Brian Brooks Moving Company; photo Matthew Murphy, courtesy of Jacob’s Pillow Dance
BRIAN BROOKS MOVING COMPANY at JACOB’S PILLOW
(BECKET, Mass.) – The dynamic contemporary dance ensemble Brian Brooks Moving Company presents a daring program featuring larger-than-life stage design, bold costuming, and full-out movement in the Doris Duke Theatre at Jacob’s Pillow Dance from Wednesday, July 10 to Sunday, July 14, 2013. Led by choreographer and artistic director Brian Brooks, the troupe will perform four different works by Brooks including BIG CITY, I’m Going to Explode, DESCENT, and excerpts from MOTOR.
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Gordon Gietz plays Jay Gatsby (photo Peter Hurley)
CONTEMPORARY OPERA VERSION of ‘GATSBY’ at TANGLEWOOD
(LENOX, Mass.) – The antidote for Baz Luhrmann’s execrable 3-D film version? John Harbison’s opera The Great Gatsby will be performed by the orchestra and chorus of Boston-based Emmanuel Music on Thursday, July 11, 2013, at 7:30 p.m., in Ozawa Hall, as part of Tanglewood’s 75th birthday tribute to the composer. The concert performance will be led by Emmanuel Music artistic director Ryan Turner and will feature tenor Gordon Gietz as Jay Gatsby and soprano Devon Guthrie as Daisy Buchanan.
CAPITOL STEPS at CRANWELL for 2013 SUMMER SEASON
(LENOX, Mass.) – The award-winning musical satire group Capitol Steps is in its seventh annual summer residency at Cranwell Resort, Spa at Golf Club through September 1, 2013, entertaining audiences with numbers from their latest album, “Fiscal Shades of Gray.” Capitol Steps’ 90-minute shows will be performed in Cranwell’s Olmsted Manor at 8pm, Monday and Wednesday through Saturday, and on Sunday at 3 pm. Cranwell offers pre-show dining from 4:30 to 6:30 at its Wine Spectator Award-winning restaurant in the Gilded Age Mansion. or a casual a la carte menu at Sloane’s Tavern, where diners have the option of outdoor terrace seating with views of the golf course. On Mondays, an “All You Can Eat” BBQ will be served at Sloane’s Tavern from 5 to 8 pm for $29.
CLOSE ENCOUNTERS WITH MUSIC CHAMBER SERIES EXPANDS to THE CLARK
(WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass.) – The dynamic Close Encounters with Music chamber series makes its debut appearance at the Clark with “White Nights,” a program of works by Russian composers Rachmaninoff, Prokofiev, and Tchaikovsky performed by pianist Vassily Primakov and cellist Yehuda Hanani, who is also artistic director of Close Encounters, on Sunday, July 14, 2013, at 3 pm.
Craig Harris
JAZZ AND BARBECUE at THE MOUNT
(LENOX, Mass.) – Never mind tea and crumpets. “Struttin’ with Some Barbecue,” an evening of music and food at The Mount – the historic home of writer Edith Wharton – takes place on Thursday, July 11, 2013, from 5 to 8pm, in conjunction with Lift Ev’ry Voice, the biennial festival celebrating African-American culture and heritage in the Berkshires. The evening features virtuoso trombonist Craig Harris and the Tailgaters, with the Peter Primamore Quartet and the MCLA Allegrettos opening. Food by Mad Jacks BBQ Restaurant in Pittsfield will be available for purchase, or attendees may bring their own picnic supper.
ALLOY ORCHESTRA PERFORMS LIVE SCORE to DOUGLAS FAIRBANKS SILENT CLASSIC ‘BLACK PIRATE’ at MASS MOCA
(NORTH ADAMS, Mass.) – Perennial MASS MoCA favorite and preeminent silent film accompanist Alloy Orchestra will perform a live score to the Douglas Fairbanks classic, The Black Pirate, on Saturday, July 13, 2013, at 8:30pm, at the museum’s brick-lined cinema courtyard, on the largest outdoor movie screen in New England. The band uses a combination of found objects, classical instruments, and state-of-the-art electronics to achieve its avant-garde sound.
WTF FREE THEATRE FEATURES NEW ‘DRACULA’ ADAPTATION, BLOOD DRIVE
(WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass.) – You can be assured of one thing: this play totally sucks. Dracula, or the Un-Dead, a dynamic new stage version of Bram Stoker’s iconic 1897 tale, opens at the Williamstown Theatre Festival’s Free Theatre on Poker Flats Field on the Williams College Campus (weather permitting). The production, adapted by Free Theatre co-founder and WTF veteran Steve Lawson, runs Wednesday, July 10 to Saturday, July 13, 2013, and Tuesday, July 16 to Friday, July 19, at 7:30 p.m. WTF Free Theatre is teaming up with Berkshire Health System Blood Mobile to perform blood drives on July 12th and July 18th from 9 a.m. – 2 p.m. at the ’62 Center for Theatre and Dance.
Stephanie Roth Haberle plays Margarita
ORIGINAL STAGE ADAPTATION of POPULAR RUSSIAN NOVEL PREMIERES at BARD SUMMERSCAPE
(ANNANDALE-on-HUDSON, N.Y.) – An original stage adaptation of Mikhail Bulgakov’s The Master and Margarita, widely recognized as one of the greatest and most beloved Russian novels of the 20th century, will enjoy its world premiere as part of the Bard SummerScape festival in ten performances between Thursday, July 11, 2013, and Sunday, July 21, 2013, in Theater Two of the Frank Gehry-designed Fisher Center, which celebrates its tenth anniversary this year, on Bard’s Hudson Valley campus.
Chris Smither
CHRIS SMITHER to PERFORM at CLUB HELSINKI HUDSON
(HUDSON, N.Y.) – Folk-blues singer-songwriter Chris Smither performs at Club Helsinki Hudson on Saturday, July 13, 2013, at 9pm. Having distilled his own signature sound of blues and folk for over 40 years, Smither is truly an American original. A profound songwriter and virtuoso guitarist, Smither continues to draw deeply from the blues, American folk music, modern poets and philosophers. From his early days as the New Orleans transplant on the Boston folk scene, through his wilderness years, to his reemergence in the 1990s as one of America’s most distinctive acoustic performers, Smither continues to hone his distinctive sound. Opener Milton is a rootsy rock singer-songwriter in a similar vein.
Playwright John Cariani
JOHN CARIANI’S ‘LOVE/SICK’ GETS STAGED READING at MAHAIWE
(GREAT BARRINGTON, Mass.) – Love/Sick, the latest play by Almost, Maine playwright John Cariani, will receive a staged reading by Berkshire Playwrights Lab on Wednesday, July 10, 2013, at 7:30pm at the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center (14 Castle Street, Great Barrington, Mass.). Love/Sick is composed of a series of ten funny, slightly twisted love stories — some gone wrong and others gone right — that explore life, relationships, and mental health in suburbia.
Mike and Ruthy
MILTON, MIKE AND RUTHY at DREAM AWAY LODGE
(BECKET, Mass.) – Milton, the Toy Soldiers, Joe Fletcher, Poor Old Shine, the Dire Honeys and Mike and Ruthy (Michael Merenda and Ruth Ungar) headline Nouveau Revue 4, the fourth annual weekend festival of new, emerging and established music at Dream Away Lodge, taking place Thursday, July 11, through Sunday July 14, 2013. Admission to the festival is free; performers play for tips. Performances begin at 8pm