Pick of the Day 7/23: Leave No Trace
Amherst Cinema is just a gold mine. No, really, their film curation is the bee’s knees. And my pick, once again, can only be found in the dark. Leave No Trace is the story of a father and his daughter who have lived off the grid for some time. They make their home in the forests of Portland, Oregon. When an event disrupts their private and idyllic world, they are both shuttled through the social service maze. Unable to live in...
Local Calendar: Monday 7/23 – Wednesday 7/25
MONDAY 7/23 MUSIC Bang on a Can Summer Music Festival 2018: MASS MoCa, 1040 MASS MoCA WAY, North Adams. Kitchen Jam – Local Music Rocks! Concert: 6:30 p.m. – 7:30 p.m. 2nd performance of our Local Music Rocks! Concert Series. Happening rain or shine!! Free. Emily Williston Memorial Library, 9 Park St., Easthampton. 413-527-1031. slevine@ewmlibrary.org. Monday Night Music – Jazz Duo Steve Kurtz and Dan Belmont: 7...
Pick of the Day 7/22: The Southern Vermont Dance Festival
The Southern Vermont Dance Festival 2018 is all day today! From 8 a.m. – 8 p.m. Take your pick of over “113 dance classes, two Galas at the Latchis, an outdoor Promenade Performance and picnic, two Informal Showings, and lots of free community events!” The event includes both free and ticketed events. Now that sounds like a good day! The River Garden, 157 Main St.,...
Pick of the Day 7/21: Lempicka at the Williamstown Theatre
Williamstown is definitely one of the places to be this summer if you love the stage! And one of my favorite artists is the inspiration for Lempicka, a world premiere musical. Tamara de Lempicka was a war time painter who created beautiful (and frosty) portraits of aristocrats and others. Her Art Deco style is beautiful and her story is compelling. Lempicka and her husband fled the Russian revolution and she turned to painting to...
Christa Joy on the Valley Advocate Sessions Stage
Christa Joy is a local singer-songwriter who writes bittersweet country folk songs about everyday life and impermanence. Watch her Valley Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Christa...
Local Calendar: Thursday 7/19 to Sunday 7/22
THURSDAY 7/19 MUSIC A Little Night Music: 6 p.m. – 8 p.m. Trinity United Methodist Church will present “A Little Night Music” every Thursday during the month of July at 6:00pm. Free. Free, donations accepted for all food items. Trinity United Methodist Church, 361 Sumner Ave, Springfield. 413-737-5311. Amherst Downtown Beats – Mister G and In The Nick of Time: 6 p.m. – 8 p.m. Grammy-award winning entertainer Mister G...
Pick of the Day 7/20: Valley Music Showcase
This Friday, the Valley Music Showcase will feature original local bands live onstage in a variety of genres as they compete for prizes such as recording time or a slot on our own Valley Advocate Sessions. The special guest for the evening is Advocate Sessions alumnus, psych blues rock group Old Flame. Contestants include indie pop band Moxie, alt country group Matchstick Architects, alternative rock band Auguste and Alden,...
Pick of the Day 7/19: The Beggar’s Opera Cabaret
Tonight at Eastworks in Easthampton is Gina Kaufmann’s intimate adaptation of a comedy from 1728. The production is a retelling of John Gay’s The Beggar’s Opera, which satirizes operatic conventions, gender, and class with a three-woman cast. The production runs from July 19 to 21 at 7 p.m. at 116 Pleasant St., in the west end event space at Eastworks in Easthampton....
VIDEO: Christa Joy on Valley Advocate Sessions Friday
Christa Joy is a singer-songwriter who writes bittersweet country folk music with songs about everyday life and impermanence. Check out a short video teaser of Christa Joy’s upcoming Valley Advocate Sessions performance available online this...
Pick of the Day 7/18: Shakespeare Under the Stars: Othello
Shakespeare’s Othello is a remarkable play that hinges upon (gulp) racist stereotypes. Othello is, after all black, and his wife Desdemona is white. Her father is none too happy and it doesn’t help that Othello’s standard bearer, Iago, is a master at stirring the racist pot. There’s a lot of charged language in this play that sounds much prettier in Elizabethan English than in current slang, but the damage is...
Evolution of a Star: Dwight Pogue’s retrospective at Smith College Museum of Art
Printmaker and Smith College art professor Dwight Pogue is retiring and he’s having quite a send off. His opus, if you will, is called Flowering Stars and is on view at The Smith College Museum of Art. Pogue’s collection is a retrospective of his lithographs and screenprints over almost 40 years at Smith College, and it’s something to behold. ; and his changing styles are evident from the samples taken from his portfolio between the...
Pick of the Day 7/17: Through the Looking Glass…and What Alice Found There at The Majestic
Probably the best thing about summer is there are no school buses to ruin my commute to work. With that said, that means all the little minions are pulling at somebody’s pants legs lamenting the lack of activity on a steamy July day. I’m here to solve that problem: Majestic Theater in West Springfield has a children’s theater program. Yep, and today Through the Looking Glass…and what Alice Found There is on...
Pick of the Day 7/16: Leaning Into the Wind: Andy Goldsworthy
Just in case you missed the memo: It’s going to be hot and humid. Surprise. The best way to beat the heat (besides a water park) is the movies. So let’s go indoors for our pick and immerse ourselves in some culture. Andy Goldsworthy is a British sculptor who creates transient, ephemeral site-specific works that have earned him accolades and honors including the O.B.E. (the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire). ...
Local Calendar: Monday 7/16 – Wednesday 7/18
MONDAY 7/16 MUSIC AMHERST JAZZ ORCHESTRA: July 16, 7:30 p.m. – 10 p.m. With vocalist Ethel Lee. Great food. Union Station Grand Ballroom, 125A Pleasant St., Northampton. 413-253- 1607. info@amherstjazzorchestra.com. Bang on a Can Summer Festival 2018: July 16, MASS MoCa, 1040 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams. STAGE/FILM/DANCE Artney Jackson: July 16, Williamstown Theatre Festival, Williamstown. TUESDAY 7/17 MUSIC Bang on a Can Summer...
Pick of the Day 7/15: Three Identical Strangers at Amherst Cinema
Oh boy, I’ve been waiting for this one! This doc is so scathing and mind boggling, you’ll be thinking about it for some time. And Tim Wardle’s documentary Three Identical Strangers is described “as the most amazing, incredible, remarkable true story ever told.” Here goes: Identical triplets are separated at birth and adopted by three different families. Somehow two of them find each other on a college campus....
Pick of the Day 7/14: Bang on a Can Summer Music Festival
The Bang on a Can Summer Music Festival at MASS MoCA is a week of innovative music making dedicated entirely to “adventurous” contemporary music. For three weeks composers will have their new works performed, and musicians will perform in ensembles sitting alongside their teachers. The Festival includes daily performances in the museum galleries (free with museum admission) and culminates in a six-hour Marathon Concert...
House Sparrow on the Valley Advocate Sessions Stage
House Sparrow is an indie pop duo from the Berkshires that combines sleigh-bells and synth. Check out the band’s complete Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with House...
Pick of the Day 7/13: Next Wave Stage at Green River Fest
My buddy Chris Goudreau made this his Staff Pick, so take heed: “Signature Sounds Recordings will continue its Next Wave Stage this year at the 2018 Green River Festival, highlighting up and coming teenage bands across the Pioneer Valley and northern Vermont. The lineup this year includes Amherst-based classic rock influenced band Glass House, indie pop/rock outfit Moxie from Brattleboro, VT, indie rock band Raspberry Jam from...
Pick of the Day 7/12: Artney Jackson at Williamstown Theater Festival
Obie Award winning actor Ray Anthony Thomas brings life to the world premiere of Artney Jackson at the Williamstown Theater Festival through July 22. Artney Jackson is about an African American man who is a respected employee at the local cable company. After 25 years, he has a chance to be manager, but his world is turned upside down when events at home and at the job threaten to derail his ambitions. Will Artney succeed? You’ll have...
Local Calendar: Thursday 7/12 – Sunday 7/15
THURSDAY 7/12 MUSIC Bang on a Can Summer Music Festival 2018: MASS MoCa, 1040 MASS MoCA Way, North Adams. David Krakauer’s Acoustic Klezmer Quartet: 8 p.m. Yiddish Book Center Members: $45, General Admission: $50. Delight in a performance emphasizing the beauty of traditional klezmer dance tunes, ritual songs, and reflective melodies. Yiddish Book Center, 1021 West St., Amherst. 413-256-4900. programs@yiddishbookcenter.org. Greenfield...
Pick of the Day 7/11: The Closet at Williamstown Theater Festival
Matthew Broderick was, of course, Ferris Bueller, but he’s done a lot more than that. He’s a Tony winner and he’s got nominations for Golden Globes and Emmys. He has some cred. So seeing him in The world premiere of The Closet is a HUGE treat! Here’s the plays synopsis from the mouth of those who know best –WTF: “Martin O’Reilly (Broderick) is stuck in Scranton in a dead-end job, his marriage...
VIDEO: House Sparrow on Valley Advocate Sessions Friday
House Sparrow is an electronic indie pop duo with sleigh bells and synth. Check out a teaser of the group’s upcoming Advocate Sessions performance to be released on Friday.
Stagestruck: Exciting new ideas from well-worn material
A new thriller, a boundary-breaking dance form, a classic tragedy, and a dramatic sequel, all on area stages this month, illustrate the creative urge to mold existing materials into new forms. In the Valley, Silverthorne Theater Company presents White, Black and Blue, a new play by Steve Henderson and Will Chalmus. It’s a thriller with a sense of humor, a different kind of mistaken-identity adventure involving an unlikely trio. In the...
Pick of the Day 7/10: Whisper and Shout at Amherst Cinema
Okay, I know this the second movie in a row for picks, but this is special! Amherst Cinema is showing a free screening of Whisper and Shout, a 1988 documentary that explores the East German rock music scene in the late 1980s — on 35 mm! Well-established bands, like Silly, and underground punk rock bands, like Feeling B (some of whose members later joined Rammstein) are a part of this doc. Amherst Cinema’s site says, “it...
Pick of the Day 7/9: Mountain at Amherst Cinema
If you love symphonic music and breathtaking visuals, you’ll love Mountain. Director Jennifer Peedom has combined the two; from Tibet to Australia, Peedom provides an astonishing look at mountaineers, ice climbers, free soloists, heliskiers, snowboarders, wingsuiters and parachuting mountain bikers through the use of drones, Go-Pros, and helicopters. Willem Dafoe narrates samples from British mountaineer Robert Macfarlane’s...
Local Calendar: Monday 7/9 – Thursday 7/12
MONDAY 7/9 MUSIC Monday Night Music – Robert Speth and Jay Letourneau: 7 p.m. – 7:45 p.m. Tilton Library, 75 N Main St., South Deerfield. STAGE/FILM/DANCE The Closet: Williamstown Theatre Festival, Williamstown. ’62 Center for Theatre and Dance. 1000 Main St., Williamstown. TUESDAY 7/10 MUSIC Northampton Jazz Workshop: 7:30 p.m. – 10:30 p.m. $5. NYC and Boston based guitarist Sheryl Bailey will be the guest soloist...
Stagestruck: Compromises and Contradictions in Chester
A poster hanging in the lobby at Chester Theater Company points out common roots and themes connecting Islam, Judaism and Christianity – for example, the Archangel Gabriel figures in all three religions’ core legends. It serves as prelude to the current production, which prowls around issues of faith and heritage in a fractious world. Director Kristen van Ginhoven and a superlative cast have created an arresting rendition of Ayad...
Stagestruck: Masters of Melody, Onstage at BTG
What happens when your music goes out of style? – when the teenagers are swooning over Elvis Presley instead of Frank Sinatra? If you’re Irving Berlin, and it’s Christmas Eve 1956, and the song at the top of the Hit Parade isn’t “White Christmas” but “Hound Dog,” you invite a couple of fellow songwriters over to your Manhattan townhouse to drink, kvetch, and reminisce. That’s the premise for Lee Kalcheim’s charming and tuneful...
Bizarro Briefs
Lay your hands off my moon dust, NASA A woman from Tennessee is proactively suing NASA to keep what she says is a vial of moon dust that astronaut Neil Armstrong gave to her has a gift. Apparently, Armstrong was a family friend who gave her a piece of the moon when she was 10 years old along with an autographed note from the first person to walk on the moon. The woman’s attorney has authenticized Armstrong’s signature through...
Pick of the Day 7/8: Asleep at the Wheel
Western swing band Asleep at the Wheel is swinging through Northampton tonight! The Iron Horse is playing host to the Austin based band that’s been in existence in some form or another since 1970. In that time, they’ve won 9 Grammys. Check them out and close out your weekend with a bang. Iron Horse Music Hall, 20 Center St.,...
Pick of the Day 7/7: Valley Show Girl
You know her, you love her, and you want to support her! Jen Levesque, aka the Valley Show Girl aka the Valley Advocate graphics guru, hosts The Valley Show Girl premiere tonight at 13th Floor Music Lounge. Everybody who’s anybody will be there; she’s lined up a slate of bands sure to please! Check out From The Woods, Arc City Angels, Flathead Rodeo, and Hannah Rose tonight in Florence! 13th Floor Music Lounge at 9...
Emma June on the Valley Advocate Sessions Stage
Emma June is a singer-songwriter who performs folk opera songs on guitar with lush vocal duo harmonies. Check out her full Valley Advocate Sessions performance in the video below. Interview with Emma...
Independent Streak: Against the odds, small book stores are on the rise
Raven Books in Northampton is the quintessential New England used bookstore. Winding stacks of books create a delightful maze that loops in and out of corners. There doesn’t seem to be a square inch of wall that remains unoccupied, and tables of books, live plants, and suspended artifacts makes for a satisfying and unique browsing experience. Raven’s owner Betsy Frederick publishes a simple trifold brochure called Bookstores of the...
Pick of the Day 7/5: It’s the first night of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night
Our fearless leader Dave Eisenstadter went all high brow on his Staff Picks this week and I’m going to defer to him for today’s Pick of the Day. Shakespeare, the bard, is being celebrated in Amherst tonight until Sunday. Here’s what Dave had to say: “Disguises, intrigue, cross-dressing, and cross-gartered stockings are all elements of this Shakespeare comedy that is actually funny. This week, Hampshire...
Local Calendar: Thursday 7/5- Sunday 7/8
THURSDAY 7/5 MUSIC Drop-in Traditional Music Sessions: 6:30 p.m. – 8:30 p.m. $5. Friendly traditional music sessions. Moderate swingy pace. Adults and teens of all skill levels welcome – and not just fiddles. Northampton Senior Center, 67 Conz St., Northampton. fiddlewesternmass@gmail.com. Greenfield Coop Concerts: 6 p.m. – 8 p.m. Featuring Sheryl Stanton, Jim Eagan, Charlie Conant. Energy Park, 50 Miles St., Greenfield....