The cultural highlights in our region this weekend include avant-protest music, choral music for Ukraine, raga-rock, classic rock … plus a whole lot more.
Grammy Award-winning rock band The Wallflowers hold forth at the Mahaiwe in Great Barrington, Mass., tonight at 8. The inheritors of the classic-rock mantle passed down from the Byrds through Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers, with a bit of punk-fueled energy courtesy of the Clash, the Wallflowers are a relative rarity these days, for 30 years laying down song-based rock hits written and sung by the group's founder and frontman Jakob Dylan, who boasts his own musical pedigree. Let’s just say the apple didn’t fall far from the tree and leave it at that. (Friday, May 20)
The Soundings: New Music at the Clark series presented by the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Mass., continues on Sunday at 3 p.m. in a program called Soundings: This Land, featuring innovative arrangements of protest music by avant-garde vocalist Theo Bleckmann & the Westerlies. The musicians arranged songs by Joni Mitchell, Woody Guthrie, Joe Hill, and Bertolt Brecht. Song titles alone tell half the story: “Look for the Union Label,” “Wade in the Water,” “I Ain’t Got No Home in This World Anymore,” and “Tear the Fascists Down.” (Sunday, May 22)
In a concert honoring the victims of the war in Ukraine, the Cantilena Chamber Choir will present the premiere of a new work, Ukrainian Prayer, by the world-famous choral composer John Rutter and a new arrangement for choir and percussion of Hymn to the Fallen by John Williams from the film Saving Private Ryan, this Saturday at 7:30 p.m. at Trinity Church, in Lenox, Mass. (Saturday, May 21)
Call it raga-rock or Bhangra-rock, Elephant Stone are in the long line of musicians combining traditional Hindustani classical music with rock and pop, stretching from the Beatles through the Kinks to Cornershop. Elephant Stone is the brainchild of vocalist, bassist, songwriter, and sitar player Rishi Dhir, who has been nominated for the prestigious Polaris Music Prize. As a highly regarded sitar player, Rishi Dhir has also collaborated with indie-rock icons including Beck and legendary cult bands including The Brian Jonestown Massacre. The group is at No Fun in Troy, N.Y., on Saturday at 8 p.m. (Saturday May 21)
Sage City Symphony presents a free Spring Concert at Bennington College on Sunday at 4 p.m. The program includes Concerto for Piano and Orchestra by Michael Gallagher, with the composer on piano; Symphony No. 3 in F major, Op. 90, by Johannes Brahms; and The Lark Ascending, by Ralph Vaughan Williams, featuring symphony concertmaster Kaori Washiyama. (Sunday May 22)
Nearly Stationary, a new interdisciplinary work conceived and designed by Barbara Kilpatrick, continues at Hudson Hall in Hudson, N.Y., this weekend. The program features choreography by Rashaun Mitchell and Silas Riener and John Cage’s String Quartet in Four Parts performed by Four Parts Quartet. The program will be repeated for the next two weekends. (May 21, 22, 28, 29 at 3 p.m. and 5 p.m.; June 4 at 5 p.m. and 7 p.m.; June 5 at 3 p.m. and 5 .p.m.)
Seth Rogovoy is editor of the Rogovoy Report, available at rogovoyreport.com
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