Socalled
(AMHERST, Mass.) – The fourth annual Yidstock: The Festival of New Yiddish Music opens on Thursday, July 16, at the Yiddish Book Center with an already sold-out concert by the Grammy Award-winning Klezmatics, and runs through Sunday, July 19, when members of all the ensembles featured throughout the festival will form a unique, one-time only superstar outfit, the Yidstock Allstars, in a special program called “More Songs About Shtetls and Food,” with musical direction by Frank London and featuring Socalled, Lorin Sklamberg, Merlin and Polina Shepherd from the UK, and special guest members of the Klezmer Conservatory Band.
Lynn Cohen
‘SEX AND THE CITY’ ACTRESS LYNN COHEN STARS in BSC’S ‘LOST IN YONKERS’
(PITTSFIELD, Mass.) – Lynn Cohen, perhaps best known for her role as Magda in TV’s “Sex and the City,” stars as Grandma Kurnitz in Neil Simon’s Pulitzer Prize-winning comedy “Lost in Yonkers,” running at Barrington Stage Company from Thursday, July 16, through August 1. Winner of the Tony Award for Best Play and the Pulitzer Prize, “Lost in Yonkers” is a heartfelt and hilarious coming-of-age story by America’s great comic playwright, Neil Simon.
Brooklyn Rider
BROOKLYN RIDER to PLAY CONTEMPORARY WORKS at TANNERY POND
(NEW LEBANON, N.Y.) – The normally staid and conservative Tannery Pond Concerts Series loosens up this weekend with an appearance by innovative string quartet Brooklyn Rider at the Darrow School, on Saturday, July 18 at 8pm. In addition to standard repertory by Haydn and Schubert, the quartet will perform contemporary compositions by avant-jazz guitarist/composer Bill Frisell, jazz pianist/composer Vijay Iyer, and Glenn Kotche of indie-rock band Wilco. The sound of things to come?
Villalobos Bros
CONTEMPORARY MEXICAN ENSEMBLE COMING to PS21
(CHATHAM, N.Y.) – The Villalobos Brothers, an ensemble that blends the richness of Mexican folk music with the intricate harmonies of jazz and classical, performs at PS21: Performance Spaces for the 21st Century, on Saturday, July 18, at 8pm. Along with the music, which features “high-octane Mexican fiddling,” the group incorporates theatrical elements into their performance.
Iris Dement
SINGER-SONGWRITER IRIS DEMENT BRINGS COUNTRY-FOLK SOUNDS to HELSINKI HUDSON
(HUDSON, N.Y.) – Singer-songwriter Iris DeMent brings her Grammy Award-nominated country-folk songs to Club Helsinki Hudson on Sunday, July 19, at 8pm. Since her debut in 1992 with “Infamous Angel,” DeMent has been regarded in musical circles as an authentic living legend, the last of fourteen children born in a Pentecostal household in Arkansas, who spent her childhood immersed in gospel and traditional country music.
Meg Hutchinson
FILM SCREENING and GUTHRIE CENTER CONCERT FEATURE MEG HUTCHINSON
(GREAT BARRINGTON, Mass.) – A pair of back-to-back events will showcase the sometimes difficult journey faced by Berkshire-born-and-raised singer-songwriter Meg Hutchinson, who is the subject of a documentary film screening at the Triplex on Thursday, July 16, at 7pm and who performs a solo concert at the Guthrie Center on Friday, July 17, at 8pm.