This weekend our region features choral legends from South Africa; the man largely credited with launching the alt-country movement; coffee inspired artworks; funk, blues, and bluegrass; small works of art and big works of classical music performed a major orchestra.
Four-time Grammy Award-winning South African vocal and dance troupe Ladysmith Black Mambazo – best known for its groundbreaking work with Paul Simon on his landmark “Graceland” album – brings its joyful choral music to the Mahaiwe in Great Barrington tonight at 8. Still led by founder Joseph Shabalala, the group went on from “Graceland” to become avatars of contemporary Afropop.
Alt-country icon and political singer-songwriter Steve Earle will make a return engagement in the Hunter Center at MASS MoCA in North Adams on Saturday at 8 p.m. Earle, who will be performing solo on the eve of the release of “Terraplane,” his new album of swampy, southern-stomp blues, is a multiple Grammy Award-winner. His work has included radio hits like “Copperhead Road,” bluegrass music, latter-day Woody Guthrie-like political protest, and even a recurring dramatic role on the long-running T.V. series “The Wire.”
For the last few months, about 20 artists have been working on a unique project – making coffee-inspired art. The results, grouped in the exhibition “Coffee as Muse,” will be on display at No. Six Depot in West Stockbridge and celebrated with a reception on Sunday from 3 to 5 p.m. Among the artists whose works are represented in the reception are Jim Youngerman, Diane Firtell, Evan J. Soldinger, John Clarke, Valerie Fanarjian, Jay Elling, Rose Tannenbaum, Peter Taussig, and others. The exhibit includes a checkerboard with coffee filters; pinhole coffee can photographs; paintings painted in coffee; stirrer stick sculptures; poems; coffee-tinted photographs, and coffee curtains from a textile artist. Coffee and coffee-related snacks will be served at the reception, which will also feature coffee related music.
The ReMINDers and Maya Azucena headline the 10th Annual Blues and Funk Festival at MCLA in North Adams tonight and Saturday at 7:30 p.m. in the MCLAVenable Gymnasium. Other performers include the Berkshires’ own Albert Cummings Band, Arthur Holmes Blues Band, and Misty Blues Band.
Works by master silkscreen artist Jon Ahlen, a Pittsfield native, will inaugurate the Shire City Sanctuary Gallery in Pittsfield with a solo exhibition, opening with an artist’s reception this evening from 5 to 8 p.m.
The American Symphony Orchestra will perform works by Tchaikovsky, Korngold, and Carl Reinecke, in a concert conducted by music director Leon Botstein and featuring Concerto Competition winners at the Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College tonight and Saturday at 8 p.m. The program includes Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 4; Erich Wolfgang Korngold’s Violin Concerto in D Major; and Carl Reinecke’s Flute Concerto.
Barnstar!, an all-star collective of bluegrass and roots-music talent, will celebrate the release of its new album, "Sit Down! Get Up! Get Out!," at Club Helsinki Hudson tonight at 9 p.m. Using the familiar tools of the genre, Barnstar! forges its own brand of song-based bluegrass, gloriously harmonized and raucously played. The group includes bassist Zachariah Hickman, singer-guitarist Mark Erelli, fiddler Jake Amerding, mandolinist Taylor Armerding, and banjoist Charlie Rose.
“Small Works,” an exhibition of artworks by more than 50 contemporary American and international artists working in a small format -- under 20 inches – is on display at Limner Gallery on Warren Street in Hudson now through February 21. All media and styles are represented in the eclectic exhibition.
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