The Rogovoy Report: Berkshire & Hudson Valley Cultural Preview

Oct 17-20, 2024

Oct 16, 2024

With so much going on culturally speaking in our greater Berkshires/Hudson Valley region, this is my highly selective, curated snapshot of some of the most promising upcoming events …

PHILIP GLASS ENSEMBLE BRINGS ‘KOYAANISQATSI’ to MASS MoCA

The Philip Glass Ensemble performs Glass’s score live alongside a screening of the cinematographic masterpiece Koyaanisqatsi, produced and directed by Godfrey Reggio, in the Hunter Center at MASS MoCA in North Adams, Mass., on Saturday, October 19, at 8pm. Reggio’s pioneering art film, without dialogue or narrative structure, is a unique and haunting look at the super-structure of modern life, integrating images, music, and ideas contrasting scenes from America’s natural and urban landscapes. Glass’s score is the perfect sonic equivalent to Reggio’s viewscape. (Sat, Oct 19)

Walton Goggins as Baby Billy Freeman in ‘The Righteous Gemstones’

FILMCOLUMBIA 2024 HONORS WALTON GOGGINS

The twice Emmy-nominated actor Walton Goggins -- who has recently been filming the much-anticipated third season of White Lotus -- will be honored by FilmColumbia – based at the Crandell Theatre in Chatham, N.Y. -- with screenings of many of his works. Goggins has acted in some 50 films and 49 TV series and is the star of the 2024 film The Uninvited, written and directed by his wife Nadia Conners. The festival will screen The Uninvited (Sat, Oct 19, 7:30pm), Quentin Tarantino’s The Hateful Eight (Sun, Oct 20, 11:30am) and the season finales of The Shield (FX) and The Righteous Gemstones (HBO) (Sun, Oct 20, 3pm). Goggins will take part in a Q&A on Sunday after the screenings. (Sat, Oct 19-Sun, Oct 20)

STEVEN SANTORO BRINGS MODERN SONG-CYCLE to THE FOUNDRY

Composer-vocalist Steven Santoro brings his contemporary song cycle for string quartet and voice, here. gone., to the Foundry in West Stockbridge, Mass., on Saturday, October 19, at 7:30pm. The songs, originally recorded with the Turtle Island Quartet and now played by Santoro's own quartet, are loosely connected as a journey through life, love, and loss. (Sat, Oct 19)

HARPSICHORD FESTIVAL CONCLUDES in STOCKBRIDGE

Elliot Figg and Caitlyn Koester play Skeletons of the Opera, a concert of Baroque opera transcriptions for harpsichord, to conclude Berkshire Bach Society’s Harpsichord Festival at Saint Paul’s Episcopal Church in Stockbridge, Mass., on Saturday, October 19, at 4pm. Works include Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas and Handel’s Opera Overtures. (Sat, Oct 19)

George Harrison author Seth Rogovoy (photo Franco Vogt)

SETH ROGOVOY to READ FROM and SIGN COPIES of NEW GEORGE HARRISON BOOK

Fresh on the heels of the publication of his new book, Within You Without You: Listening to George Harrison, Seth Rogovoy will be appearing at several book events in the region, including The Bookstore in Lenox, Mass., on Sunday, October 27, at 4pm; the Chatham Bookstore in Chatham, N.Y., on Sunday, November 3, at 5pm (in conversation with Elena Siyanko, director of PS21: Center for Contemporary Performance), and at Upstate Films/Orpheum Theatre in Saugerties, N.Y., on Sunday, November 17, at 2pm (in conversation with rock biographer Holly George Warren and author/musician Robert Burke Warren, who will play a few George Harrison tunes). Beatles expert Kenneth Womack writes in his review for Salon, “Within You Without You accomplishes a rare feat. In a sea of ineffectual biographies devoted to the Beatles’ guitarist, Rogovoy makes a case for Harrison’s most important contribution: the music itself … Rogovoy’s eye towards soberly capturing the history of the Beatles with a welcome dose of critical objectivity makes Within You Without You required reading when it comes to the guitarist. It’s that good.” (Sun, Oct 27; Sun, Nov 3; Sun, Nov 17)

Also of note:

Five-time Grammy Award-winner Robert Cray brings his patented style of modern blues to the Egg in Albany, N.Y., on Thursday, October 17, at 7:30pm.

Grammy-winning Lebanese-American tenor Karim Sulayman joins forces with British-Japanese guitarist Sean Shibe to perform their 2023 Grammy Award-nominated album Broken Branches, which traces their cultural roots, at the Albany Institute of History and Art in Albany, N.Y., on Thursday, October 17 at 7:30pm, in a presentation of Capital Region Classical. The duo will play works by Dowland, Monteverdi, Britten, and others, along with traditional music from the Middle East.

Israeli clarinetist and composer Itay Dayan brings his traditional-sounding klezmer ensemble to the Parlor Room in Northampton, Mass., on Thursday, October 17, at 7:30pm.

Scottish fiddler Alasdair Fraser and Californian cellist Natalie Haas make the case for the natural affinities of their two instruments in Scottish dance music when they perform at the Stationery Factory in Dalton, Mass., on Friday, October 18, at 7:30pm. (Fri, Oct 18)

The China Now Chamber Orchestra and The Bard East/West Ensemble perform AI’s Variation: Opera of the Future-- a science fiction–themed drama for three voices and chamber orchestra -- at the Bard Fisher Center in Annandale-on-Hudson, N.Y., on Friday, October 18, at 7pm.

A jazz quartet comprised of Matt Steckler, Yayoi Ikawa, Lonnie Plaxico, and Tony Lewis bring their Old Friends Beckoned / New Sounds Reckoned program to the Linda, WAMC’s Performing Arts Studio, in Albany, N.Y., on Friday, October 18, at 8pm.

Former Bob Dylan sideman Rob Stoner will be at the Colony Cafe in Woodstock, N.Y., on Saturday, October 19, at 7pm.

At 86 years old and on the verge of retirement, legendary folksinger Tom Paxton brings his farewell tour to the GE Theatre at Proctors in Schenectady, N.Y., on Saturday, October 19, at 7:30pm, in a presentation by the Eighth Step.

The Cantilena Chamber Choir kicks off its 21st season with a program of Coronation Music for Chorus and Brassfeaturing works by Handel, Holst, Purcell, and Andrew Lloyd Webber at Trinity Church in Lenox, Mass., on Sunday, October 20, at 3pm.

The love triangle connecting Robert and Clara Schumann and Johannes Brahms will be explored in seldom-heard works that highlight the musical cross-references and spiritual bond that united them in Drama and Melodrama: The Schumanns, at the Mahaiwe in Great Barrington, Mass., on Sunday, October 20, at 4pm, in a concert presented by Close Encounters with Music.

The West Stockbridge Chamber Players Harvest Concert is an all-Mozart program at the West Stockbridge Old Town Hall in West Stockbridge, Mass., on Sunday, October 20, at 4pm.

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The Rogovoy Report