Franco-Austrian artist, choreographer, and director Gisèle Vienne’s adaptation of Swiss author’s Robert Walser’s bitter family drama, L’etang (The Pond), with Pina Bausch dancer Julie Shanahan and César winner Adèle Haenel, who play all ten roles, and music by doom metal band Sunn O))) frontman Stephen O’Malley, will be staged at PS21 in Chatham, N.Y., tonight and Saturday at 7pm. The work utilizes contrasts of story and movement, an unsettling soundscape, and the incredible gifts of the two actors to create multiple levels of perception of reality and temporality, interiority and exteriority, and to magnify the family trauma central to Walser’s original piece. (Fri-Sat, Oct 13-14)
Several original members of Art Blakey’s Jazz Messengers will be on hand to pay tribute to their former bandleader, legendary drummer and one of the founding fathers of modern jazz, in A Tribute to Art Blakey, a concert featuring favorites from the Messengers’ repertoire, at the Clark Art Institute in Williamstown, Mass., on Saturday at 7pm. Joining original Messengers George Cables, David Schnitter, and Steve Davis will be trumpeter Haneef Nelson, bassist Matt Dwonszyk, and drummer Ryan Sands. (Sat, Oct 14)
Writer/director Lisa Peterson’s new take on The Odyssey by Homer will be staged by The Acting Company at the Mahaiwe in Great Barrington, Mass., on Saturday at 8pm, and Sunday at 1pm. Based on a new translation by Emily Wilson, the Acting Company brings new life to this ancient epic. “Set in a present-day relocation center for refugees on the Isle of Lesbos, four young women fleeing conflict in Middle Eastern, North African and Eastern European countries await the next step of their quest for home and family.” (Sat-Sun, Oct 14-15)
The Belcea Quartet will perform works by Bartók, Beethoven, and Debussy at Union College’s Memorial Chapel in Schenectady, N.Y., on Sundayat 3pm, as part of the Capital Region Classical series. From 2017 to 2020, the quartet was ensemble-in-residence at the Pierre Boulez Saal in Berlin. In addition, the Belcea Quartet has been part of a shared string quartet series at the Vienna Konzerthaus since 2010. (Sun, Oct 15)
EK Duo, the dynamic musical duo grounded in chamber music, improvisation, groove, and sound exploration, bring their haunting avant-chamber music with folkloric, minimalist, electronic, and noise elements to Time & Space Limited in Hudson, N.Y., on
Monday, October 16, at 7pm. Longtime collaborators bassoonist Rachael Elliott and percussionist Thomas Kozumplik perform original works and their own arrangements of music by Philip Glass, Padma Newsome, and others. Together with Newsome and Grammy Award-winner Bryce Dessner of the National, Elliott and Kozumplik form the beautiful chamber music group, Clogs. (Mon, Oct 16)
Seth Rogovoy is editor of the Rogovoy Report, available at rogovoyreport.substack.com.
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