A highly selective preview of cultural events taking place this weekend in the greater Hudson, N.Y., region, including sports-inspired modern dance; a celebration of Chopin; a cello-piano duo; abstract art; and more.
Anna Bass and Monica Bill Barnes
MONICA BILL BARNES & CO. PREVIEWS NEW DANCE at PS21
(CHATHAM, N.Y.) – Monica Bill Barnes & Company performs a two-night preview performance of “One Night Only (running as long as we can)” at PS21 on Friday and Saturday, August 18 and 19, at 8pm. The evening-length work, part of PS21’s Chatham Dance Festival and which draws on sports competitions for inspiration, features Barnes and her longtime dance partner Anna Bass.
Frances McDormand and Suzzy Roche in ‘Early Shaker Spirituals’ (photo Paula Court)
FRANCES McDORMAND and SUZZY ROCHE to PERFORM at SHAKER MUSEUM GALA
(NEW LEBANON, N.Y.) – Frances McDormand and Suzzy Roche, a member of the celebrated experimental theater collective The Wooster Group, will perform at the Shaker Museum | Mount Lebanon gala on Saturday, August 19. McDormand and Roche, along with director Kate Valk, will present an excerpt from Early Shaker Spirituals: A Record Album Interpretation, a performance based on the record album of the same name recorded by the Sisters of the Sabbathday Lake, Maine, Shaker Community in 1976.
Early Shaker Spirituals: A Record Album Interpretation premiered at The Performing Garage in New York City in 2014. The New York Times called the performance “profoundly affecting…. a kind of phantasmal possession of the present by the past or, if you prefer, the eternal.”
Inbal Segev (photo Dario Acosta)
INBAL SEGEV and ALON GOLDSTEIN to PERFORM at TANNERY POND
(NEW LEBANON, N.Y.) – Cellist Inbal Segev and pianist Alon Goldstein will perform works by Brahms and Dvorak in the Tannery Pond Concerts series at the Tannery on the grounds of Mount Lebanon Shaker Village and Darrow School on Saturday, August 19, at 8pm. The program explores the relationships among these Romantic composers and the ways in which they influenced each other – as friends and as mentors. The duo will also perform Ravel’s Kadish in memory of Leslie Teicholz — long-time president and board chair of Tannery Pond — who passed away in 2015.
The program includes Brahms’ Sonata in F Major and Six Songs, Dvorak’s Rondo Op. 94, and solo piano works by Liszt/Wagner.
Orion Weiss
BARD MUSIC FESTIVAL CELEBRATES ALL THINGS CHOPIN
(ANNANDALE-on-HUDSON, N.Y.) – Polish composer Fryderyk Chopin, who transformed the aesthetic potential of the piano, will be celebrated at the Bard Music Festival, running for two weekends (August 11-13 and August 18-20) in the Fisher Center at Bard College. Twelve themed concert programs will be complemented by pre-concert lectures, panel discussions, two special events, and expert commentary.
Jenny Nelson, Bend, 2017
ABSTRACTIONS EXHIBITION OPENS at CARRIE HADDAD GALLERY
(HUDSON, N.Y.) – Abstractions, a new multi-artist exhibition featuring works by Jenny Nelson, Stephen Walling, Juan Garcia-Nunez, Bruce Murphy, Christopher Engel, Joe Wheaton, and John Griebsch goes on view at Carrie Haddad Gallery on Wednesday, August 9, and runs through Sunday, September 24. A reception for the artists takes place on Saturday, August 12, from 5 to 7pm.
The exhibition features new abstract paintings by Jenny Nelson; 3-D wooden wall sculpture by Stephen Walling; a new series of abstract watercolors by Juan Garcia-Nunez; enamel sheet metal paintings by Bruce Murphy; gestural abstract paintings by Christopher Engel; and oxidized metal sculpture by Joe Wheaton. The upstairs gallery will feature aerial landscape photography by John Griebsch.