BAAFF builds on AARW’s more than 45 years of film advocacy, showcasing Asian American experiences and connecting filmmakers with Greater Boston audiences.

October 18 (Emerson Paramount Center)
3:30 p.m. — Chinatown Cha-Cha
6:30 p.m. — Shorts: Drawing Lines

October 24 (Emerson Paramount Center)
3:30 p.m. — Shorts: Families Forged & Found
6:30 p.m. —  Y Vân: The Lost Sounds of Saigon

October 25 (Emerson Paramount Center)
1 p.m. — In Waves

A scene from Edward Said: Between Worlds. Photo: Boston Palestine Film Festival

Boston Palestine Film Festival
October 16–23
Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

The 20th Boston Palestine Film Festival showcases the diverse and creative work of filmmakers exploring Palestinian culture, experience, and narratives.  Arts Fuse review. The MFA screenings are:

• Edward Said: Between Worlds — October 16, at 7 p.m.
• Palestine Shorts: Transitions of the Body and Mind — October 17, at 2 p.m.
• Who Killed Alex Odeh? — October 18, at 2 p.m.
• Chronicles from the Siege — October 23, at 7 p.m.

Boris Karloff as the monster in Frankenstein.

Frankenstein (1931)
October 18, at 2 p.m.
Somerville Theatre, Davis Square

James Whale’s classic, with Boris Karloff as the monster, also owes its power to Herman Rosse’s amazing set designs, Kenneth Strickfaden’s electrical equipment, and Jack Pierce’s iconic creature makeup. The film has long stretches without music that, at this screening, will be enhanced by Jeff Rapsis’s live accompaniment. Presented as part of the Silents, Please! series.

A Land Within
October 18, at 5 p.m.
Goethe-Institut, 170 Beacon Street, Boston

In 1961, a northern Italian region with a German-speaking minority is shaken by a series of separatist bomb attacks. Free spirit Paul wants to escape the narrowness and lack of prospects of his small village and study painting in Munich. When his hard-line brother, Anton, becomes a fugitive terrorist, Paul reluctantly puts his plans on hold to support Anton’s wife, Anna, and their young son on the family’s small farm. As ethnic tensions and police repression grow, Paul is drawn into a downward spiral of violence and toxic masculinity. A Q&A in English with director Michael Kofler follows the screening. The subtitled film is free, but registration is required.

The Art of Adventure
October 21 at 7:30 p.m.
Regent Theater, Arlington

The Art of Adventure is an inspiring and award-winning documentary about the lifelong friendship between world-renowned wildlife artist Robert Bateman and biologist Bristol Foster, now both in their 90s. Armed with a 16mm camera and an artist’s brush and a love of nature they took an epic 1957 journey around the world to view a planet wild and unscarred, wide open and free. Along the way, the film weaves together themes of friendship, mortality, artistic expression, and protection of the natural world. Canadian Filmmaker, Alison Reid, will be present for a post-screening Q&A.

Jimi Plays Berkeley
October 22, at 7:30 p.m.
Regent Theatre, Arlington

Digitally restored and transferred from the original 16mm film, this edition of the 1971 documentary showcases two concerts at the Berkeley Community Theatre on May 30, 1970. It includes more than 15 minutes of newly discovered, previously unseen documentary and performance footage, with renditions of such classic songs as “Voodoo Child (Slight Return),” “Machine Gun,” and “Hear My Train A Comin’” that were not featured in the original film..

GlobeDocs Film Festival
October 23–25: Brattle screenings
Brattle Theatre, Cambridge

The Boston Globe presents its 12th documentary film festival. In addition to the Brattle screenings below, 13 films will be available on demand. See the full festival schedule for screenings at other venues and the virtual lineup.

October 23

• Union Town — 6 p.m.
• Jean-Michel Basquiat — 8:30 p.m.

October 24

• Fork in the Road — 11 a.m.
• All About the Money — 1:30 p.m.
• The Other Side of Memory — 4:30 p.m.
• Give Me the Ball! — 7 p.m.
• A Tape: The American History of Nobuhiko Obayashi’s “House,” followed by a 35mm screening of House — 9:30 p.m.

October 25

• Local Shorts Program — 11 a.m.
• Cut to David — 1:30 p.m.
• The Oldest Person in the World — 4 p.m.
• Playing POTUS — 7 p.m.

Hunted (also known as The Stranger in Between)
October 26, at 7 p.m.
Harvard Film Archive, Cambridge

A shatteringly lyrical film about a fugitive murderer, played by Dirk Bogarde, who drags along an orphaned boy who has witnessed his crime. Occupying a middle ground between Roberto Rossellini and British rubble crime, it won the Golden Leopard at Locarno in 1953.

Preceded by A Diary for Timothy (40 minutes), Humphrey Jennings’s touching docudrama, featuring Michael Redgrave and John Gielgud and loaded with apprehensive humanism. Archival footage of World War II accompanies a voice narrating a cinematic letter to the infant Timothy, explaining why the war was fought and what kind of future awaits him.

A scene from Dziga Vertov’s The Eleventh Year.

Dziga Vertov’s The Eleventh Year, with the Psychedelic Cinema Orchestra
November 1 at 3 p.m.
Somerville Theatre, Davis SquareThis silent Soviet documentary charts the accelerated industrialization and modernization of Ukraine in the years following the October Revolution. Rather than following individual characters or a conventional plot, it depicts workers, mines, factories, and the construction of the Dnieper hydroelectric dam, presenting collective labor as the force building a new socialist society.

The screening features the world premiere of a new score by the Psychedelic Cinema Orchestra, a four-person ensemble led by Ken Winokur, former director, composer, and percussionist for Alloy Orchestra. The group will donate a large percentage of the proceeds to Ukrainian humanitarian relief agencies.

Pick of the Week

In America
Amazon Prime ($2.99); Fandango

A scene from Jim Sheridan’s In America.

Irish filmmaker Jim Sheridan (My Left Foot) draws on his own experiences for In America (2003), a drama about an Irish immigrant family’s struggles in New York City. Samantha Morton and Paddy Considine star as the parents, the latter playing a struggling actor. Sisters Sarah and Emma Bolger are remarkable as their daughters. Djimon Hounsou (Blood Diamond) earned his first Oscar nomination for his portrayal of Mateo, an artist who lives downstairs in the dilapidated Hell’s Kitchen tenement. Initially a vaguely sinister presence, the gravely ill Mateo befriends the daughters on Halloween. Seen through the children’s eyes, he becomes a catalyst for the family’s healing. With stellar performances, this is a brilliant, heartwarming movie that stays with you long after it ends.

— Tim Jackson

Theater

Anthony T. Goss as Johnny and Deannah “DRIPP” Blemur as Avery in the SpeakEasy Stage Company production of Covenant. Photo: Benjamin Rose Photography

Covenant by York Walker. Directed by Dawn M. Simmons. Staged by SpeakEasy Stage at Boston Center for the Arts, at 527 Tremont Street, Boston, through October 17.

The SpeakEasy Stage company describes this drama, centered on Black and queer characters, as a “Southern Gothic thriller about myth-making, moral panic, and the stories people choose when the truth is too inconvenient.” The plot: “Johnny ‘Honeycomb’ James comes back home famous, changed, and impossible to explain. The voice is real, but the rumors are loud. In a town that remembers everything and forgives nothing, his return cracks open old stories and new accusations. Soon no one can agree on what’s true, only on what feels true enough to believe.” Arts Fuse review

The Urmetazoan by Alex Rugman. Directed by Jack Serio. Staged by Barrington Stage Company, 30 Union Street, Pittsfield, MA, through October 25.

“In the not-too-distant future, two sisters contemplate their past together as they get ready for their futures apart as one of them heads to live on Mars. Sisterly bonds are examined and tested to see if they can hold across time and space.” Starring Francesca Carpanini, Julia Chan, Beatrix Flynn-Powell, Justin Mark, and Lyla Randall.

Vanya by Simon Stephens. After Anton Chekhov’s Uncle Vanya. Co-created by Simon Stephens, Andrew Scott, and Sam Yates. Directed by Alan Paul. Staged by Barrington Stage Company, 30 Union Street, Pittsfield, through October 24

“Mark H. Dold stars in this one-man adaptation of Chekhov’s classic tale of love, art, and attempted murder. Comedic and tragic, our shared humanity is thrust into sharp focus in … this fresh adaptation, which explores the kaleidoscope of human emotions.”

Bill Mootos and Julian Hirshfield in the Lyric Stage production of All My Sons. Photo: Benjamin Rose

All My Sonsby Arthur Miller. Directed by Scott Edmiston. Staged by Lyric Stage Company of Boston, 140 Clarendon Street, 2nd floor, Boston, through October 18.

Arthur Miller’s postwar drama and first Broadway success premiered in 1947—before Death of a Salesman or The Crucible or A View from the Bridge. It is one of the most revered and consistently revived of Miller’s plays (see the Arts Fuse review of the 2009 Huntington Theatre Company production); adapted for radio, film, and television; studied and performed in high schools and universities around the world. For some, the play is “more timely than ever.”

For those of you who’ve forgotten or never knew the story, All My Sons is based on a newspaper account of an Ohio manufacturer who, during the Second World War, chose personal gain for himself and his family over responsibility to his country, and shipped defective military equipment to American forces abroad instead of taking a loss by correcting the flaws. His wartime crime was reported to authorities by his own daughter. Miller turned the daughter of this Ohio newspaper into Ann, a prospective daughter-in-law, and imagined a drama, based on Greek tragedy, that centers around willful blindness, loyalty, and betrayal. Miller’s father is driven to suicide by the revelation of his wartime perfidy and his son’s demand that he be “better.” Arts Fuse review

Bouncers by John Godber. Directed by Bill Doncaster. Presented by Visual City LLC and Suffolk University’s Modern Theatre at the Modern Theatre, 525 Washington Street, Boston, through October 24.

A dark comedy set in the ’80s that dramatizes “the escapades of young lads and lasses at a hard drinking disco where ‘there’s sex in the air, and the hunt is on.'”Four bouncers endeavor to illustrate the madness of the throngs that converge on the discotheque–embodying a whirlwind of characters, male and female–in the pulsating debauchery of a typical Friday night.” The script remains a trenchant satire of gender stereotypes, misogynistic language, and sexual aggression.

The Chevalier, conceived, written and directed by Bill Barclay. Staged by the Concert Theatre Works at the Emmanuel Church, 15 Newbury Street, Boston, October 24 and 25.

“This original adaptation of The Life and Music of Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges, is the story of Black violin virtuoso Joseph Bologne’s true friendships with Mozart and Marie Antoinette, and his astonishing and widely unrecognized contribution to the abolition of slavery. Featuring the music of Joseph Bologne, Chevalier de Saint-Georges.

“The Boston premiere features celebrated violinist Brendon Elliott, solo violin and Dr. Karen Walwyn, piano, with Bill Barclay as Chod, Thomas Brazzle as Joseph Bologne, the Chevalier de Saint-Georges, Merritt Janson as Marie Antoinette, and David Joseph as Mozart. The piece also features musicians from The Chamber Orchestra of Boston, led by music director David Feltner, with student string players from Project STEP, a Boston-based non-profit that provides talented young musicians that identify with historically underrepresented backgrounds in Western classical music with comprehensive music instruction.”

Camp Siegfriedby Bess Wohl. Directed by Genée Coreno. Staged by WAM Theatre at the Elayne P. Bernstein Theater, Shakespeare & Company, Lenox, MA, October 16 through November 1.

The timely plot: “It’s 1938 on Long Island, and summer at Camp Siegfried is full of dances, sports, campfires, and camaraderie. Two teenagers meet, fall in love, and experience all the excitement of youth. But the camp is reserved for American youth of German descent, and behind the cheerful activities lurks the dangerous allure of Nazi ideology.”

“As their attraction deepens, so does their indoctrination, revealing how easily charm and ritual can mask the spread of hatred.”

Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird, an adaptation of the eponymous novel, by Aaron Sorkin. Directed by Loretta Greco. Staged by the Huntington Theatre Company production at the Huntington Theatre, 264 Huntington Ave., Boston, through November 8.

The Academy Award–winning writer of The West Wing, A Few Good Men, and Moneyball, Aaron Sorkin’s stage adaptation of Harper Lee’s Pulitzer Prize–winning novel receives its first regional production in Boston. “As Alabama lawyer Atticus Finch defends a Black man falsely accused of rape, the trial tests his moral convictions and forces the community—and the audience—to confront racism, justice, forgiveness, and the distance still to travel.”

A scene from Drama of Works ensemble’s The Four Seasons. Photo: courtesy of the artist

The Four Seasons, written and performed by the Drama of Works ensemble. Directed by Gretchen Van Lente. Designed and built by Kristiana Pärn. Music by Antonio Vivaldi. At the Puppet Showplace Theater, Brookline, October 24 and 25

“Classical music, plus lots of gentle humor, bring to life this beautifully illustrated story of seasonal change and a parent-child relationship.

“Big Fox is only concerned with all the chores that must be done each season. Little Fox only wants to play with Bird. But when winter comes, Bird must fly away. Will Big Fox keep doing chores, or stop and play with Little Fox to cheer him up?

“Set to Vivaldi’s violin compositions of the same name, The Four Seasons invites us to watch through Little Fox’s eyes as the seasons transform—with the help of innovative magnetic sets and charming, bright puppets designed by Estonian illustrator Kristiana Pärn.

“Drama of Works is a New York-based, award-winning puppet theater company that travels the world with its imaginative shows. The Four Seasons is performed with modernist-influenced flat metal puppets—as if picture book illustrations peeled themselves off the page and came to life on stage!—in a contemporary twist on a style of puppetry known as ‘toy theater.'”

Dracula: A Comedy of Terrors by Gordon Greenberg and Steve Rosen. Directed by Christopher V. Edward At the Mosesian Center for the Arts, Watertown, MA, through November 1.

“Join Jonathan Harker, London’s most naive real estate agent, as he clashes with some of the most iconic characters in horror literature: Van Helsing, Renfield, Lucy, and of course, Count Dracula—a hunky, self-obsessed, pansexual, fitness-nut sex icon that would put Edward Cullen to shame. You know, exactly like Bram Stoker wrote.” ASP Resident Actors Doug Lockwood and Bobbie Steinbach will tackle the iconic roles of Jean Van Helsing and Renfield, with Nicholas Papayoanou and Thalia Gerloff rounding out the ensemble.

New and Dangerous Opinions of Roger Williams, written and performed by the Aurea Ensemble. At the Providence Friends Meeting House, 99 Morris Avenue, Providence, on October 18 at 4:30 p.m.; at the Smithfield Friends Meeting House, 108 Smithfield Road, Woonsocket, RI, on October 25 at 12:30 p.m. This will be followed by a 4:30 p.m. performance at the Westerly Friends Meeting House, 57 Elm Street, Westerly, RI.

“The drama is part of the state’s commemoration of the 250th anniversary of the United States. It explores the ideas of Rhode Island’s founder through a distinctive combination of music and spoken word. The program weaves together Williams’s writings and his translations from the Narragansett language with early English and American hymns and music by Henry Purcell, George Frideric Handel, William Byrd, Charles Ives and Barbara Kolb.

“Actors Nigel Gore and Chris Turner bring Williams’s words to life, punctuated by Turner’s evocative harmonica improvisations and music performed by Aurea’s string ensemble.

“Set against the political and philosophical upheaval of colonial America, the program explores Williams’s revolutionary ideas about religious liberty, freedom of conscience, and the separation of church and state, as well as his relationship with the Indigenous people of the region. Ideas considered radical—and even dangerous—in his own time would ultimately become central to the principles on which the United States was founded.”

— Bill Marx

Television

Linda Cardellini in Crystal Lake. Photo: Peacock

Crystal Lake (October 15, Peacock) — Created by Brad Kane (It: Welcome to Derry), this new series is an intriguing prequel to the Friday the 13th franchise, starring Linda Cardellini (Mad Men, DTF St. Louis) as Pamela, the mother of Jason Voorhees. When her teenage son apparently dies in a tragic accident, Pamela refuses to believe he’s gone and clings to the hope of finding him alive. The local sheriff, Levon Brooks (Will Catlett), befriends the grieving Pamela and tries to offer comfort. When dead bodies start turning up, Levon asks his sister Briana (Devin Kessler), a local journalist, to help investigate. I’m not sure we need more prequels and sequels to stories that have already run their course, but following the critical acclaim for Jane Schoenbrun’s indie meta-slasher pic Teenage Sex and Death at Camp Miasma, audiences might be excited enough to tune in.

Swipe Right on the Devil (October 22, Hulu) — This docuseries is based on a missing-persons case involving young women in Nebraska who met a self-proclaimed “witch” (actually a deluded sexual predator) on Tinder. If you’ve ever seen the trilogy of Paradise Lost documentary films co-directed by Joe Berlinger and Bruce Sinofsky, about the 1993 West Memphis murders that sent three innocent teenagers to prison, this new series might feel eerily and maddeningly familiar. As a media critic who’s been writing about the representation of witchcraft and the occult for decades, it is appalling to hear law enforcement discussing “witchcraft” in the mid-2020s drawing on ignorant stereotypes that were used during the 1980s Satanic Panic. The show’s aesthetic and style feel like sensationalist fodder–there are reenactments and manipulative talking-head interviews with the survivors of the “coven.” I will be tuning in and offering a longer review later this month.

The New Stanford Prison Experiment (October 25, Netflix) — This new series is based on a famous psychology experiment conducted by a Stanford University professor in 1971. The story was adapted into a well-received feature film in 2015 starring Billy Crudup and Ezra Miller. Netflix has created a hybrid documentary-reality series using the same experimental structure: 30 volunteers are randomly assigned to be either guards or prisoners in a simulated prison setting. This is sure to be controversial and absorbing.

— Peg Aloi

Visual Art

Yayoi Kusama, Love Is Calling, 2013. Photo: Charles Mayer

I was first taken to the Institute of Contemporary Art by my father, a professor of religion who had an intense interest in the trends of the ’60s, artistic and otherwise. In those days, the ICA maintained an exhibition space overlooking Newbury Street on the ground floor of the New England Life Building (now 501 Boylston). It was a spacious, loft-like commercial space where I remember being fascinated by new media works by Nam June Paik and Bill Viola, both of whom have since had a huge influence on American art.

The ICA moved around. A lot. By the ’70s, I rarely knew where it was, much less what was on display there. Always short of money, space, and public visibility, the organizationally fragile Institute wandered in the wilderness of Boston’s long cultural winter until, in 1973, it landed a permanent home in a former police station at 995 Boylston Street. Renovated to a design by the late Boston architect and collector Graham Gund, the Richardsonian Romanesque Revival building was never a particularly satisfactory container for contemporary art. But it did allow the ICA to stay put for 33 years, easily the most geographically stable period in its history. At least I knew where it was.

The ICA opens 90 Years on October 15 in its landmark Seaport District building, the ICA’s waterfront home since 2006. The show surveys nine exhibitions and initiatives that remind us that, despite often seeming to walk along the edge of oblivion, the museum kept abreast of major developments in contemporary art and design and, not infrequently, was at the forefront of presenting them to the public.

Since its founding in 1936 as the Boston Museum of Modern Art, the “sister” (or, perhaps more accurately, second cousin once removed) to New York’s Museum of Modern Art, the ICA has survived numerous name, place, and mission changes and, most importantly, managed to endure the frosty environment of a city culture that turned from one of the most progressive in America into one of the most regressive and reactionary—one arguably institutionally and politically hostile to modern art right through the end of the 20th century. That it now seems (almost) as established as the venerable Museum of Fine Arts amounts to a major accomplishment in itself.

Alfonso Ossorio, Christ in Limbo, 1950. Watercolor, black ink, and wax on white wove paper. Photo: courtesy of the Harvard Art Museums/Fogg Museum

Born into an affluent family in the Philippines with a mixed Hispanic, native Filipino, and Chinese heritage, Alfonso Ossorio (1916–1990) moved with his family to the United States at age 14. There he studied at Harvard and later at the Rhode Island School of Design. Arriving in New York City just after World War II, Ossorio worked in a Surrealist style at first but soon fell in with the Abstract Expressionists, including Jackson Pollock, whose work he collected. Later, his friendship with French artist Jean Dubuffet led him to develop his “congregations,” mixed-media assemblages. In 1951, on Pollock’s advice, Ossorio purchased a 60-acre estate in East Hampton, Long Island, where he lived and worked for the rest of his life.

The Harvard Art Museums’ Alfonso Ossorio: Line and Lineage, opening October 23, features works and archival materials by this “understudied” artist. Prints, drawings, and wax-resist paintings illustrate his connections to his three major influences: Surrealism, Abstract Expressionism, and Dubuffet.

In 2022, the Museum of Fine Arts acquired, directly from the artist himself, an extensive archive related to Chizo (The Map) along with an original copy of the photobook itself. Published in 1965 by the Japanese photographer Kawada Kikuji, Chizo collages black-and-white images of ruins in postwar Tokyo and Hiroshima to create a landscape without narrative or explanation. The work has been called “one of the most important photobooks in the history of photography.”

Opening on October 24, the MFA’s exhibition Kawada Kikuji: Chizo (The Map) includes images, negatives, notes, and contact sheets from the Chizo collection to evoke the uneasy and ambiguous atmosphere of Japan in the 1960s.

In Constitutive Outside, opening at Harvard’s Carpenter Center on October 22, four artists—Markele Cullins, Jibade-Khalil Huffman, Steffani Jemison, and Rindon Johnson—use screens, installations, and “spatialized viewing situations” to upset the normal relationship between the viewer’s gaze and understanding. Rather than being fixed, the exhibition suggests, interpretation of the visible is always being negotiated and renegotiated because of the limits of representation.

Two exhibitions open on October 23 at MIT’s List Visual Arts Center, which is celebrating its 40th anniversary this year. Uri Aran: Look How Hard They Workis the New York–based artist’s first institutional solo exhibition in the United States. It draws on new work to present panel paintings and welded sculpture based on “the stuff of ordinary life,” from “kitschy keepsakes” to a “mass of piled-up googly eyes.” To follow Aran’s work, the Center says, “is to tinker alongside the artist, to be let in on an invention, or perhaps a shorthand between friends.”

Hao Jingban, I Witness, 2025, Three-channel video installation, 54’41”, Edition of 6 + 2AP. Commissioned jointly by the Han Nefkens Foundation, Mori Art Museum, M+, and Singapore Art Museum. Image courtesy the artist and Blindspot Gallery

Hao Jingban’s first major US exhibition, Hao Jingban: I Witness, centers on the three-channel video installation I Witness (2025), which “takes up the embodied residue of the COVID-19 pandemic.” By following four participants as they move through a well-lit apartment, she creates a work that blends “documentary sensibility with poetic construction.”

Everyone seems to have forgotten that the whole point of remembering the Salem witch trials is that the accused and the executed were not witches but the victims of a vicious conspiracy theory. But innocent victims are probably not the best thing to build a tourist industry on.

We are therefore entering the most intense season for the “Witch City,” with everyone, including the Peabody Essex Museum, crowding into the act before Halloween brings down the curtain. Among other programs, PEM is presenting two screenings of the first movie to adapt Bram Stoker’s Dracula to the screen: the silent era’s horror classic Nosferatu (1922), starring Max Schreck, looking ghastly as Count Orlok. The shows on October 24 come complete with a live performance of the Nosferatu score by the Arpeggione Ensemble on early 20th-century instruments. Screenings take place at 1 p.m. and 7 p.m., with a discussion with the musicians in between at 4 p.m.. Tickets are $40, or $30 for members and Salem residents; preregistration is required.

— Peter Walsh

Jazz

David Eure and Alexei Tsiganov
October 11 at 5 p.m.
Eustis Estate, Milton, MA

In a summer-fall transition, Mandorla Music moves its Eustis Estate concerts from the lawn into the mansion for this show by violinist David Eure and pianist Alexei Tsiganov. The eclectic program, “rooted in the jazz tradition,” will draw on “Brazilian, Latin, soul, R&B, blues, funk, and classical influences.” Eure’s credits include Yuseef Lateef, Taj Mahal, and Wayne Newton. Tsiganov has been a mainstay of the Boston scene since moving from the Soviet Union in 1991, teaching at New England Conservatory, playing with the Either/Orchestra, and gigging with any number of Brazilian-centric jazz bands.

Saxophonist and composer Tia Fuller. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Tia Fuller
October 11 6 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge

Saxophonist and composer Tia Fuller (Berklee teacher and former Beyoncé band member) plays this show, originally washed out by a storm, with a band that includes pianist Shamie Fuller-Royston, bassist Eric Wheeler, and drummer Koleby Royston. The Zeb Jewell-Alibhai Quartet open.

Dave Bryant’s Third Thursdays
October 15 at 8 p.m.
Harvard-Epworth Church, Cambridge

Former Ornette Coleman Prime Time keyboardist Dave Bryant tackles the harmolodic jams this month with saxophonist Tom Hall, drummer (and another Prime Time alumnus) James Kamal Jones, and bassist Rick McLaughlin.

Listen to This: Celebrating 100 Years of Miles Davis
October 16 at 7:30 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge

The long-running Boston band Listen to This makes a specialty of digging into a period of Miles Davis’s career that some of us find his most provocative: 1968-75, from the beginnings of his “jazz-rock” experiments up to his five-year hiatus from performing and recording. The period covered (roughly beginning with Miles in the Sky) eventually spawned several live albums of uncompromising open-form experimentation, with lineups that included Chick Corea and Keith Jarrett on Fender Rhodes, bassists Dave Holland and Michael Henderson, guitarists Pete Cosey and Reggie Lucas, saxophonists Gary Bartz and Sonny Fortune, drummers Jack DeJohnette and Al Foster, percussionist Mtume, and others too numerous to name. Oh, and Miles on his electrified trumpet and fearsome Yamaha keyboard. Listen to This describes itself as “a band of Boston jazz and rock scene regulars who grew up with this music and joyfully revisit their early influences.” They include drummer Jerome Deupree, keyboardist Dave Bryant (see October 15), woodwind player and organist Russ Gershon, percussionist Rick Barry, trumpeter Bryan Murphy, bassist Rick McLaughlin, guitarist J. Johnson, and bass clarinetist Todd Brunel (yo, Bennie Maupin!).

Pierre Hurel Trio
October 17 at 7 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge

The Paris-born transplant Pierre Hurel has long been a Boston-area favorite, bringing a personal lyric introspection to standards like “Stella by Starlight” and “Someone to Watch Over Me” as well as finely wrought originals. (Favorite title: “My Life Is Like a French Movie.”) He’s at the R-bar with longtime trio mates Greg Loughman (bass) and Mike Connors (drums).

Saxophonist, composer, educator, and conceptualist Caroline Davis. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Caroline Davis
October 17 at 8 p.m.
Anderson Auditorium, School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston

The astonishing 45-year-old saxophonist, composer, educator, and conceptualist Caroline Davis gives one of her patented performances for solo saxophone and electronics as part of the Mandorla Music series. With her work mostly previously confined to academia, Davis moved to Brooklyn a little over a dozen years ago and immediately started making inroads in New York’s progressive jazz scene. Her collaborators have included Allison Miller, Lee Konitz, John Zorn, Angelica Sanchez, The Femme Jam, Miles Okazaki, Nicole Mitchell, Rajna Swaminathan, and Matt Mitchell. Her music is as inviting as it is questing and far-reaching.

Charlie Kohlhase (left) with Garrison Fewell and John Tchicai, in an undated photo. Photo: on the Lilypad website

Charlie Kohlhase’s Explorers Club
October 18 at 6:30 p.m.
Lilypad, Cambridge

Charlie Kohlhase had a long musical relationship with the late John Tchicai (1936-2012), including a sublime trio with the late guitarist Garrison Fewell, and Kohlhase regularly includes Tchicai compositions in his set. Tonight, in preparation for a recording of Tchicai’s work, Kohlhase has assembled an expanded edition of his Explorers Club. The program will include pieces from Tchicai’s days in the ’60s with the New York Contemporary Five and the New York Art Quartet, “as well as music from the ’70s, ’80s, ’90s and aughts.” The band will include Kohlhase, Seth Meicht, and Brian Price on reeds; Daniel Rosenthal on trumpet and flugelhorn; Bill Lowe on bass trombone and tuba; Aslan Islamov and Josiah Reibstein on tubas; guitarist Eric Hofbauer; vibraphonist and percussionist Dylan Jack; Tony Leva on bass and sintir; and drummer Curt Newton.

Christian McBride and Ursa Major
October 21 8 p.m.
Berklee Performance Center, Boston

The undeniably great bassist Christian McBride brings his jazz-funk outfit, Ursa Major, to the Berklee Performance Center for this Vivo Performing Arts (formerly Celebrity Series of Boston) presentation. The crazy-good band includes tenor saxophonist Nicole Glover, guitarist Ely Perlman, pianist/keyboardist Mike King, and drummer Savannah Harris.

Danilo Pérez PanaMonk Trio
October 22 at 8 p.m.
Groton Music Center, Groton, MA

Visionary pianist, composer, and educator Danilo Pérez celebrates the 30th anniversary of his breakthrough album PanaMonk, combining the Afro-Latin rhythms of his native Panama with the sui generis inventions of jazz holy man Thelonious Monk. Joining Pérez are his longtime trio partners Ben Street (bass) and Adam Cruz (drums).

Mehmet Alí Sanlíkol Quintet
October 22 at 7:30 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge

The fine composer and multi-instrumentalist Mehmet Alí Sanlíkol continues to explore the byways of the microtonal scales of his Turkish heritage with his jazz and classical education. (His most recent album, The Electric Oud Man Speaks, assayed electric-oud blues rock with jazz-improv explorations laced with Turkish makam scales.) For this show Sanlíkol will play oud, piano, and the Renaissance 17 device he invented to explore microtones. And he’ll sing. The band includes rising-star saxophonist Edmar Colón (see October 24), bassist James Heazlewood-Dale, drummer George Lernis, and Mark Tipton on trumpet and flugelhorn.

Pianist Joe Block. Photo: Gilberto Tadday/Jazz at Lincoln Center

Joe Block Quintet
October 23 at 7 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge

Back in June, guitarist Kurt Rosenwinkel brought a killer quintet to the Regattabar to play his tunes. Now the pianist from that gig, Joe Block, is back with his own quintet. Their new album of Block’s original material, There’s Always Hope, does not disappoint: post-bop, post-Kurt swing and grooves, with fresh harmonies everywhere, and plenty of chops and thoughtful forward drive leavened with inviting introspection. Block is joined by trumpeter Noah Halpern, saxophonist Dylan Band, bassist Sam Harris, and drummer Miguel Russell.

Dafnis Prieto Sí o Sí Quartet
October 24 at 7 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge

The Cuban percussionist and composer Dafnis Prieto just blew up (in a good way) the Harvard community (and those non-Harvardians fast-footed enough to scoop up one of the free tickets) in a show at Paine Hall with the collective supergroup trio of himself, Vijay Iyer, and sage Henry Threadgill. Here Prieto leads his own long-running quartet Sí o Sí with saxophone and flute man Peter Apfelbaum, pianist Martin Bejerano, and bassist Ricky Rodríguez.

Pianist Tim Ray. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Tim Ray Trio with Edmar Colón
October 24 at 7 p.m.
Scullers Jazz Club, Boston

Boston audiences knew about the invaluable pianist and composer Tim Ray long before he became Tony Bennett’s pianist and musical director. The young saxophone phenom Edmar Colón joins Ray and his trio with bassist Ehud Ettun and drummer Mark Walker.

Aardvark Jazz Orchestra
October 24 at 7:30 p.m.
Church of the Covenant, Boston

Aardvark opens its 54th season with a typically thoughtful and relevant program celebrating America250: Chester (1770) by Boston composer William Billings, “evoking the beginnings of our democracy,” followed by works from Aardvark founder and music director Mark Harvey:  The Journey (“commemorating the struggle for desegregation in Boston schools from the 1850s to the 1970s and beyond”); Of the People (for Lincoln and the Civil War); Passione (“evoking the story of immigrants in America”); No Walls (Aardvark’s anthem of inclusivity); and Peace, Goodwill. You can also expect a celebration of the centennials of both John Coltrane and Miles Davis “with the rarely heard ‘Miles’ Mode,’ Coltrane’s tribute to Davis.”

— Jon Garelick

— Noah Schaffer

R&B

Don Was & the Pan-Detroit Ensemble playing live. Photo: Jeff Dunn

Don Was & the Pan-Detroit Ensemble
October 16 at 8:30 p.m.
The Sinclair, Cambridge
October 17 at 8 p.m.
Groton Music Center, Groton, MA

The musician Don Was is renowned for a slew of high-profile production credits (The Rolling Stones, Bonnie Raitt, Bob Dylan, Willie Nelson, etc., etc.) and, for his presidency of revered jazz label Blue Note Records (since 2011), but some folks may remember the rock-and-soul revue Was (Not Was),  with his “brother” David (actually his pal David Weiss), back in the ’80s. Now Don has a new band in the same vein, the Pan-Detroit Ensemble, and it cooks. Their most recent disc, from last year, is Groove in the Face of Adversity, with another due in November. You can find more details in Scott McLennan’s Fuse interview feature with Was and check the band out at two Boston-area shows.

— Jon Garelick

Roots and World Music

Providence-based multi-instrumentalist and scholar Jake Blount. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Jake Blount Band
Oct. 14
Club Passim, Cambridge

Providence-based multi-instrumentalist and scholar Jake Blount has made his name as one of his generation’s most engaging practitioners of old-time string band music, including—but certainly not limited to—the Black string band tradition. Blount is signaling that his new and excellent album Single-Footing Horse is his final old-time record. But, before he reveals what his new direction will be, he’s touring for the album with an all-star band that includes one of his banjo mentors, Cathy Fink. At press time, tickets were nearing single digits.

MC Lyte
Boston City Winery
Oct. 15

The Rock & Roll Hall of Fame is oft-maligned, but sometimes it gets it right. A case in point is next month’s induction of female hip-hop pioneer MC Lyte as a Musical Influencer. It’s a case of someone getting their flowers while they’re here: Lyte is still delivering high-energy shows of hits and history, usually backed by both a DJ and a live drummer.

Brazilian Night feat. Ian Coury & Friends
Oct. 15
Arrow Street Arts, Cambridge

The flashy Brazilian mandolinist Ian Coury spent a number of years gracing Boston stages. Now he’s back for the night, part of an intriguing trio with two local jazz greats: drummer Bertram Lehmann and keyboardist Maxim Lubarsky.

Bluesman Jerron Paxton Photo: courtesy of the artist

Jerron Paxton and Dennis Lichtman
Oct. 21
Shalin Liu Performance Center, Rockport, MA

Jerron Paxton seems to have abandoned his (inaccurate) nickname “Blind Boy,” but he remains one of the great practitioners of early blues, rags, and hollers. He’ll be joined for this duo show by another fine multi-instrumentalist, Dennis Lichtman. The evening is a free community event with advance reservations available.

Alash
Oct. 22
Pickman Hall, Longy School of Music, Cambridge

Here’s another free-with-reservations indoor show, this time with the Tuvan throat-singing trio Alash, whose otherworldly singing and tales of Central Asian horse culture were a big hit at the most recent Lowell Folk Festival. And, if you miss this appearance, there’s yet another Cambridge visit from the group coming up in January, when they come to Global Arts Live’s soon-to-open venue, The Platform.

Jim Kweskin and Samoa Wilson
Oct. 24
Club Passim, Cambridge

The leader of the Cambridge folk jug band that energized and humorously defied the serious “folk scare” revival of the ’60s is a very vigorous 84 and is still making vibrant music. Next month he’s releasing an epic (and delightful) 18-track record called  A Songster’s Journey, which is chock-full of the early blues, jazz, and country he’s been exploring for decades. It includes “Would You Like to Play the Guitar?,” a Pat Donahue-created send-up of “Swinging on a Star” that has long been a staple of Kweskin’s live shows. For this date, Kweskin will be joined by one of his longtime collaborators, the sweet singer Samoa Wilson.

Sol y Canto will perform “Songs of Defiance and Hope.” Photo: courtesy of the artist

STAND UP! RESIST! — Songs of Defiance and Hope with Sol y Canto & special guests Chris and Meredith Thompson
Oct. 24
First Church Belmont

The Arts Fuse‘s editor often asks how artists are—or aren’t—engaging with the current state of affairs. Happily, the Boston music scene does not have its head in the sand. There’s the monthly Which Side? protest music teachout, which returns to the Burren on Oct. 27. Before that comes this pre-midterms evening hosted by Boston’s masters of pan-Latin song, Sol y Canto. Leaders Rosi and Brian Amador have long drawn from the socially conscious song tradition known as nueva canción. There is no doubt some of those inspiring and outspoken anthems will be part of this evening, which also includes fellow folk duo Chris and Meredith Thompson. Proceeds go to the Boston Immigration Justice Accompaniment Network and its Beyond Bond and Legal Defense Fund.

— Noah Schaffer

Rock, Indie, and Alternative

Roger C. Miller. Photo: Jesse Kreizer.

Roger C.  Millerwith Chris Brokaw and Beth Kaplan
October 14 (doors at 7)
Deep Cuts, Medford

Roger C. Miller is an original and lifelong member of the seminal Boston post-punk quartet Mission of Burma. The limited and sporadic (but hugely influential) nature of that band’s output has afforded him the opportunities to work in numerous, often experimental/avant-garde musical contexts that have effectively utilized his multi-instrumentalist talents and visual artist mindset. His latest collection of material, The Green Man, arrived on September 18, swiftly on the heels of last year’s Curiosity for Solo Electric Guitar Ensemble, of which The Arts Fuse’s Scott McLennan wrote a stellar review. Reviewers of The Green Man have praised it for “evoking images of a barren and dystopian landscape” (WIRE), Miller’s “bottomless imagination” (POP Matters), and its “sonic surrealism” (Premier Guitar). Miller will celebrate his latest creation at Deep Cuts on October 14.

Neko Case with Destroyer
October 14 (show at 7:30)
Shalin Liu Performance Center, Rockport
October 15 (show at 7:30)
Cary Hall, Lexington

Veteran musician Neko Case (click for my recent Arts Fuse interview) has been pairing her otherworldly voice with lyrics of all poetic varieties for three decades. While last year’s Neon Grey Midnight Green could be called the best of her career, the same could be said of any number of her previous efforts. Whatever the case (wink), it is an exceptional addition to an already exceptional catalog, and she will draw significantly from it on in Rockport and Lexington this week. That her erstwhile New Pornographers bandmate Dan Bejar – aka Destroyer (here is my 2018 Arts Fuse interview) – is the opener will make these shows a real treat for fans of all the involved artists.

The Suitcase Junket
October 15 with Ciarra Fragale (doors at 7 / show at 8)
October 16 with Julia Read(doors at 7 / show at 8)
Lizard Lounge, Cambridge

Matt Lorenz is the mastermind of The Suitcase Junket, who added To Go On to its discography on October 2. The songs were inspired by the 2022 death of Matt’s sister, Kate, with whom recorded several albums as member of Rusty Belle. Describing the depth to which her presence what felt, Lorenz said, “Kate’s more on my mind than she ever would have been if she were alive, so there’s something sweet in that sadness.” To Go On will receive a warm public welcome via back-to-back nights at Lizard Lounge on the 15 and 16.

The Tubs with Mopar Stars
October 16 (doors at 7)
Deep Cuts, Medford

I have eagerly awaited new material from The Tubs ever since I first heard 2023’s Dead Meat. 2025’s Cotton Crown also delivered more of the occasionally vicious jangle pop goods in the most satisfying manner possible. Thankfully, the self-described “Celtic jangle boyband” didn’t keep me waiting too long by delivering Hard Life in September. This LP finds Owen Williams and his mates offering up more songs than ever without losing any oomph. Williams’s voice and delivery still unmistakably recall Richard Thompson, and the comparisons don’t stop there. Williams sounds not unlike the master when he describes his own lyrics in this way: “I’m interested in the way sympathy and patience for someone suffering always runs out eventually.” This comes from someone who has done his share of suffering. Heck, I can’t help but see a young RT when I watch Owen, and the guitarist is wearing a Fairport Convention T-shirt in this video.

Finally, Hard Life amplifies the “Celtic” portion of their self-description with its inclusion of a fiddle player, who figures prominently on the single “Stoop To Me”. The last time I saw The Tubs live was at Deep Cuts. I suggest that you do the same when they return there on October 16. I also recommend that you arrive in time for Mopar Stars, a lively, energetic Philly quartet who released Official Researchers of the NJ Devil in July.

The Jayhawks with Joe Pernice
October 24 (show at 8)
Shubert Theatre (Boch Center), Boston

The Folk Americana Roots Hall of Fame is presenting The Jayhawks 40-year anniversary tour show at Shubert Theatre on October 24. Their new release, Sanctuary Park, was produced by Bob Ezrin, a platinum-résuméd veteran whose credits include Pink Floyd, Alice Cooper, Peter Gabriel, Lou Reed, The Jayhawks’ 2000 LP Smile, and, yes, Taylor Swift (Speak Now World Tour – Live). For such a quintessentially American band, Sanctuary Park bears many traces of the Great White North. The title is the name of an actual place near Hamilton, Ontario, Gary Louris and his bandmates recorded the album at Ezrin’s Toronto studio, and Louris’s wife is a native Canadian. However, songs like “Mr. Lincoln” and “American Midnight” demonstrate that the quartet has not strayed too far from its geographical roots. “Keeping Our Heads Above Water” kicks off the album, serves as the lead single, and demonstrates that sweet sing-along pop is just one of the many fortes that have kept The Jayhawks afloat for four full decades.

— Blake Maddux

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Classical Music

Composer Carlos Simon introduces Fate Now Conquers in 2024 at Tanglewood. Photo: Hilary Scott

Hahn & Parker Woods play Carlos Simon
Presented by Boston Symphony Orchestra
October 15 at 7:30 p.m., 16 at 1:30 p.m., and 17 at 8 p.m.
Symphony Hall, Boston

Violinist Hilary Hahn and cellist Seth Parker Woods team up for BSO composer chair Carlos Simon’s Double Concerto Suite. Andris Nelsons conducts additional works by Tchaikovsky.

Ax plays Mozart
Presented by Music Worcester
October 16, 8 p.m.
Mechanics Hall, Worcester

Emanuel Ax joins The Knights for a pair of Mozart piano concertos, Nos. 17 and 25. The conductor-less ensemble also assays Joseph Bologne’s Overture to L’amant anonyme.

Pianist Bruce Liu will perform at the Groton Hall Music Center, presented by Vivo Performing Arts. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Bruce Liu in recital
Presented by Vivo Performing Arts
October 18, 3 p.m.
Groton Hill Music Center, Groton, MA

Pianist Liu returns to the area for a recital of familiar and less-so numbers that, among other things, highlight different times of night and day. The lineup includes music by Beethoven, Ligeti, Liszt, Mompou, Bach, and Chopin.

Nagano conducts Machover & Mendelssohn
Presented by Boston Symphony Orchestra
October 22 at 7:30 p.m, 23 at 1:30 p.m, and 24 at 8 p.m.
Symphony Hall, Boston

The world premiere of Tod Machover’s already and not yet—which has provoked some internet commentary owing to its announced utilization of AI processes—kicks off the BSO’s “Technology & Our Humanity” series. Nagano, returning to lead the orchestra at Symphony Hall for the first time since 1984, leads further selections by Alex Nante and Mendelssohn.

Pianist Boris Giltburg. Photo: Sasha Gusov

Giltburg plays Bach
Presented by Music Worcester
October 24, 8 p.m.
Mechanics Hall, Worcester

Music Worcester’s The Complete Bach series welcomes pianist Boris Giltburg to perform Book 1 from The Well-Tempered Clavier.

— Jonathan Blumhofer

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Author Events

An Arts Fuse Sponsored Evening of Readings from Poets and Others Protesting the Ongoing Robotic Infestation.

An evening of poetry and protest — among the first of its kind — will be at held at the Friends Meeting House in Cambridge on October 24, 6-8 p.m. I will offer a rabble-rousing intro in defense of cognitive integrity.

There will be no cognitive surrender.

Human beings — repeat after me:

LLMs erode our critical thinking skills

LLMs erode cognition and brain plasticity

LLM users show lower brain activity

LLMs are theft

LLMs are taxation without representation

LLMs harms learning and thinking

— Bill Marx

Anand Giridharadas at The Brattle Theatre
Man in the Mirror: Hope, Struggle, and Belonging in an American City
October 13 at 6 p.m.
The Brattle Theatre, Cambridge
Tickets: $45.09 with a book

“Man in the Mirror is a gripping American tragedy—a profoundly human story of systemic failures, unequal judicial access, and the complexity of mental health care and individual choice. Anand Giridharadas captures how when rugged individualism, neoliberalism, and populism collide, people struggle to see each other until it is too late. Giridharadas is a powerful and compassionate writer of extraordinary conviction. This is a tremendous achievement.” —Min Jin Lee, New York Times bestselling author of Pachinko, a National Book Award finalist

Ayad Akhtar at The Brattle Theatre
The Radiance
October 14 at 6 p.m.
Tickets: $42.99 with a book or $13.59 without a book

“One of the most purely entertaining and fascinating novels I’ve read in ages. Akhtar plays with form and wrestles with big ideas in a way that somehow avoids the pretension that so often accompanies such experiments. And his engagement with other texts and thinkers, from Freud to Buber to Leonard Cohen, is always generous and even generative…. Above all, the book is vivid, often funny, and genuinely affecting. The story is mysterious, even puzzling, but it’s not a puzzle that Akhtar is forcing us to solve. Rather, this is a book that tickles the mind and, in its best moments, soothes the soul.” —Kate Tuttle, Boston Globe

Erin French in conversation with Dan Souza — Brookline Booksmith
Seize the Supper
October 14 at 7:30 p.m.
Tickets: $66 with a book

“Erin French brings you perfectly crafted meals for dining outside the box and living in the moment in her latest cookbook, Seize the Supper. From her beloved home and restaurant, the Lost Kitchen in Freedom, Maine, come hearty main dishes balanced with crisp, bright salads and sweet and spiced desserts. Her well-rounded meals are made with true comfort and seasonal nourishment that are perfect for carrying you from shorter days and late-afternoon feasts to snowy winter nights sitting by the fire to picnics that welcome the blooming of spring.

“In simple yet rewarding steps, French shares delicious recipes that will foster connection and inspiration around the table. From flavorful salads and sides such as Soft Polenta with Honey & Ricotta, Roasted Asparagus with Tarragon Vinaigrette, and Pear, Walnut & Blue Cheese Waldorf to rich mains including Provençal Roasted Chicken, Fried Halibut, and Buttermilk Leg of Lamb with Fennel & Orange to irresistible desserts like Baked Vanilla Spice Puddings with Cherry Compote and Rosemary Maple Ice Cream, French’s recipes are filled with warmth, heart, and meaningful tips for embracing the joy of now.”

Cortney LaCorte a.k.a. “Cheese Gal”– Porter Square Books
Oversharing
October 14 from 7-8:30 p.m.
First Parish Church, Cambridge
Tickets are $45 with signed copy of book included

“Oversharing is filled with comforting recipes that are organized into playful chapters for every meal and moment. Want to unwind with guilt-free reality TV? Settle in for one of Cort’s famous Bougie Couch Snacks, like Chili Crisp Elevated Popcorn. Too tired to cook? Consider Caesar Salad Meatball Smash Burgers and Pantry Puttanesca Pasta your new favorite Weak-Night Dinners.

“Impress your guests with When to Wow’s Whole Bottle of Cab Pot Roast and Raise the Bar’s Dirty Like the Cumberland Martini, extra dirty and extra shaken, naturally. Then finish it all off with Kar’s Potato Chip and Pecan Cookies, a Dessert You Won’t Desert. Plus, Cort dishes out practical advice, including her ten kitchen commandments (leave your butter on the counter—and make sure it’s salted) and even a culinary dictionary (“cocktail cardio” anyone?). With easy, flavor-forward recipes and hilarious anecdotes you’ll want to immediately text to your best friend, Oversharing reminds us that the best meals, and the best moments, are meant to be shared.”

Susan Neiman in conversation with James Wood – Porter Square Books
Call It Evil
October 16 at 7 p.m.
Free

“Moral philosopher Susan Neiman makes the argument for naming and confronting evil as essential to preserving democracy in an age of demagogues. Call It Evil is a bold reckoning with one of the most fraught words in our moral vocabulary. Philosopher Susan Neiman argues that ‘evil’ is not a relic of the past or a term to be avoided, but a vital lens through which to understand the threats facing democracy today.

“From the rise of Donald Trump to the erosion of shared values, Neiman examines how our reluctance to name evil has left public life vulnerable to demagogues who twist morality to their own ends. Drawing on history—from fascism to the moral failures of recent US leaders—she shows how the normalization of wrongdoing corrodes trust, distorts justice, and endangers our future. This is a book for readers who refuse to accept moral confusion as the price of political life, and who believe that confronting evil is the first step toward renewal.”

Boston Book Festival Presents: An Evening with Michael Lewis at Old South Church
Blockers
October 16 at 7:30 p.m.
Tickets: $49.87 with a book

Blockers is the story of people who believed they had a calling, who were convinced they were doing something the country couldn’t do without, and then discovered they were no longer wanted. One kept Americans’ most sensitive tax data out of the wrong hands and another made sure that politicians and civil servants played by the rules. One figured out how to stop wildfires from destroying suburban neighborhoods, another helped uncover the mysteries of cystic fibrosis. There was also a security guard.

“It should come as no surprise that the writer who made subprime mortgages gripping (The Big Short) and who turned baseball statistics into poetry (Moneyball) could transform the first two years of the second Trump administration into a thriller about federal employees. But he does.

“And he does something else. He puts before us a clear question: If these public servants can’t survive in government today, then what does that say about us?”

Boston Book Festival
October 17 from 10 a.m.- 6 p.m.
Free

The 18th Annual Boston Book Festival returns this year with an impressive lineup of 200 authors and 80 sessions. The event is free and stocked with an intriguing lineup of keynote readers and speakers, from Homer translating Emily Wilson to Walter Mosely to Edwidge Danticat to Michael Lewis to Imbolo Mbue.

Nichole Accettola at Brookline Booksmith
Scandinavian Everyday
October 19 at 7 p.m.
Tickets: $35.97 with a book; admission without a book is free

“Contemporary Scandinavian cooking is approachable, fresh, and simple, made with an abundance of seasonal ingredients, artisan grains, and local and sustainable meat and fish.

“Written with expertise and warmth, Scandinavian Everyday invites readers into Nichole Accettola’s kitchen to experience more than 85 easy-to-follow, savory, and sweet recipes inspired by the cuisines of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden. As a chef for decades and now the owner of San Francisco’s beloved Kantine, Nichole shares glimpses of Scandinavian life and food culture, along with chapters full of clean, satisfying recipes to cook from morning to evening.”

Céline Leboeuf in conversation with Charles More at Porter Square Books
The Tyranny of Thinness
October 21 at 7 p.m.
Cambridge Edition, 1815 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge
Admission: Free

“Drawing on memoir, feminist theory, and cultural analysis, Dr. Céline Leboeuf’s The Tyranny of Thinness is a wide-ranging and erudite treatise on how the skinny ideal shapes our earliest memories and experiences—and steals joy, agency, and self-determination from our adolescences, our social identities, our ambitions, and even our sense of moral worth.

“From the resurrection of heroin chic and thinspo to the rise of #SkinnyTok and Ozempic, Dr. Leboeuf exposes how thinness becomes a political weapon—and shows how the body positivity movement has been coopted and repackaged. This book is an elevated must-read for anyone struggling with body image—and every reader searching to understand what the culture dictates about beauty and perceived worth.”

Maria DiLorenzo in conversation with Dave Wedge at Brookline Booksmith
Confessions of the Green River Killer
October 23 at 7 p.m.
Tickets: $35.97 with a book; admission without a book is free

“When crime journalist Maria DiLorenzo mailed a letter to Gary Ridgway, she never expected him to reply. He refused to speak to reporters and would send only religious materials back to anyone who contacted him in prison—if he replied at all. But instead of silence or a boilerplate letter, Maria’s phone rang—and it was the Green River Killer calling.

“Over the next several years, Ridgway would call Maria hundreds of times, using all of his free time in prison to speak with her. Her goal: to pry the details of his dozens of unidentified and unsolved murders from him. His motivation in speaking to her: unknowable. Through these hundreds of hours of phone calls, Ridgway revealed new details about his life, his crimes, and his motives—and manipulated Maria much like he tormented his victims.”

Third Annual Bloody Book Bash at Boston Edition of Porter Square Books
October 24 from 7 to 9 p.m.
GrubStreet Center for Creative Writing, 50 Liberty Drive, Suite 500, Boston
Tickets: $5

“Are you a fan of spooky reads, scary movies, and a good fright? Join us on Saturday, October 24, for our third annual Bloody Book Bash at our Seaport location! We’re dying to have you! Planned activities include:

• Signing tables featuring Gretchen Felker-Martin, Nicky Gonzalez, Eric LaRocca, Aaron Mahnke, and Rebecca Mahoney
• A costume contest with prizes
• A screening of Creature from the Black Lagoon
• Terrifying trivia
• Food and drinks
• A raffle open to all attendees, with a poster signed by all participating horror authors as the prize”

— Matt Hanson