Jul 21, 2019, 9:00 PM
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Saturday, July 20, 2019, 7:30 PM – 8:30 PM
Liquid Light Lab & Ricardo Romaneiro: Liquidverse: Apollo 11
MUSIC / PERFORMANCE
SATURDAY, JULY 20, 2019
7:30 PM
National Sawdust
80 North 6th Street, Williamsburg, Brooklyn
$25
https://nationalsawdust.org/event/liquidverse-apollo/
A multi-media show treating the first moon landing, 50 years ago today -- using audio and visual footage from the mission. I don't know that Ricardo Romaneiro lives up to his claim of combining chamber music with electronic music -- but if you take the music as pop, it's incredibly engaging and entertaining. Liquid Light Lab creates very involving and impressive neo-psychedelic visual environments. This will be FUN.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Speaking of FUN, let's go back to Pearl's for Caribbean food and drink.
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Saturday, July 20, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
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Saturday, July 20, 2019, 5:00 PM – 6:00 PM
DUSKLIT
PERFORMANCE / THEATER
SATURDAY, JULY 20, 2019
5:00 PM
Seligmann Center
23 White Oak Drive, Sugar Loaf (Chester), Orange County
$15-$20
https://www.dusklit.com/
An evening of performance art, cooking, music, virtual reality, dance, and interactive theater -- including a synthesizer petting zoo, an inflatable room, and a nature bathing station (wonder what THAT is?) -- all happening simultaneously over the four hours of the festival, the audience walking from feature to feature as they please. If you need further inducement to schlep up to the Catskills, one of the pieces is by List fave Sibyl Kempson, whose allusive, illusive works are always worth seeing.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: There'll be food trucks and stations for local wineries and breweries on-site.
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Fri, Jul 19, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sat, Jul 20, 2019, 9:00 PM
Michael Morley: Music for the Never Quartet
MUSIC
FRIDAY & SATURDAY, JULY 19 & 20, 2019
8:00 PM
ISSUE Project Room
22 Boerum Place, Downtown, Brooklyn
$15
https://issueprojectroom.org/event/michael-morley-music-never-quartet-natacha-diels-sad-music-lonely-people
https://issueprojectroom.org/event/michael-morley-music-never-quartet-ursula-scherrer-michael-schumacher-exotica
New Zealand post-rock experimental sound artist Michael Morley presents a piece exploring the sonic possibilities of the acoustic guitar as a resonant amplifier of sound, with four guitars placed on solid wooden furniture and bowed, creating a lush soundscape as the music resonates inside the guitars' soundboxes, further amplified by the solid wood beneath them. Of the two shows, Friday gets the slight nod, because opening that night is Natacha Diels, one of this List's favorite soundscapers: her assemblages of found and other sounds are rooted in a dark humor. Here she'll be concentrating onurban found-sound artifacts -- as will Ursula Scherrer & Michael Schumacher in their opening piece on Saturday, highlighting how exotic -- like a rain forest -- urban ambient sound can seem.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: June, a delightful natural wine bar.
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Friday, July 19, 2019, 8:00 PM – 9:00 PM
J Hoard
MUSIC
FRIDAY, JULY 19, 2019
8:00 PM
National Sawdust
80 North 6th Street, Williamsburg, Brooklyn
$20
https://nationalsawdust.org/event/j-hoard-4/
Brooklyn neo-R&B sensation J Hoard heads a long bill that he hand-picked himself. He's great -- and you can certainly trust his taste in the other acts.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Light aperitif-like cocktails and light food on the Wythe Hotel rooftop at Lemon's. What a treat!
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Friday, July 19, 2019, 8:00 PM – 9:00 PM
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Fri, Jul 19, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sat, Jul 20, 2019, 9:00 PM
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Friday, July 19, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
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Friday, July 19, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
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Thu, Jul 18, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sun, Jul 21, 2019, 2:30 PM
Michael Gordon: Acquanetta
OPERA
THURSDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 18 - 21, 2019
8:00 PM THURSDAY & FRIDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY & SUNDAY
SummerScape
LUMA Theater, Fisher Center, Bard College
60 Manor Avenue, Annandale-On-Hudson, Dutchess County
$35-$75
https://fishercenter.bard.edu/events/acquanetta/
Michael Gordon's Acquanetta was the star of last year's PROTOTYPE Festival. Now that director Daniel Fish is the toast of Broadway, it's back, atBard's SummerScape. A nonlinear account of a B-movie Latin Spitfire of the Hollywood '40s and '50s who was actually a Native American (or maybe African American) from Pennsylvania (or maybe Wyoming), it's presented as the kind of horror movie in which she specialized. The Goth-inflected score is one of Gordon's greater achievements.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Once long ago, I ran into Stiller & Meara in The "Historic" Village Diner in Red Hook, NY. As I recall, they said they were visiting one of their children at Bard. Which is odd, since as far as I know, neither of their children went to Bard.
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Thursday, July 18, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
A Far Cry
MUSIC
THURSDAY, JULY 18, 2019
7:00 PM
Naumburg Orchestral Concerts
Temple Emanu-El
1 East 65th Street, Upper East Side, Manhattan
Free (ticket required)
https://naumburgconcerts.org/concert/second-concert/
This summer's strangely indoor iteration of the normally outdoor Naumburg Orchestral Concert series (while the Bandshell is being repaired) continues with the Boston chamber orchestra A Far Cry, which specializes (like our ownKnights) in mixing old and new. The new here is everybody's favorite, Caroline Shaw, and Lembit Beecher, another of those composers who use old sonorities in new ways -- and whom I've come think deserves to be a lot better known. The old is Early Baroque from Muffat (my taste exactly) andTchaikovsky's Serenade for Strings, which even Late-Romantic-hating grouches like me have to admit is absolutely delightful (Tchaikovsky's OK when he's forgetting to be lugubrious and instead trying to sound like Mozart).
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Vaucluse is one of the better of a very sorry bunch in this horrible neighborhood.
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Thu, Jul 18, 2019, 6:00 PM – Sun, Jul 21, 2019, 2:00 PM
Risa Puno: The Privilege of Escape
PERFORMANCE
THURSDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 18 - 21, 2019 (continuing through AUGUST 11)
6:00 PM THURSDAY
7:15 PM FRIDAY
1:00 PM SATURDAY & SUNDAY
Onassis USA
645 Fifth Avenue, Midtown, Manhattan
Free (by registration)
http://creativetime.org/the-privilege-of-escape/
Installation artist Risa Puno puts the audience in a series of "escape rooms" that they can only get out of by solving a series of puzzles. But over the course of the event, the rules start subtly changing, revealing (SPOILER ALERT) truths about social inquality. Another event whose entire run sold out virtually as soon as it was announced; as usual, look for cancellations.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Let's keep the social inequality thing going. Evenings, the wealthy or profligate can go to the new highly-seasonal French/Japanese fusion place, Shun. Those of more modest means -- or greater frugality -- can go to the Bar Room at The Modern (which remains open during the closure of MoMA, in which it's housed). Lunch, the blow-out crowd can go to The Grand Salon at the Baccarat Hotel. Everyone else can go to the Halal Guys cart.
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Wednesday, July 17, 2019, 8:00 PM – 9:00 PM
Cunningham: SummerCool
DANCE
WEDNESDAY, JULY 17, 2019
8:00 PM
SummerStage
Ramsey Playfield, Central Park, Manhattan
Free
https://cityparksfoundation.org/events/merce-cunningham/
Another centennial tribute to Merce Cunningham (he was so great, and his influence has spread so widely, that you can't have enough of them). This one features an interesting line-up including, among others, Stephen Petronio (who's been making that influence manifest by having his company dance more and more Merce), ABT star Calvin Royal III, and Merce alumna Melissa Toogood.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Excellent cocktails and bar snacks at Daniel Boulud's Bar Pleiades.
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Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 8:00 PM – Thu, Jul 18, 2019, 9:00 PM
MOONCAKE COLLECTIVE: Twice the Moon
PERFORMANCE
WEDNESDAY & THURSDAY, JULY 17 & 18, 2019
8:00 PM
Out of Line
High Line
14th Street & 10th Avenue, Meatpacking District, Manhattan
Free (with R.S.V.P.)
https://www.thehighline.org/events/out-of-line-twice-the-moon-by-mooncake-collective/
Queer Chinese performance collective MOONCAKE presents a site-specific piece about Chinese-American queerness and its cultural/communal ramifications, drawing on fireside storytelling, Chinese opera, and shadow puppetry.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: The Standard Grill under Rocco DiSpirito is actually very good. And they're kicking up the food program at the Bar/Café in the front now.
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Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sat, Jul 20, 2019, 9:00 PM
?!:New Works 2019
THEATER
WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 17 - 20, 2019
8:00 PM
Point:Title
The Brick
579 Metropolitan Avenue, Williamsburg, Brooklyn
$10
http://www.bricktheater.com/
The highly experimental Brooklyn theater company Title:Point curates a two-week festival of new theater works. Go any night.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Roman flatbread with various toppings -- this is really great stuff -- at Montesacro Pinseria Romana.
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Wednesday, July 17, 2019, 7:30 PM – 8:30 PM
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Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 7:00 PM – Sat, Jul 20, 2019, 8:00 PM
Theater of War: Antigone in Ferguson
THEATER
WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 17 - 20, 2019
7:00 PM WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY
St. Ann & the Holy Trinity Church
157 Montague Street, Brooklyn Heights, Brooklyn
Free (by registration)
https://www.stannholytrinity.org/event/antigone-in-ferguson/
We long ago saw, in The Gospel at Colonus, how eloquently and effectively a gospel choir could function as the chorus in a Greek tragedy. Now, in the wake of the murder at Ferguson, Missouri, that approach takes its gloves off. A rotating cast of high-powered New York actors reads excerpts fromSophocles's Antigone (about, as I don't have to tell you, resisting oppressive governmental power), with choral interjections by members of Brooklyn and Ferguson gospel choirs: activists, police officers, youth, citizens. An audience discussion follows -- not, the creators of this piece emphasize, a post-performance "talk back", but rather an integral part of the piece.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: It's funny to say so about such a homey place, but Polish standby Teresa's shines like a beacon in the food desert that is Montague Street.
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Wed, Jul 17, 2019, 7:00 PM – Sat, Jul 20, 2019, 8:00 PM
Mozart: The Magic Flute
OPERA
WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 17 - 20, 2019
7:00 PM
Mostly Mozart Festival
David H. Koch Theater
20 Lincoln Center Plaza, Upper West Side, Manhattan
$55-$175
http://www.lincolncenter.org/mostly-mozart-festival/show/the-magic-flute-2
Mainstream opera in New York is a pretty sorry affair. An audience of brain-dead reactionaries has assumed control of it, making it impossible to mount productions that appeal to the general intelligent audience that frequents other performing art forms. This brain-dead audience denies that opera is theater -- indeed, it denies that opera is a living form. It rejects productions that engage with and interrogate classic works -- the kind of thing that's SOP in current classic theater productions, in the absence of which people wouldn't even bother going -- and instead demands calcified thought-free retreads of its "beloved" melodramas of victimization of women. Only happy when its intelligence is being insulted (or, more accurately, its complacency and empty-headed love of shallow luxury is being indulged), this audience haughtily sniffs at "eurotrash" and "regie" whenever faced with an opera production that actually addresses the (often problematic) content of the classic work being presented. So when one of the summer festivals sneaks in a current European production of a classic opera -- the kind of thing the mainstream New York audience won't let our hometown opera house put on -- it's both a breath of fresh air and a very big deal. Has the work of the leading opera director Barrie (he misspells his first name!) Kosky ever been presented in New York? Well, here's his Komische Oper Berlin take on Mozart's high-and-low extravaganzaThe Magic Flute, produced along with a British theater company specializing in integrating animation with live action and presented as a Weimar-era movie. This promises to be a superb entertainment as well as a chance to hear some of the best music every written by a European (another of those very late Mozart pieces that make you suspect he died just when he was getting reallygood). No one with a brain should miss this.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Bar Boulud's across-Broadway-from-Lincoln-Center location has probably stopped people from considering it what it is: one of the finest bistros in New York, worth visiting even if you're not going to Lincoln Center.
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Tue, Jul 16, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sun, Jul 21, 2019, 4:00 PM
Chen Shi-Zheng / Jonathan Aibel & Glenn Berger: Dragon Spring Phoenix Rise
THEATER
TUESDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 16 - 21, 2019 (continuing through JULY 27)
8:00 PM TUESDAY - SATURDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY
3:00 PM SUNDAY
The Shed
545 West 30th Street, Hudson Yards, Manhattan
$25-$99
https://theshed.org/program/5-dragon-spring-phoenix-rise
Go see this, and turn your skepticism about The Shed into hatred. (Ticket prices, lowered after the reviews came out, go back up next week.)
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Momofuku Kāwi -- the most explicitly Korean of all the Momofukus (which is not to say it's anything like straight Korean) -- makes it impossible to say that there's nothing good about Hudson Yards. But it's not good enough to justify a visit to this example of naked oligarchic overreach.
-
Tue, Jul 16, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sun, Jul 21, 2019, 8:30 PM
Jackie Sibblies Drury: Fairview
THEATER
TUESDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 16 - 21, 2019 (continuing through AUGUST 11)
7:30 PM TUESDAY - SUNDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY & SUNDAY
Theater for a New Audience
262 Ashland Place, Fort Greene, Brooklyn
$55-$115; $20 students & 30 and under
https://www.tfana.org/current-season/fairview/overview
Most people who saw Fairview (SPOILER ALERT: DON'T READ THAT LINKED REVIEW IF YOU PLAN TO SEE THIS) during its run at Soho Rep. thought it was the best theater they saw last year (the Pulitzer Prize Committee certainly agreed). Now there's another chance. A canny, biting, laugh-till-you-think-about-it exposition of racism, stereotyping, and enforced social stultification. The only question is how well the famous (and, as has emerged in the months since the initial run, extremely influential) ending will translate to this much bigger theater.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: There's now a Bolivian Llama Party in the Gotham Market at the Ashland!
-
Tue, Jul 16, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sun, Jul 21, 2019, 3:00 PM
Maria Kochetkova: Catch Her If You Can
DANCE
TUESDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 16 - 21, 2019
7:30 PM TUESDAY & WEDNESDAY
8:00 PM THURSDAY - SATURDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY & SUNDAY
Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Avenue, Chelsea, Manhattan
$56-$91
https://www.joyce.org/performances/maria-kochetkova
If their must be International Star Ballerina Tours, let them be like this. Former San Francisco Ballet star Kochetkova dances all contemporary works, including a piece by the absolute leader of the contemporary ballet field,William Forsythe, and, intriguingly, the conceptual non-dance choreographerJérôme Bel. So let's at least give Kochetkova points for bravery.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Tropical food and drinks at Jungle Bird.
-
Tuesday, July 16, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
-
Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sun, Jul 21, 2019, 3:30 PM
Halley Feiffer: Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow
THEATER
MONDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 15 - 21, 2019 (continuing through AUGUST 3)
7:30 PM MONDAY - SATURDAY
2:30 PM WEDNESDAY, SATURDAY & SUNDAY
MCC Theater
511 West 52nd Street, Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan
$54-$74 Mon.-Fri.; $64-$84 Sat.-Sun.; $30 front row; $30 rush tickets under 30 years/65 years and over; $30 people residing between West 34th & 59th Streets and 8th & 10th Avenues
https://mcctheater.org/tix/moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow/
A reimagined update of Chekhov's Three Sisters that takes the comedy in the seriocomedy and runs with it. Former Rookies will want to know that Tavi Gevinson plays Irina. (SPOILER ALERT: they never get there.)
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Excellent cheese, excellent snacks, excellent sweets, EXCELLENT wine at Casellula. For the Sunday matinée, go to longtime (albeit peripatetic) Theater District standby Mont Blanc 52 for utterly charming Swiss (have the Emince de Veau).
-
Sunday, July 14, 2019, 3:00 PM – 4:00 PM
Bang on a Can Music Series: 75 Dollar Bill
MUSIC
SUNDAY, JULY 14, 2014
3:00 PM
Noguchi Museum
9-01 33rd Road, Long Island City, Queens
Free with museum admission ($10; $5 students/seniors)
https://www.noguchi.org/programs/public/artists-noguchi-bang-can-music-series-75-dollar-bill-july-14-2019
When I say 75 Dollar Bill combines dance and trance music, I don't mean they sound like they've played at beach parties in Goa. I mean that their pieces combine beat-oriented music -- blues, post-punk, world -- with what I hope they'll forgive me for calling a naive Minimalism. The results are inspiriting -- in large part because they always retain a hard edge. This afternoon, they play pieces conceived as reflecting the Noguchi's rather special landscape.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: When Orhan Yegen opens a new Turkish restaurant, it's news indeed. I wonder if you'll be able to get near Lokanta after Pete Wells's recent love letter?
-
Sunday, July 14, 2019, 1:00 PM – 2:00 PM
Found Sound Collage: P. Spadine
MUSIC
SUNDAY, JULY 14, 2019
1:00 PM
Nolan Park 8B, Governors Island, Manhattan
Free (registration required)
https://pioneerworks.org/classes/found-sound-collage-with-p-spadine/
Ashcan Orchestra leader P. Spadine, who describes himself as "a composer, tinkerer, scientific tourist, and pack rat", leads the audience around Governors Island, collecting found sounds on their cell phones as they go. Then, Spadine assists the audience members in creating sonic collages from the sounds they've gathered. All the reserved slots for this program are filled; look for cancellations.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: There is plenty of food, beer, and cocktails on the Island. Afterward, stop at The Long Island Bar from the Brooklyn ferry landing, Dead Rabbit from the Manhattan.
-
Sat, Jul 13, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sun, Jul 14, 2019, 8:30 PM
Pierre-Laurent Aimard et al.: Caramoor Takes Wing!
MUSIC
SATURDAY & SUNDAY, JULY 13 & 14, 2019
7:30 PM SATURDAY
6:00 AM SUNDAY
Caramoor
149 Girldle Ridge Road, Katonah, Westchester
Aimard: $30 each recital; $45 all three; $15 aged 18 and under
Everything else: Free
https://www.caramoor.org/events/caramoor-takes-wing/
The centerpiece of this celebration of birdsong is (as you might guess) a three-recital series by Pierre-Laurent Aimard traversing Messiaen's titanic collection of transcribed birdsong, the Catalogue d'Oiseaux. Pianist Aimard is Messiaen's preeminent interpreter (if you don't believe me, listen to Messiaen himself and his wife, the splendid pianist Yvonne Loriod, who should know). So I was pretty excited about this -- until I noticed that one of the three recitals starts at dawn on Sunday (6:00 AM on Sunday not being a time that's in my repertoire -- much less in Westchester). Surrounding Aimard's recitals are some enticing free performances. One is by clarinetist/naturalist David Rothenberg, who is not only an amazingly distinctive stylist on his instrument, but a recognized expert on the interplay of human music and bird and insect(!) song (so he's got both ends of that food chain covered). And a performance of John Luther Adams's songbirdsongs by Sandbox Percussion with Emi Ferguson and Catherine Gregory on piccolos!
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Picnic!
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Friday, July 12, 2019, 8:30 PM – 9:30 PM
Mike McGinnis Trio
MUSIC
FRIDAY, JULY 12, 2019
8:30 PM
iBeam
168 7th Street, Gowanus, Brooklyn
Ticket price unavailable
https://www.ibeambrooklyn.com/home/2019/7/12/mike-mcginnis-trio
Clarinetist/saxophonist Mike McGinnis is a really good poly-stylistic jazz-based composer; his Angsudden Song Cycle of several years ago is a particular personal favorite that I keep returning to. You never know exactly what he's going to sound like -- but you know that it will be piquant and surprising while remaining resolutely listenable, with no pandering. Tonight he leads a trio. Always worth it.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Great barbecue at Fletcher's.
-
Friday, July 12, 2019, 8:00 PM – 9:00 PM
-
Friday, July 12, 2019, 7:30 PM – 8:30 PM
Matthew Dear
MUSIC
FRIDAY, JULY 12, 2019
7:30 PM
(Le) Poisson Rouge
158 Bleecker Street, Greenwich Village, Manhattan
$20 advance; $25 door
https://lpr.com/lpr_events/matthew-dear-july-12-2019/
To say that Matthew Dear does electronic dance pop is a bit misleading. He does each of them -- electronic, dance, and pop -- in varying combinations, almost always excellently.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Summer is the perfect (some would say the only) time for the light digestivo-derived cocktails and even lighter sandwiches at Bar Pisellino.
-
Friday, July 12, 2019, 7:30 PM – 8:30 PM
-
Fri, Jul 12, 2019, 7:00 PM – Sat, Jul 13, 2019, 8:00 PM
-
Fri, Jul 12, 2019, 6:00 PM – Sat, Jul 13, 2019, 9:30 PM
-
Thursday, July 11, 2019, 9:00 PM – 10:00 PM
-
Thursday, July 11, 2019, 8:00 PM – 9:00 PM
-
Thu, Jul 11, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sun, Jul 14, 2019, 3:00 PM
Michael Gordon: Acquanetta
OPERA
THURSDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 11 - 14, 2019 (continuing through JULY 21)
8:00 PM THURSDAY & FRIDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY & SUNDAY
SummerScape
LUMA Theater, Fisher Center, Bard College
60 Manor Avenue, Annandale-On-Hudson, Dutchess County
$35-$75
https://fishercenter.bard.edu/events/acquanetta/
Michael Gordon's Acquanetta was the star of last year's PROTOTYPE Festival. Now that director Daniel Fish is the toast of Broadway, it's back, atBard's SummerScape. A nonlinear account of a B-movie Latin Spitfire of the Hollywood '40s and '50s who was actually a Native American (or maybe African American) from Pennsylvania (or maybe Wyoming), it's presented as the kind of horror movie in which she specialized. The Goth-inflected score is one of Gordon's greater achievements.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Once long ago, I ran into Stiller & Meara in The "Historic" Village Diner in Red Hook, NY. As I recall, they said they were visiting one of their children at Bard. Which is odd, since as far as I know, neither of their children went to Bard.
-
Thursday, July 11, 2019, 8:00 PM – 9:00 PM
-
Thursday, July 11, 2019, 7:30 PM – 8:30 PM
-
Thursday, July 11, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
Nick Dunston's Atlantic Extraction
MUSIC
THURSDAY, JULY 11, 2019
7:00 PM
Spectrum
70 Flushing Avenue, Garage A, Fort Greene, Brooklyn
$15; $10 students/seniors
http://www.spectrumnyc.com/site/calendar.php
Out of all the hyperactive bassist/composer Nick Dunston's many projects, Atlantic Extraction may be my favorite. It incorporates influences from, as Dunston himself puts it, Free Jazz, No Wave, 20th Century Western Classical, and Appalachian folk -- a heady (and very enjoyable) brew indeed. And it includes, among its members, one of this List's very favorite chamber duos,The Witches, on violin/viola and flute. You can't go wrong. Opening is an intriguing trumpet/drums duo, Pluto's Lawyer.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Williamsburg sensation Republic of Booza -- purveyor of a primordial antecedent to ice cream, developed in the Middle East centuries ago -- is doing a pop-up in Fort Greene, a few blocks from Spectrum!
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Wed, Jul 10, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sun, Jul 14, 2019, 9:00 PM
?!:New Works 2019
THEATER
WEDNESDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 10 - 14, 2019 (continuing through JULY 20)
8:00 PM
Point:Title
The Brick
579 Metropolitan Avenue, Williamsburg, Brooklyn
$10
http://www.bricktheater.com/
The highly experimental Brooklyn theater company Title:Point curates a two-week festival of new theater works. Go any night.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Roman flatbread with various toppings -- this is really great stuff -- at Montesacro Pinseria Romana.
-
Wed, Jul 10, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sat, Jul 13, 2019, 8:30 PM
Mark Morris Dance Group
DANCE
WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 10 - 13, 2019
7:30 PM
Rose Theater, Jazz at Lincoln Center
10 Columbus Circle, Upper West Side, Manhattan
$40-$150
http://www.lincolncenter.org/mostly-mozart-festival/show/mark-morris-dance-group-2
Who better to make a brand new setting of Satie's exceeding droll Sports et Divertissements -- a piece illustrating sports and leisure activities originally presented as a cycle of piano works with visual and spoken-word accompaniment -- than The World's Funniest, Wittiest, And Most Purely Entertaining Choreographer (also The World's Choreographer Most Responsive To Music)? Morris and Satie were made for each other -- Morris's prior Satie settings are among his best works -- so expect the moon and stars from this new piece. Also on the bill is one of Morris's most miraculous prior musical settings, V to Schumann's stupendous Piano Quintet: you feel like you're actually seeing the music. And Empire Garden to Ives's Piano Trio, whose playful folk usages would be catnip to Morris even if the central movement's tempo marking, TSIAJ ("this scherzo is a joke"), didn't seem like something Morris would have written himself (surely the sophisticated readers of this list don't need to be told that "scherzo" is Italian for "joke"). Yet, as you'll see, Morris's response to Ives's music is not what you'd have expected at all.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Good Italian food -- and excellent Martinis (of all things) -- at Gabriel's.
-
Wed, Jul 10, 2019, 7:30 PM – Thu, Jul 11, 2019, 8:30 PM
Carmines / Fornés: Promenade
THEATER
WEDNESDAY & THURSDAY, JULY 10 & 11, 2019
7:30 PM
Encores! Off Center
City Center
131 West 55th Street, Midtown, Manhattan
$25-$125
https://www.nycitycenter.org/pdps/2018-2019/promenade/
Al Carmines and Maria Irene Fornés: those were names to conjure with on the'60s Off-Off-Broadway scene. Their work wasn't abstruse -- if anything, it might have seemed a little simple (or at least naive). But it was affecting, it was absurd -- it took you someplace, and that someplace was interesting. Carmines's music was catchy; Fornés's plays were whatever the verbal equivalent of "catchy" is (while maintaining full avant credentials). Their only collaboration was a major Off-Off hit, opening at the Judson (where Carmines was a minister) and then moving (far) uptown to the Promenade for a nice commercial run that featured, at the outset, the sublime Madeline Kahn (who soon left to get famous). Maybe this will be great, maybe it'll be embarrassing. Only one way to find out.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Nobody ever says so, but Benoit really is one of New York's best bistros.
-
Wednesday, July 10, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
-
Wed, Jul 10, 2019, 7:00 PM – Sat, Jul 13, 2019, 8:00 PM
Theater of War: Antigone in Ferguson
THEATER
WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 10 - 13, 2019
7:00 PM WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY
St. Ann & the Holy Trinity Church
157 Montague Street, Brooklyn Heights, Brooklyn
Free (by registration)
https://www.stannholytrinity.org/event/antigone-in-ferguson/
We long ago saw, in The Gospel at Colonus, how eloquently and effectively a gospel choir could function as the chorus in a Greek tragedy. Now, in the wake of the murder at Ferguson, Missouri, that approach takes its gloves off. A rotating cast of high-powered New York actors reads excerpts from Sophocles's Antigone (about, as I don't have to tell you, resisting oppressive governmental power), with choral interjections by members of Brooklyn and Ferguson gospel choirs: activists, police officers, youth, citizens. An audience discussion follows -- not, the creators of this piece emphasize, a post-performance "talk back", but rather an integral part of the piece.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: It's funny to say so about such a homey place, but Polish standby Teresa's shines like a beacon in the food desert that is Montague Street.
-
Tue, Jul 9, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sun, Jul 14, 2019, 4:00 PM
Chen Shi-Zheng / Jonathan Aibel & Glenn Berger: Dragon Spring Phoenix Rise
THEATER
TUESDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 9 - 14, 2019 (continuing through JULY 27)
8:00 PM TUESDAY - SATURDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY
3:00 PM SUNDAY
The Shed
545 West 30th Street, Hudson Yards, Manhattan
$25-$99
https://theshed.org/program/5-dragon-spring-phoenix-rise
What is becoming the usual Shed blend of the avant and banal pop, attempting (to put a good face on it) to effect popular outreach while maintaining at least an appearance of artistic cred. So the piece was conceived by Chen Shi-Zheng (of The Peony Pavilion fame) (but of Monkey: Journey to the West infame) -- but along with the guys who wrote Kung Fu Panda. Songs by Sia, a veritable mistress of pop banality -- but remixed byavant-pop electricians The Haxan Cloak and Arca. OK, choregrapher Akram Khan is unimpeachable. On the plus side, the story involves a secret sect in Flushing with the magical power to extend life. On the negative side, the whole thing seems either naive (good face) or meretricious (bad face). Note that they've lowered ticket prices through July 21 (presumably in light of the dire reviews).
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Momofuku Kāwi -- the most explicitly Korean of all the Momofukus (which is not to say it's anything like straight Korean) -- makes it impossible to say that there's nothing good about Hudson Yards.
-
Tue, Jul 9, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sun, Jul 14, 2019, 8:30 PM
Jackie Sibblies Drury: Fairview
THEATER
TUESDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 9 - 14, 2019 (continuing through JULY 28)
7:30 PM TUESDAY - SUNDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY & SUNDAY
Theater for a New Audience
262 Ashland Place, Fort Greene, Brooklyn
$55-$115
https://www.tfana.org/current-season/fairview/overview
Most people who saw Fairview (SPOILER ALERT: DON'T READ THAT LINKED REVIEW IF YOU PLAN TO SEE THIS) during its run at Soho Rep. thought it was the best theater they saw last year (the Pulitzer Prize Committee certainly agreed). Now there's another chance. A canny, biting, laugh-till-you-think-about-it exposition of racism, stereotyping, and enforced social stultification. The only question is how well the famous (and, as has emerged in the months since the initial run, extremely influential) ending will translate to this much bigger theater.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: There's now a Bolivian Llama Party in the Gotham Market at the Ashland!
-
Tue, Jul 9, 2019, 7:00 PM – Sun, Jul 14, 2019, 8:00 PM
David Cale: We're Only Alive for a Short Amount of Time
THEATER
TUESDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 9 - 14, 2018
7:00 PM TUESDAY - SUNDAY
1:00 PM SATURDAY & SUNDAY
Public Theater
425 Lafayette Street, NoHo, Manhattan
$45
https://www.publictheater.org/Tickets/Calendar/PlayDetailsCollection/18-19-Season/Were-Only-Alive/
David Cale, a very special solo performer, puts together an autobiographical music-theater piece that is much more direct that his rather mediated previous work has been. That has its downsides as well as its upsides -- indirection in art is usually a good thing -- but (who knew?) the material he had to work with turns out be sensational. And Cale still manages to keep some distance (which is either a miraculous achievement or the only way a person could deal with stuff like this and maintain his sanity). This is very much worth seeing.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Best Sichuan in Manhattan at Szechuan Mountain House (too bad it isn't easier to get into).
-
Monday, July 8, 2019, 9:00 PM – 10:00 PM
Mallory Catlett: DECODER: Ticket That Exploded
THEATER
MONDAY, JULY 8, 2019
9:00 PM
Pioneer Works
159 Pioneer Street, Red Hook, Brooklyn
$10 advance; $15 door
https://pioneerworks.org/programs/decoder-ticket-that-exploded/
William Burroughs wrote his Nova Trilogy in the 1960s using the "cut-up technique", in which texts from various sources (including but very much not limited to Burroughs himself) were cut up and then reassembled at random. So how did it turn out to be so prophetic? The Chocolate Factory in Queens has commissioned a set of theatrical performances/interpretations of the whole trilogy, which will be staged there next year. This is the middle piece (the second of the three novels), conceived and directed by the redoubtable Mallory Catlett, who is fully able to fully match Burroughs's hallucinatory, disjointed manner.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Superb cocktails at Fort Defiance. And Monday is Burger Night!
-
Mon, Jul 8, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sat, Jul 13, 2019, 8:30 PM
Halley Feiffer: Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow
THEATER
MONDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 8 - 13, 2019 (continuing through AUGUST 3)
7:30 PM MONDAY - SATURDAY
2:30 PM WEDNESDAY & SATURDAY
MCC Theater
511 West 52nd Street, Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan
$54-$74; $30 front row; $30 rush tickets 29 years and under/65 years and over;$30 people residing between West 34th & 59th Streets and 8th & 10th Avenues
https://mcctheater.org/tix/moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow/
A reimagined update of Chekhov's Three Sisters that takes the comedy in the seriocomedy and runs with it. Former Rookies will want to know that Tavi Gevinson plays Irina. (SPOILER ALERT: they never get there.)
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Excellent cheese, excellent snacks, excellent sweets, EXCELLENT wine at Casellula. For the Sunday matinée, go to longtime (albeit peripatetic) Theater District standby Mont Blanc 52 for utterly charming Swiss (have the Emince de Veau).
-
Monday, July 8, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
Stew & Heidi: Staged Dives: An Evening with Stew & Heidi of the Negro Problem
MUSIC
MONDAY, JULY 8, 2019
7:00 PM
Joe's Pub, Public Theater
425 Lafayette Street, NoHo, Manhattan
$25
https://www.publictheater.org/Tickets/Calendar/PlayDetailsCollection/Joes-Pub/2019/S/Stew/?SiteTheme=JoesPub
Stew is as good a singer-songwriter as there is out there: intelligent, incisive, with his own unique point of view and a great melodic sense. Guitarist/songwriter Heidi Rodewald, out of the LA Paisley Underground, is his invaluable collaborator. They built up a great catalogue with their band, The Negro Problem, and have written even better music-theater pieces like Passing Strange and The Total Bent. All of that will be channeled into this show.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Summer's here and the time is right to go to Decibel for sake and snacks.
-
Sunday, July 7, 2019, 4:00 PM – 5:00 PM
Caroline Shaw: Watermark
MUSIC
SUNDAY, JULY 7, 2019
4:00 PM
Jonathan Biss / Orchestra of St. Luke's
Venetian Theater, Caramoor
149 Girldle Ridge Road, Katonah, Westchester
$15-$88
https://www.caramoor.org/events/orchestra-of-st-lukes-jonathan-biss/
Caroline Shaw was commissioned to write a "response" to Beethoven's Third Piano Concerto, to be played after the concerto itself is performed by Jonathan Biss. It probably doesn't need to be said that out of all the current bunch of audience-friendly New Music composers, Shaw manages to be both one of the most audience-friendly and one of the most consistently surprising and distinctive. And I can tell you from personal experience that Biss plays that Third Concerto very well.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Picnic! The produce at the Greenmarkets could hardly be more appealing than it is right now. (N.B.: Do not buy Caramoor's catered food. Bring your own! You'll do SO much better!)
-
Sunday, July 7, 2019, 2:30 PM – 4:30 PM
THEATER
MONDAY - WEDNESDAY & SUNDAY, JULY 1 - 3 & 7, 2019 (continuing through AUGUST 3)
7:30 MONDAY - WEDNESDAY & SUNDAY
2:30 PM SUNDAY
Halley Feiffer: Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow
MCC Theater
511 West 52nd Street, Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan
$54-$74; $30 front row; $30 rush tickets 29 years and under/65 years and over;$30 people residing between West 34th & 59th Streets and 8th & 10th Avenues
https://mcctheater.org/tix/moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow/
A reimagined update of Chekhov's Three Sisters that takes the comedy in the seriocomedy and runs with it. Former Rookies will want to know that Tavi Gevinson plays Irina. (SPOILER ALERT: they never get there.)
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Excellent cheese, excellent snacks, excellent sweets, EXCELLENT wine at Casellula. For the Sunday matinée, go to longtime (albeit parepetetic) Theater District standby Mont Blanc 52 for utterly charming Swiss (have the Emince de Veau).
-
Saturday, July 6, 2019, 1:00 PM – 5:00 PM
Rite of Summer: Sandbox Percussion
MUSIC
SATURDAY, JULY 6, 2019
1:00 & 3:00 PM
Nolan Park, Governors Island, Manhattan
Free
https://www.riteofsummer.com/festival/sandbox-percussion-2019/
Most things about right now absolutely suck, but one of the good things is how there's a plethora of thriving percussion ensembles with great skill, unimpeachable integrity and taste, and an absolute willingness to be . . . fun. Here's one: Sandbox Percussion. The program includes, among other things, pieces by Steve Reich, Juri Seo, and Julia Wolfe.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: There is plenty of food, beer, and cocktails on the Island. Afterward, stop at The Long Island Bar from the Brooklyn ferry landing,Dead Rabbit from the Manhattan.
-
Saturday, July 6, 2019, 12:00 PM – 1:00 PM
Warm Up: Freddie Gibbs & Madlib
MUSIC
SATURDAY, JULY 6, 2019
12:00 PM
PS1
22-25 Jackson Avenue, Long Island City, Queens
$18 advance; $22 door
https://www.moma.org/calendar/events/5527?locale=en
It should surprise precisely no one that I'm a huge fan of the hallucinatory, sonically expansive, witty hip-hop of Madlib. His recent teamups with logorrheic rapper Freddie Gibbs have been loads of fun. Here, they'll be supported by the usual well-chosen crew of dance acts at another great PS1 party.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Before, beer-and-sausage brunch at Bierocracy. After, more beer at LIC Beer Project (it's your patriotic duty to drink a lot of beer this week), or extra-good ramen at Mu Ramen.
-
Friday, July 5, 2019, 10:00 PM – 11:00 PM
-
Fri, Jul 5, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sun, Jul 7, 2019, 4:00 PM
Chen Shi-Zheng/Jonathan Aibel & Glenn Berger: Dragon Spring Phoenix Rise
THEATER
TUESDAY - WEDNESDAY & FRIDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 2 - 3 & 5 - 7, 2019 (continuing through JULY 27)
8:00 PM TUESDAY - WEDNESDAY & FRIDAY - SATURDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY
3:00 PM SUNDAY
The Shed
545 West 30th Street, Hudson Yards, Manhattan
$40-$155
https://theshed.org/program/5-dragon-spring-phoenix-rise
What is becoming the usual Shed blend of the avant and banal pop. So the piece was conceived by Chen Shi-Zheng (of The Peony Pavilion fame) (but ofMonkey: Journey to the West infame) -- but along with the guys who wroteKung Fu Panda. Songs by Sia, a veritable mistress of pop banality -- but remixed by avant-pop electricians The Haxan Cloak and Arca. OK, choregraphy by Akram Khan can't be faulted. And on the strong plus side, the story involves a secret sect in Flushing with the magical power to extend life.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Momofuku Kāwi -- the most explicitly Korean of all the Momofukus (which is not to say it's anything like straight Korean) -- makes it impossible to say that there's nothing good about Hudson Yards.
-
Fri, Jul 5, 2019, 8:00 PM – Sat, Jul 6, 2019, 9:00 PM
-
Fri, Jul 5, 2019, 7:30 PM – Sun, Jul 7, 2019, 8:30 PM
Jackie Sibblies Drury: Fairview
THEATER
TUESDAY - WEDNESDAY & FRIDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 2 - 3 & 5 - 7, 2019 (continuing through JULY 28)*
7:30 PM
2:00 PM SATURDAY & SUNDAY
Theater for a New Audience
262 Ashland Place, Fort Greene, Brooklyn
$55-$115
https://www.tfana.org/current-season/fairview/overview
Most people who saw Fairview (SPOILER ALERT: DON'T READ THAT LINKED REVIEW IF YOU PLAN TO SEE THIS) during its run at Soho Rep. thought it was the best theater they saw last year (the Pulitzer Prize Committee certainly agreed). Now there's another chance. A canny, biting, laugh-till-you-think-about-it exposition of racism, stereotyping, and enforced social stultification. The only question is how well the famous (and, as has emerged in the months since the initial run, extremely influential) ending will translate to this much bigger theater.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: There's now a Bolivian Llama Party in the Gotham Market at the Ashland!
-
Fri, Jul 5, 2019, 7:00 PM – Sun, Jul 7, 2019, 8:00 PM
-
Thu, Jul 4, 2019, 7:00 PM – Sat, Jul 6, 2019, 8:00 PM
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Wed, Jul 3, 2019, 7:00 PM – Sat, Jul 6, 2019, 8:00 PM
Limited Liability Theater Company: The Drinking Bird
THEATER
WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 3 - 6, 2019
7:00 PM
Ice Factory
New Ohio Theater
154 Christopher Street, West Village, Manhattan
$20; $16 students
http://newohiotheatre.org/drinking-bird.htm
Asking the theatrical question, if robots are taking our jobs, why is everybody still working so hard? The actors explore the issues raised by that question while completing a strange, repetitive (and hopefully entertaining) series of tasks that may or may not accomplish anything.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Malatesta Trattoria is a longtime West Village standby for good, reasonably priced Italian. (Good thing about those prices -- it's cash only.)
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Wed, Jul 3, 2019, 7:00 PM – Sat, Jul 6, 2019, 8:00 PM
Theater of War: Antigone in Ferguson
THEATER
WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 3 - 6, 2019 (continuing through JULY 13)
7:00 PM WEDNESDAY - SATURDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY
St. Ann & the Holy Trinity Church
157 Montague Street, Brooklyn Heights, Brooklyn
Free (by registration)
https://www.stannholytrinity.org/event/antigone-in-ferguson/
We long ago saw, in The Gospel at Colonus, how eloquently and effectively a gospel choir could function as the chorus in a Greek tragedy. Now, in the wake of the murder at Ferguson, Missouri, that approach takes its gloves off. A rotating cast of high-powered New York actors reads excerpts fromSophocles's Antigone (about, as I don't have to tell you, resisting oppressive governmental power), with choral interjections by members of Brooklyn and Ferguson gospel choirs: activists, police officers, youth, citizens. An audience discussion follows -- not, the creators of this piece emphasize, a post-performance "talk back", but rather an integral part of the piece.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: It's funny to say so about such a homey place, but Polish standby Teresa's shines like a beacon in the food desert that is Montague Street.
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Tue, Jul 2, 2019, 8:00 PM – Wed, Jul 3, 2019, 9:00 PM
Chen Shi-Zheng/Jonathan Aibel & Glenn Berger: Dragon Spring Phoenix Rise
THEATER
TUESDAY - WEDNESDAY & FRIDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 2 - 3 & 5 - 7, 2019 (continuing through JULY 27)
8:00 PM TUESDAY - WEDNESDAY & FRIDAY - SATURDAY
2:00 PM SATURDAY
3:00 PM SUNDAY
The Shed
545 West 30th Street, Hudson Yards, Manhattan
$40-$155
https://theshed.org/program/5-dragon-spring-phoenix-rise
What is becoming the usual Shed blend of the avant and banal pop. So the piece was conceived by Chen Shi-Zheng (of The Peony Pavilion fame) (but ofMonkey: Journey to the West infame) -- but along with the guys who wroteKung Fu Panda. Songs by Sia, a veritable mistress of pop banality -- but remixed by avant-pop electricians The Haxan Cloak and Arca. OK, choregraphy by Akram Khan can't be faulted. And on the strong plus side, the story involves a secret sect in Flushing with the magical power to extend life.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Momofuku Kāwi -- the most explicitly Korean of all the Momofukus (which is not to say it's anything like straight Korean) -- makes it impossible to say that there's nothing good about Hudson Yards.
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Tue, Jul 2, 2019, 7:30 PM – Wed, Jul 3, 2019, 8:30 PM
Jackie Sibblies Drury: Fairview
THEATER
TUESDAY - WEDNESDAY & FRIDAY - SUNDAY, JULY 2 - 3 & 5 - 7, 2019 (continuing through JULY 28)*
7:30 PM
2:00 PM SATURDAY & SUNDAY
Theater for a New Audience
262 Ashland Place, Fort Greene, Brooklyn
$55-$115
https://www.tfana.org/current-season/fairview/overview
Most people who saw Fairview (SPOILER ALERT: DON'T READ THAT LINKED REVIEW IF YOU PLAN TO SEE THIS) during its run at Soho Rep. thought it was the best theater they saw last year (the Pulitzer Prize Committee certainly agreed). Now there's another chance. A canny, biting, laugh-till-you-think-about-it exposition of racism, stereotyping, and enforced social stultification. The only question is how well the famous (and, as has emerged in the months since the initial run, extremely influential) ending will translate to this much bigger theater.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: There's now a Bolivian Llama Party in the Gotham Market at the Ashland!
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Tuesday, July 2, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
ÌFÉ / Balún
MUSIC
TUESDAY, JULY 2, 2019
7:00 PM
Elsewhere Rooftop
599 Johnson Avenue, Bushwick, Brooklyn
$16 advance; $20 door
https://www.elsewherebrooklyn.com/events/2019-07-02-ife/
Puerto Rican electro-dance music! From the island itself, the Afro-Caribbean drum-based electronic band ÌFÉ -- a really welcome visit. From our own island, Brooklyn-from-Puerto Rico composer Angélica Negrón's wonderful dance band Balún. Great great great.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: You KNOW what I'm gonna say.
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Tue, Jul 2, 2019, 7:00 PM – Wed, Jul 3, 2019, 8:00 PM
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Tuesday, July 2, 2019, 7:00 PM – 8:00 PM
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Monday, July 1, 2019, 8:00 PM – 9:00 PM
75 Dollar Bill: Record Release Show
MUSIC
MONDAY, JULY 1, 2019
8:00 PM
Roulette
509 Atlantic Avenue (entrance on 3rd Avenue), Boerum Hill, Brooklyn
$18
https://roulette.org/event/75-dollar-bill-joshua-abrams-natural-information-society/
I guess you'd call 75 Dollar Bill homemade outsider avant-garde music. They're basically pop rather than classical -- but out there on the frontier where genre distinctions don't make much difference (GENRE MUST DIE). There are elements of Minimalism, world music, even blues -- as well, of course, as our old friends No Wave and noise. All played on homemade instruments that hit microtones you might not be used to hearing from this kind of band. What's surprising is how groovy it all is. The opening act, Chicago psych-experimental band Joshua Abrams & Natural Information Society, play extended psychedelic pieces with some similar elements as 75 Dollar Bill but less groovy, less dancey, certainly less noisy -- and, occasionally, more boring.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Hollow Nickel is sort of the Roulette post-show headquarters. The beer and cocktails are nothing special, but the burgers are perfectly adequate.
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Mon, Jul 1, 2019, 7:30 PM – Wed, Jul 3, 2019, 8:30 PM
Halley Feiffer: Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow Moscow
THEATER
MONDAY - WEDNESDAY & SUNDAY, JULY 1 - 3 & 7, 2019 (continuing through AUGUST 3)
7:30 MONDAY - WEDNESDAY & SUNDAY
2:30 PM SUNDAY
MCC Theater
511 West 52nd Street, Hell's Kitchen, Manhattan
$54-$74; $30 front row; $30 rush tickets 29 years and under/65 years and over;$30 people residing between West 34th & 59th Streets and 8th & 10th Avenues
https://mcctheater.org/tix/moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow-moscow/
A reimagined update of Chekhov's Three Sisters that takes the comedy in the seriocomedy and runs with it. Former Rookies will want to know that Tavi Gevinson plays Irina. (SPOILER ALERT: they never get there.)
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: Excellent cheese, excellent snacks, excellent sweets, EXCELLENT wine at Casellula. For the Sunday matinée, go to longtime (albeit parepetetic) Theater District standby Mont Blanc 52 for utterly charming Swiss (have the Emince de Veau).
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Mon, Jul 1, 2019, 7:00 PM – Sat, Jul 6, 2019, 7:00 PM
Gordon Dahlquist: [VEIL WIDOW CONSPIRACY]
THEATER
MONDAY - SATURDAY, JULY 1 - 6, 2019
7:00 PM MONDAY - SATURDAY
3:00 PM SATURDAY
National Asian American Theater Company
Next Door at NYTW
Fourth Street Theater
83 East 4th Street, East Village, Manhattan
$39-$49
https://www.nytw.org/show/veil-widow-conspiracy/
This looks really interesting. It tells the story of a 1922 political murder mystery in Xinjiang in far Western China, as dramatized in a 2010 big-budget Hollywood movie, and amended by the supplementary materials on a subsequent DVD release, as well as by censorship negotiations between the filmmakers and the Chinese government -- and finally by two lovers in a future dystopian Brooklyn who lack the resources to watch the film, one describing it to the other in the dystopian future Brooklyn dark.
MAKE A NIGHT OF IT: No way I'm sending you anywhere other than the Jiang Diner, where the delicious food of Xinjiang is served by people lucky enough to have gotten out. The steamed eggplant and potato appetizer is one of those dishes where, once you've eaten it, you wish you were always eating it.
