Lydia Davis
ACCLAIMED AUTHOR LYDIA DAVIS to READ at WILLIAMS
(WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass.) – Short story writer Lydia Davis, winner of the Man Booker International Prize as well as a host of other awards, will read from her works of fiction in Griffin Hall, Room 3, at Williams College tonight (Wednesday, February 18, 2015) at 7pm. The reading is free and open to the public. Her most recent collection, “Varieties of Disturbance,” was published in 2007 and was a finalist for the National Book Award. In 2009, “The Collected Stories of Lydia Davis” was published, containing all of her work up to 2008. Davis is the winner of a MacArthur Fellowship, a Guggenheim Fellowship, and the 2013 Man Booker International Prize.
Playwright Emily Taplin Boyd (photo Jordan Matter)
BARRINGTON STAGE PRESENTS 10 SHORT NEW PLAYS
(PITTSFIELD, Mass.) – Barrington Stage Company’s fourth annual 10×10 New Play Festival – featuring ten, 10-minute plays, as part of the annual 10×10 Upstreet Arts Festival in Pittsfield – runs through Sunday, March 1. Playwrights represented include Chris Newbound, Emily Taplin Boyd, Christopher Innvar, and Kelly Younger. Directors for the 10×10 New Play Festival are BSC artistic director Julianne Boyd and artistic associate and director of new play development Stephanie Yankwitt.
Mark Dion: The Octagon Room
ARTIST MARK DION to SPEAK at MASS MoCA
(NORTH ADAMS, Mass.) – Artist Mark Dion will discuss his career and The Octagon Room, his current installation, in Club B-10 at MASS MoCA on Thursday, February 19, at 5:30 pm. The Octagon Room is a mini-retrospective that is equal parts cabinet of curiosity, Victorian sitting room, and military bunker, from the artist known for his large-scale, intricate, mixed-media interactive installations that merge art, science, history, and archaeology. MASS MoCA curator Denise Markonish, who worked closely with Dion during the installation of The Octagon Room, says, “Mark Dion gives an incredibly engaging artist talk – one of the best I’ve ever heard – touching on subjects such as archaeology, history, museums, and natural science, all with the same irreverent humor found in his work.”
(l-r) Kris Allen, sax; Conor Meehan, drums; Avery Sharpe, bass
AVERY SHARPE, CONOR MEEHAN and JAZZ FACULTY to PLAY ORIGINALS at WILLIAMS
(WILLIAMSTOWN, Mass.) – Musicians who teach jazz at Williams College will offer a Jazz Faculty Concert, featuring all original compositions, in Brooks-Rogers Recital Hall on the Williams College campus on Thursday, February 19, at 8pm. The concert is free and open to the public. The ensemble includes jazz director Kris Allen, saxophonist Mike Kolodny, trombonist John Wheeler, bassist Avery Sharpe, pianist Andy Jaffe, and drummer Conor Meehan.
Bill Mays
PIANIST to OFFER ’10 DECADES of JAZZ PIANO’ at BABA LOUIE’S
(PITTSFIELD, Mass.) – New York City-based pianist Bill Mays will offer a program called “Ten Decades of Jazz Piano” as part of the Pittsfield 10×10 Upstreet Arts Festival on Saturday, February 21, at 8pm, at Baba Louie’s Backroom. The program, a presentation of Berkshires Jazz, takes familiar works by 10 different composers – one per decade over a 100-year span – and reimagines them in Mays’s own inimitable style. Mays’s program surveys jazz’s progression from raggedy honkytonk sounds to the speakeasy era to the swing era to bebop and beyond.
Cynthia Hopkins (photo Jeff Sugg)
CYNTHIA HOPKINS BRINGS NEW ONE-WOMAN SHOW to BARD
(ANNANDALE-on-HUDSON, N.Y.) – Performance artist Cynthia Hopkins brings her newest work, “A Living Documentary,” to the LUMA Theater in the Fisher Center for the Performing Arts at Bard College on Friday, February 20, and Saturday, February 21, at 7:30 pm. “A Living Documentary” is a hilarious and searing reflection on the trials and tribulations of earning a living as a professional theater artist in the 21st century. Intertwining elements of musical comedy, documentary, and fiction, the show intersperses autobiographical storytelling with portrayals of semi-fictional comedic characters, all the while asking myriad questions about the realities of artistic life in New York City.
Jeff Tweedy and Mavis Staples for web
MAVIS STAPLES to BRING SOUL-GOSPEL SOUNDS to HELSINKI HUDSON
(HUDSON, N.Y.) – Mavis Staples, a scion of America’s first family of socially conscious soul-gospel music and a member of the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, brings her contemporary sound, crafted in collaboration with Jeff Tweedy of Wilco, to Club Helsinki Hudson on Sunday, February 22, at 8pm. Even after achieving the status of a living legend for her work with the Staple Singers and her solo achievements, Mavis Staples has enjoyed an entirely new chapter in the past five years since teaming up with Jeff Tweedy for a series of Grammy Award-winning recordings, including 2011’s “You Are Not Alone” and 2013’s “One True Vine.” This is a rare chance to catch this living legend in the intimate confines of a nightclub; she usually performs in large theaters and on festival stages throughout the world.