Arts Fuse critics select the best in music, film, visual art, theater, author readings, and dance that’s coming up in the next week.

By The Arts Fuse Staff

Film

Boston Area Film Schedules — What is playing today, Where and When

Kill Your Darlings
Tuesday, October 7 at 7 p.m.
Bright Screening Room Emerson/Paramount Center
559 Washington St., Boston, MA

The film serves up a portrait of a mysterious 1944 killing that tangentially involved the young Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, and William Burroughs. Kill Your Darlings captures “the first flickers of the literary movement without hipster self-consciousness . . . spliced with hallucinogenic interludes, introspective detours and moments of romantic reverie. Ginsberg (Daniel Radcliffe) provides its overriding point of view.” (Sundance) Producer Christine Vachon — the woman responsible for this and other progressive art house features from directors such as Todd Solondz, Todd Haynes, and Mary Harron — is on hand for a discussion.

History Zero
Thursday, October 9 at 7:30 p.m.
The School of the Museum of Fine Arts, Mrs. E. Ross Anderson Auditorium, Boston, MA
Free

History Zero, which represented Greece at the 2013 Venice Biennial, dramatizes three human experiences that touch on our shifting value systems, with the emphasis on how money shapes the formation of relationships as well as political and social power. There will be a conversation with director Stefanos Tsivopoulos 
and SMFA faculty members Jane Gillooly and Tina Wasserman.

Love Child
October 9 at 7 p.m.
UMass Boston at the Campus Center Ballroom, Boston, MA
Free

This HBO film is set in the Republic of Korea – the world’s most wired nation – where “internet addiction” was initially cited in the courtroom as a mental illness defense. Love Child looks at Korean gaming culture, an increasingly immersive media environment in which virtual is becoming the new reality. According to Variety, it “joins a growing body of work that explores the potential costs of our Web-connected existence, using the tragedy of a South Korean infant neglected and left to die by her game-obsessive parents.” Q&A with director Valerie Veatch follows the screening.

Black Radical Imagination
October 12 at 2 p.m. 

Museum of Fine Arts, Harry and Mildred Remis Auditorium, Boston, MA

Exploring an artistic movement and school of thought, Black Radical Imagination presents examples of new media, video art, and experimental narrative that illuminate contemporary black experience: “focusing on new stories within the diaspora, each artist contributes their own vision about post-modern society through the state of current black culture.” Black Radical Imagination curators Erin Christovale and Amir George will answer questions after the screening.

— Tim Jackson

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Special Events

HONK!
October 10 through 12
Various locations in Cambridge and Somerville, check website.

It is sort of hard to describe this populist event — marching bands, left-wing politics, and various forms of whooping-it-up mix in an expansive festival (a “revolutionary street spectacle of never-before-seen proportions”) that just keeps growing, becoming bigger, better, and brassier with each passing year. 27 bands from all over the world will take part this time around, and there will be a new “Day of Action” held on Friday, Oct. 10. The idea is to organize a weekend-long partnership between HONK! bands and local community organizations. Be there or be reactionary …

— Bill Marx

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Classical Music

Mozart’s Sinfonia concertante
Presented by the Boston Classical Orchestra
October 5, 3 p.m.
Faneuil Hall, Boston

Steven Lipsitt’s BCO opens its 35th-anniversary season with guest soloists Lucia Lin and Cathy Basrak performing Mozart’s Sinfonia concertante for violin and viola. Bach’s festive Brandenburg Concerto no. 2 and Beethoven’s sunny First Symphony round out the program.

Collage New Music
Presented by Collage New Music
October 5, 8 p.m.
Pickman Hall, Cambridge

David Hoose leads the venerable new music ensemble in its season-opening concert. The program consists of music by Joan Tower, Jonathan Harvey, John Harbison, and Collage favorite Andrew Imbrie. Hoose hosts a pre-concert conversation with Harbison at 7 p.m.

Respighi, Mozart, and Beethoven
Presented by Pro Arte Orchestra
October 11, 8 p.m.
First Church, Cambridge

Pro Arte Orchestra’s first concert of the season is a mostly-Viennese mix of Mozart (the Clarinet Concert, with soloist Ian Greitzer) and Beethoven (Symphony no. 8). Also included is the first suite from Respighi’s Ancient Airs and Dances.

Chamber Music
Presented by the Radius Ensemble
October 11, 8 p.m.
Pickman Hall, Cambridge

Radius Ensemble surveys a wide range of chamber music – from Schubert’s famous String Quintet to Kaija Saariaho’s Vent Nocturnes – to open their season at Longy’s Pickman Hall. Randall Woolf and Samuel Barber are both represented, too.

Baroque Fireworks
Presented by the Handel & Haydn Society
October 10 (at 7:30) and 12 (at 3 p.m.)
Symphony Hall, Boston

The Handel & Haydn Society kicks off its yearlong bicentennial celebration in grand style with some of the most spirited music of the Baroque era. The foundation of the program is music by Handel – a pair of coronation anthems, the Music for the Royal Fireworks, and closing chorus from Messiah – interspersed with pieces by Bach, Sir John Stevenson, and Vivaldi.

Surround Sound
Presented by the Boston Modern Orchestra Project
October 12, 3 p.m.
Jordan Hall, Boston

BMOP’s season begins with a program devoted to music for orchestra and electronics. Pieces by Ronald Bruce Smith and David Felder sandwich the world premiere of Anthony Paul de Ritis’ Riflessioni.

— Jonathan Blumhofer

Violinist Stefan Jackiw
October 5 at 1:30 p.m.
Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, Boston, MA

Violinist Jackiw and the excellent pianist Anna Polonsky perform an all-Brahms program (the three sonatas).

Pianist Maurizio Pollini
October 5 at 3 p.m.
Presented by the Celebrity Series at Symphony Hall, Boston, MA

Celebrity Series presents celebrated pianist Pollini performing works of Robert Schumann (Arabesque and Kreisleriana) and Chopin (Piano Sonata #2 in B flat minor; Berceuse in D flat major; and Polonaise # 6 in A flat major).

Pianist Gabriel Chodos
October 5 at 8 p.m.
NEC’s Jordan Hall, Boston, MA
Free

New England Conservatory presents pianist Chodos, who chaired the NEC piano department for 25 years, performing Berg’s Sonata for Piano, Op. 1, Brahms’s Variations for Piano on an Original Theme, Op. 21, and Schubert’s Four Impromptus.

Mignarda
October 5 at 3 p.m.
AT the Loring-Greenough House, 12 South Street
Jamaica Plain, MA

The Sunday Parlor Concert Series presents the superb lute song duo of Donna Stewart, voice, and Ron Andrico, lute, performing works of John Dowland, Thomas Campion, and others.

Muir String Quartet
October 6 at 8 p.m.
At the Tsai Performance Center, 685 Commonwealth Ave., Boston, MA

Boston University School of Music presents the ace quartet performing Hugo Wolf’s The Italian Serenade and Leos Janacek’s String Quartet No. 2, Italian Letters.

First Monday at Jordan Hall
October 6 at 8 p.m.
At New England Conservatory’s Jordan Hall, Boston, MA
Free

Members of NEC Philharmonia and Chamber Orchestra celebrate the 30th anniversary of First Monday. On the program: Stravinsky’s Greeting Prelude; Handel’s “Let the Bright Seraphim” from Samson; Barber’s Summer Music; and Schubert’s Quintet for Piano and Strings in A major, “Trout.”

Boston Early Music Festival
October 11 at 8 p.m.
At NEC’s Jordan Hall, Boston, MA

Now in its 25th year, BEMF and its superb vocal and instrumental ensembles, led by Grammy-nominated Musical Directors Paul O’Dette and Stephen Stubbs, present Monteverdi’s eighth and final book of madrigals. Pre-concert lecture at 7 p.m.

Roberto Poli: Late Chopin
October 12 at 8 p.m.
New England Conservatory, Jordan Hall, Boston MA
Free

A NEC faculty recital presents the esteemed Chopin pianist in an all-Chopin recital that includes Nocturne In B Major, Op. 62, No. 1; Polonaise-Fantasie in A-flat Major, Op. 61; Three Mazurkas, Op. 59; Berceuse in D-flat Major, Op. 57; Barcarolle in F-sharp Major, Op. 60; and Sonata in B Minor, Op. 58.

Sunday Concert Series: Mark Padmore, tenor & Jonathan Biss, piano
October 12 at 1:30 p.m.
Gardner Museum, Boston, MA

Padmore and Biss will perform Schumann’s “Liederkreis” and “Sechs Dedichte and Requiem”; Tippett’s Boyhood’s End; and Fauré’s La Bonne Chanson.

— Susan Miron

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Dance

Kyle Abraham / Abraham.In.Motion
October 10 – 12
Institute of Contemporary Art
Boston, MA

Drummer Max Roach’s great 1960 composition “We Insist! (Freedom Now Suite)” inspired the newest politically informed work of choreographer Kyle Abraham, whose When the Wolves Came In is combined with a new trio, Hallowed and The Gettin’, a collaboration between Abraham, jazz musician Robert Glasper and visual artist Glenn Ligon.

Jose Mateo Ballet Theatre
Oct. 10 – 26
Sanctuary Theatre
Cambridge, MA

The season opening repertory program is a musically varied one, with Henryk Gorecki’s Symphony #3 inspiring Presage, Cuban composer Manuel Samuel’s score featured in Ayer Pasado (The Day Before Yesterday) and J.S. Bach’s Piano Concerto in G Minor grounding Back to Bach.

2014 North America Same-Sex Ballroom Dance Championship
Oct 11
Hynes Convention Center
Boston, MA

This all day competition — the first of its kind in New England — ranges from American country western dancing to Argentine tango, all performed by same-sex, transgender, and who-cares-as-long-as-they-look-good-together couples of all ages and levels of dance proficiency, from beginners to pros.

Bodas De Sangre / Suite Flamenca
Oct. 12
Coolidge Corner Theatre
Brookline, MA

Choreographer Antonio Gades’ suite of flamenco dances from his 1974 ballet Bodas de Sangre (Blood Wedding) is captured in a 2011 film of a performance featuring Joaquín Mulero, Maite Chico, and Cristina Carnero at Madrid’s Teatro Real. Note that the screening is at 10 a.m.

— Debra Cash

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Jazz

Kat Edmonson
October 8, 7:30 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge, MA.

Kat Edmonson’s small-ish voice and gamine looks (she favors a Jean Seberg haircut) can be deceptive: the 31-year-old Texan (now living in New York) writes and sings with uncommon focus, vocal control, and wit. She’s equally drawn to old movie musicals, Cole Porter, and Ennio Morricone. She celebrates the release of her Sony Masterworks debut, The Big Picture, with guitarist Steve Elliot (a regular collaborator), bassist Bob Hart, drummer Aaron Thurston, and keyboardist/vibraphonist Laura Scarborough.

Harold Lopez-Nussa
October 8, 8 p.m.
Scullers Jazz Club, Boston, MA.

The young Havana pianist Harold Lopez-Nusa, who has been making a name for himself in Europe (he won the 2005 Monteux Jazz Festival solo piano competition), has begun to make inroads in the States. He has the characteristic explosive virtuoso, well-schooled Cuban technique as well as a far reaching imagination. His last Boston show was a knockout. He comes to Scullers with his brother, Ruy Adrián López-Nussa, on drums, and bassist Jorge Sawa Pérez.

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Rachelle Ferrell
October 10-11 8 p.m. + 10 p.m.
Scullers Jazz Club, Boston, MA.

Vocal dynamo Rachelle Ferrell blows into Scullers for four shows this weekend. Ferrell has gospel fervor, jazz chops, and astounding vocal skill. Hang on to your hats.

Alex Alvear & Mango Blue
October 11, 7:30 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge, MA.

Bassist, singer, and songwriter Alex Alvear was long a mainstay of Boston’s Latino musical community — and the go-to guy for touring bands in need of a bass player — before returning to his native Ecuador a couple of years ago. He comes to the Regattabar with his long-running band Mango Blue — who mix all manner of pan-American sounds, songs, and dance forms.

Darrell Katz and the Jazz Composers Alliance Orchestra
October 14, 8 p.m.
Berklee Performance Center

Composer Darrell Katz’s new CD, Why Do You Ride? (Leo Records), with the JCAO, features some of his strongest writing and, as always, great playing by the band. Bicycle lover Katz will feature his eight-part suite from the disc, “Wheelworks,” as well as an “improvisational concerto grosso” dedicated to his retired Berklee colleague Phil Wilson, entitled “How To Clean a Sewer.” The latter will feature the marimba/violin duo of Vessela Stoyanova and Helen Sherrah-Davies. Rebecca Shrimpton is the band’s more than capable vocalist, and the other players in the 20-piece crew include Boston stalwarts like Bill Lowe, Jim Hobbs, Phil Scarff Forbes Graham, Bob Pilkington, and Norm Zocher.

Lawnmower
October 14, 8 p.m.
Lily Pad, Cambridge, MA.

For Lawnmower, drummer Luther Gray said he wanted “rock musicians who improvise like rock musicians but listen to other kinds of music.” This edition of the band also deploys jazz players who listen to other kinds of music: alto saxophone genius Jim Hobbs (whose residency this is), guitarists Van Martin and Jeff Platz, and bassist Winston Brahmin.

Rebecca Parris with Ernie Andrews
October 16, 8 p.m.
Scullers Jazz Club, Boston, MA.

Rebecca Parris was the inaugural booking at Scullers Jazz Club 25 years ago, so it’s fitting that she’s coming in to celebrate the venue’s silver anniversary. One of Boston’s most esteemed jazz singers, she’s joined by special guest Ernie Andrews, now 86, who made a name for himself as a big band singer in the Joe Williams mode with the Harry James Orchestra and later recorded with Kenny Burrell, Gene Harris, the Hamilton Brothers band, and many others.

— Jon Garelick

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Theater

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. Music and Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, Book by Hugh Wheeler. Directed by Spiro Veloudos.
Through October 11
Staged by the Lyric Stage Company of Boston, Boston, MA

I don’t remember ever seeing a production of this show that didn’t provide plenty of blood-curdling fun: “Stephen Sondheim’s Tony-Award winning Sweeney Todd, a macabre musical thriller, blends Sondheim’s characteristic wit with a sweeping and hauntingly beautiful score, grisly humor, and chilling drama.” Arts Fuse review

Whitebreadmusic by Marianna Salzmann. Translated by Charlotte Collins. Directed by Guy Ben-Aharon
October 5 at 7 p.m.
Staged reading by German Stage at the Goethe-Institut Boston, 170 Beacon Street, Back Bay/Boston
Performance in English

An award-winning script about alienation: “Aron, Nurit and Sedat grew up in Germany, but they don’t feel at home there. They are caught between fatherland and mother love, friendship and betrayal, past and future generations, struggling for where they belong.”

An Enemy of the People, by Henrick Ibsen, in a version adapted by Arthur Miller. Directed by Julianne Boyd.
Through October 19
Staged by the Barrington Stage Company at the Boyd-Quinson Mainstage, 30 Union Street, Pittsfield, MA.

I bow to no one in my love of the plays of Ibsen, and he is always worth seeing, even when his flinty complexity is softened by the liberalism of Arthur Miller. The script revolves around a public fight over acknowledging polluted natural resources. In Miller’s version, the nasty truth-speaking hero at the center of the original Norwegian fracas becomes an archetypal American do-gooder defeated by the forces of ignorance. Still, I have seen productions that have made something dramatically powerful out of this vision of the deadly spread of stupidity.

Poe, written and directed by Eric Hill
Through October 26
Staged by the Berkshire Theatre Festival at the Unicorn Stage, Stockbridge, MA

A world premiere production of a script about the final days of Edgar Allan Poe. David Adkins stars as the doomed writer, who was “found nearly dead outside a 14th Ward polling station in Baltimore on the evening of election day in 1849 … his last wanderings in the city he made famous are the subject of a play that examines the man behind the poems and stories.”

Traces
Through October 12
Arts Emerson/ the Cutler/Majestic Theatre, Boston, MA

“Boston favorites and circus icons” 7 Fingers (PSY, Sequence 8) return to present their signature work. This Time magazine Top Ten favorite “fuses storytelling, music, and acrobatics into a magical explosion that awes and delights at every turn.” See Arts Fuse review.

Assassins, Music & lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, Book by John Weidman. Directed by Jim Petosa. Musical direction by Matthew Stern. Choreographed by Judith Chaffee.
Through October 26.
Staged by New Repertory Theatre at the Charles Mosesian Theater, the Arsenal Center for the Arts, Watertown, MA.

In 2012 at Boston University, New Rep artistic director Jim Petosa directed a fine production of this unusual musical (even for Stephen Sondheim), which focuses on the men and women who, over the past two centuries, have killed or tried to kill America’s Commander-in-Chief. At the time, The Arts Fuse presented a Judicial Review (a round-up of critiques and conversations) on the staging: the judges included Hugo Burnham, drummer and a founding member of England’s post-punk band Gang of Four, and Jeff Melnick, an associate professor of American Studies at UMass Boston, where he specializes in twentieth-century US history. Let’s see what Petosa does with the piece this time around.

The Comedy of Errors by William Shakespeare. Directed by David R. Gammons.
Through October 19
Staged by the Actors’ Shakespeare Project at the Brighton High School, Brighton, MA

An early laughfest from the Bard that aims for capers rather than complexity. The ASP cast includes stalwarts Richard Snee, Sarah Newhouse, and Jessie Hinton.

Reconsidering Hanna(h) by Deirdre Girard. Directed by Bridget Kathleen O’Leary.
Through October 19
Staged at the Boston Playwrights’ Theatre, Boston, MA

An intriguing dramatic premise: “Hanna, a brutally blunt international journalist, is struggling to come to terms with her husband’s violent death. After accepting a seemingly tame assignment, she becomes increasingly obsessed with uncovering the history of another Hannah: the infamous Hannah Dustin who was kidnapped by a Native American raiding party in 1697.”

Knock! The Daniil Kharms Project Directed by Matthew Woods.
Through October 18.
Staged by imaginary beasts at the Plaza Black Box Theatre at the Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA.

The world premiere production of “a carefully curated evening” of work by early Soviet-era surrealist/absurdist writer Daniil Kharms via “new translations (by Irina Yakubovskaya) of his micro-prose, short plays, and poetry in new adaptations by the imaginary beasts ensemble.” Kharms is a fascinating figure, a dreamer of marvelously anarchistic fantasies. American short story writer George Saunders, an avid admirer, has summed up his brilliance this way: “Reading Kharms makes us look askance at more traditional stories. We see more clearly what they are: beautiful reductions. They are more substantial, yes, more moving, more consoling. But his work constitutes a kind of noble boundary, the limit to which stories can go before succumbing to the necessary falsification — dozens of small crouching men, misshapen but dignified, refusing, forever, to jump.” This evening promises to be a real treat. Knock! will be presented in rep with First of all, Second of All, “a play for children and their families adapted from a story by Kharms and performed by the Wee Beasties ensemble.”

Bent by Martin Sherman. Directed by David J. Miller
Through October 11
Staged by Zeitgeist Stage Company in the Plaza Theatre at the Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA

Well, now I feel old. According to the Zeitgeist Stage Company press release this acclaimed play about “the often-overlooked persecution of gays in Nazi Germany” has not been produced professionally in Boston in nearly 30 years. I saw that staging, and look forward to seeing if the script retains its power after three decades.

Far From Heaven: A New Musical — Book by Richard Greenburg, Music by Scott Frankel, Lyrics by Michael Korie. Based on the Focus Features/Vulcan Production Motion Picture written & directed by Todd Haynes. Directed by Scott Edmiston.
Through October 11.
Staged by SpeakEasy Stage Company, at the Roberts Studio Theatre, Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA.

The out-of-control fad of adapting films into musicals continues with “a lush musical adaptation of Todd Haynes’ acclaimed romantic melodrama of private longings and social taboos. A 1950s Connecticut housewife’s perfect life is shattered when she discovers her husband’s shocking secret and then seeks comfort in a forbidden relationship that dramatically alters her view of herself and the world.” Arts Fuse review

— Bill Marx

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Rock

The Orwells
October 9
Brighton Music Hall, Boston, MA

The Illinois-based Orwells have made at least two trips to our area in the past year-and-a-half, first opening for Palma Violets in May 2013 and then supporting Arctic Monkeys and Deerhunter in February 2014. On each occasion, they proved themselves well worthy of a headlining spot and the Brighton Music Hall is the perfect venue for their garage punk sound.

Remembering the Tam! With Terry Kitchen, Jay Feinstein, and the Memphis Rockabilly Band
October 9
Brookline Library, Brookline, MA

Few people have done more than musician and author Terry Kitchen to keep Boston’s music history alive (others doing fine work in this arena include our very own Brett Milano as well as Steve Nelson of the Music Museum of New England). In remembrance and celebration of Brookline’s Tam O’Shanter nightclub, Kitchen will perform some tunes and read from his excellent debut novel Next Big Thing. He’ll be joined by local legends Memphis Rockabilly Band and Jay Feinstein, an alum of ‘80s Hub rock band Push Push.

Foxygen
October 11, 2014
Paradise Rock Club, Boston, MA

Foxygen are unquestionably one of the most interesting bands recording and performing today. Just when you think you’ve got them pegged as one thing, they throw a new sound at you. Take the two songs they’ve already released from their upcoming double album …And Star Power (which will be released the Tuesday after this show): “How Can You Really” sounds like Electric Light Orchestra-pop (not always a good thing, but here it works), while “Cosmic Vibrations” is reminiscent of the Doors at their “Strange Days”-strangest. And this is on top of their ’60s-indebted 2013 album We Are the 21st Century Ambassadors of Peace & Magic and its all-time great lyric “There’s no need to be an asshole, you’re not in Brooklyn anymore.” If nothing else, this concert should be an eclectic, wild ride.

Upcoming and On Sale…

J Mascis (10/18/2014, The Sinclair); The Thurston Moore Band (10/22/2014, The Sinclair); Temples (10/24/2014, Paradise Rock Club); Drowners (10/29/2014, Great Scott); Chrissie Hynde (11/1/2014, Orpheum Theatre); Peter Hook & the Light (11/8/2014, Royale); Stevie Wonder (11/11/2014, TD Garden); Bob Dylan (11/14/2014, Orpheum Theatre); Bob Dylan (11/15/2014, Providence Performing Arts Center); Johnny Marr (11/16/2014, Paradise Rock Club); Randy Newman (11/19/2014, Wilbur Theatre); Film Screening: “Pulp: A Film About Life, Death & Supermarkets” (11/19/2014, Brattle Theatre); Daniel Lanois (11/22/2014, Brighton Music Hall); Greg Trooper (11/23/2014, Atwood’s Tavern); Julian Casablancas + The Voidz (11/26/2014, House of Blues)

— Adam Ellsworth

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Author Events

Maureen Corrigan
So We Read On: How The Great Gatsby Came to Be and Why It Endures
October 11 at 7 p.m.
Harvard Book Store, Cambridge MA
Free

The book critic for NPR’s Fresh Air comes to Cambridge to discuss and sign her new book. It tells the surprising story behind F Scott Fitzgerald’s Jazz Age masterpiece and why, many years after its debut, it still captivates so many readers, borne back ceaselessly unto its dazzling prose and tragic denouement.

Bobby Orr
Orr: My Story
October 12 from 2-4p.m.
Brookline Booksmith, Coolidge Corner, Brookline, MA
Free with purchase of the book

Boston sports fans need no introduction to the Bruins’ beloved number 4. Orr will come to Brookline to sign copies of his memoir. A purchase of the memoir is required to join the signing queue.

Bob Ryan
In conversation with Bill Littlefield
Scribe: My Life in Sports
October 14 at 6 p.m. (doors open at 5:30)
Presented by the Harvard Book Store at the Brattle Theatre, Cambridge, MA
Free

The veteran Boston Globe sportswriter comes to Harvard Square to read from and discuss his new autobiography. He will trace his passion for sports, dating back to his youth spent going to games at the Polo Grounds all the way through the Celtics’ championship years with Bill Russell and up to the Red Sox finally winning a World Series.

David Sedaris
Presented by Celebrity Series of Boston
October 15 at 8 p.m.
Symphony Hall
Boston, MA
Tickets are $45-$55

The acclaimed, bestselling humorist comes to Boston to read from his latest work, Let’s Discuss Diabetes With Owls. Need we say more?

Colm Tóibín
Nora Webster
October 16 at 7 p.m.
Brookline Booksmith, Coolidge Corner, Brookline, MA.
Free

The eminent Irish novelist behind Brooklyn and The Testament of Mary comes to read from and discuss his latest novel. Set in the 1970’s, the titular character, reeling from the death of her husband and the responsibility of caring for their four children, finds her only solace in music.