The weekend highlights in our region include an Afro-funk dance party; Hawaiian-influenced modern dance; a Strauss opera; rockabilly music; a blend of Indian classical and modern Minimalism; and a whole lot more.
Underground System, a collective of Fela Kuti-worshipping musicians based in Brooklyn and fronted by flautist and chanteuse Domenica Fossati, brings its Afro-funk sounds to Courtyard C at MASS MoCA in North Adams, Mass., on Saturday at 8pm. Joining them will be Brooklyn-based brass band Underground Horns. This weekend is also your last chance to visit Nick Cave’s massive site-specific installation “Until” in MASS MoCA’s football-field-sized Building 5 gallery.
PS21 closes its 2017 Chatham Dance Festival with dancer and choreographer Christopher K. Morgan’s solo work “P?haku” (the Hawaiian word for stone), on Saturday and Sunday at 8pm. The piece incorporates the story of Morgan’s own family to reflect on the larger story of Hawaii’s native people, and features live music. Morgan danced hula with his family as a child in California, far from their ancestral Hawaii. As he developed a body of work in modern dance, he longed to connect his Native Hawaiian artistic and personal roots to his contemporary work. “P?haku” explores compelling universal themes in the story of Hawaii’s native people, including land loss and fractured identity.
Last chance to catch the Berkshire Opera Festival’s critically acclaimed staging of Richard Strauss’s “Ariadne auf Naxos” at the Colonial Theatre in Pittsfield, Mass., tonight at 7:30pm. This hilarious “behind-the-scenes” opera explores what happens when a wealthy patron who has commissioned two very different forms of entertainment for an evening finds that time is too short for both, leaving the artistic forces to combine their efforts. The result is a comedic masterpiece set to the exquisitely lush music of Strauss.
If you have visited or live in Hudson, N.Y., over the last 10 years, there’s no doubt that you have wandered past the storefront at 348 Warren St. and wondered just what the heck is it with these “Incident Reports”? Just who is creating them and what are they about? On the 10th anniversary of this ongoing installation, September Gallery promises to “present a framework for looking at Incident Report overall,” revealing who many of the artists are as well as exhibiting new works and an archive of all past 100 projects, in an exhibition opening on Saturday.
Celebrating over a quarter-century of music-making, Big Sandy and His Fly-Rite Boys bring their swinging brand of neo-rockabilly back to Club Helsinki Hudson tonight at 9pm. Hearing Big Sandy instantly puts a listener in mind of early greats like Buddy Holly, Roy Orbison, Buck Owens, Chuck Berry, and, of course, Elvis Presley. Longtime Helsinki favorite Sarah Borges will warm up the crowd with her smoky blend of noir-rock.
The score for Terry Riley’s 1964 minimalist masterpiece “In C” consists of just one page, but it allows for any number of performers in any instrumental combination to perform it. In spirit, Riley’s piece mirrors the raga, the melodic structure of classical Indian music, and no two performances are ever the same. With its repeated patterns and improvisational form, the work can last for several hours or a fraction thereof, to ecstatic and transcendental effect. Therefore it only makes sense that Brooklyn Raga Massive would tackle Riley’s influential piece, which they will do live onstage at Hudson Hall, tonight at 7pm.
Seth Rogovoy is editor of Berkishire Daily and the Rogovoy Report, available online at rogovoyreport.com
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