Compiled by Arts Fuse Editor

Our expert critics supply a guide to film, visual art, theater, author readings, television, and music. More offerings will be added as they come in.

Film

A scene from Naruse Mikio’s 1955 film Floating Clouds. Photo: HFA

Floating Clouds… The Cinema of Naruse Mikio screening at the Harvard Film Archive, through November 3.

A generous retrospective of the films made by a Japanese filmmaker Harvard Film Archive calls “still underrated and underappreciated.” Here is what The Arts Fuse‘s Betsy Sherman wrote about the HFA’s 2005 Centennial Tribute to a “Japanese master” who spotlit “the plight of women on the margins of society”: “Was he a precursor to Lars Von Trier, who seems to take sadistic delight in putting his female protagonists through the wringer? Or was Naruse an artist of rare courage, who could depict the pitfalls of desire while retaining a respect for those who fall prey to it?” Arts Fuse preview

— Bill Marx

The Great Remakes
Through September 1
Somerville Theatre in Davis Square

The cleverly curated series screens double features that pair films in which both the original and the remake are solid movies. “The Great Remakes series celebrates films where both versions are terrific movies that complement each other in a variety of ways.” Double Features include: The Thing, The Fly, 3:10 to Yuma, The Parent Trap, The Departed & Internal Affairs, Invasion of the Body Snatchers, Airplane & Zero Hour, Cat People, Cape Fear, and A Star Is Born (1954 & 2018) Complete details and times

A scene from Kaneto Shindô’s Kuroneko.

Chilling Tales from Japan
Tuesdays in July
Coolidge Corner Theatre, Brookline

According to the Coolidge Corner Theatre website: “As a way of chilling their bones in the heat, the Japanese challenge themselves to watch kaidan, or ghost stories known as Kimodameshi.” A sampling, co-presented with the Japan Society of Boston.

Ringu (Hideo Nakata) on July 22

Outdoor Screenings

The Coolidge Corner Theater “En Plein Air” screenings will take place at the Kennedy Greenway, the Charles River Speedway, Mt. Auburn Cemetery, the Rocky Woods, and more!

All shows begin at sunset. All films are linked with details and locations.

Mean Girls (Wednesday, July 23)

The Blob (1988) (Wednesday, August 13)

Twin Peaks: Fire Walk with Me (Wednesday, August 20)

Cemetery Cinema: The Sweet Hereafter and Gates of Heaven (Tuesday, August 26)

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (1990) (September 17)

I Know What You Did Last Summer (October 15)

The Woods Hole Film Festival
July 26 – August 1
Multiple Venues

This year’s line-up continues the festival’s mission to showcase the work of emerging and New England filmmakers and independent filmmakers who have a relationship to Cape Cod. The goal is also to develop and foster a creative, independent film community. This year features talks with critics Jim Sullivan and Ty Burr and a presentation by Elijah Wald, a best-selling historian whose books have inspired critically acclaimed films. There will also be a Master Class with television and film director Brad Silberling, and a seminar with entertainment attorney Chris Perez and music supervisor Jonathan Finegold about the artistic and business aspects of music in filmmaking. Complete Schedule of Films and Events

Grrl Haus Cinema Presents: Local Showcase
July 23 at 8:30 p.m.
The Brattle Theatre

This is a single program of 9 short films by women, trans, non-binary, and genderqueer artists working across experimental, DIY, and underground cinema featuring Boston-area voices that explore identity, memory, queerness, death, and transformation.. Complete descriptions

A scene from The Count of Monte Cristo. Screening at the Boston French Film Festival

The Boston French Film Festival
July 25 – August 24
Museum of Fine Arts Boston

A terrific line-up of films this year with all titles linked to descriptions.

Three Friends on July 25 at 7 p.m. & August 2 at 11 a.m. Directed by Emmanuel Mouret

Filmlovers! (Spectateurs!) on July 26 at 11 a.m. Directed by Arnaud Desplechin

The Ties that Bind Us (L’attachement) on July 26 at 2:30 p.m. Directed by Carine Tardieu

When Fall Is Coming on July 27 at 11 a.m. and August 2 at 2:30 p.m. Directed by François Ozon (Arts Fuse Review)

Misericordia on July 27 at 2:30 p.m. and August 9 at 11 a.m. Directed by Alain Guiraudie

Night Call on August 1 at 7 p.m. and August 10 at 11 a.m. Directed by Michiel Blanchart

Holy Cow  on August 3 at 11 a.m. and August 10 at 2:30 p.m. Directed by Louise Courvoisier

The Count of Monte Cristo on August 3 at 1:30 p.m. Directed by Alexandre de La Patellière and Matthieu Delaporte

The Marching Band (En fanfare) on August 8 at 7 p.m. Directed by Emmanuel Courcol

The President’s Wife (Bernadette) on August 9 at 2:30 p.m. Directed by Léa Domenach

Souleymane’s Story on August 15 at 7 p.m. Directed by Boris Lojkine

Visiting Hours (La prisonnière de Bordeaux) on August 16 at 2:30 p.m. Directed by Patricia Mazuy

The Art of Nothing on August 17 at 2:30 p.m. Directed by Stefan Liberski

A Missing Part on August 22 at 7 p.m. and August 24 at 2:30 p.m. Directed by Guillaume Senez

Bonnard, Pierre and Marthe on August 23 at 2:30 p.m. and August 24 at 11 a.m. Directed by Martin Provost

Joanna Rakoff: When A Memoir Becomes A Movie 
July 31 at 6 p.m.
The Vilna Shul, 18 Phillips Street Boston

Joanna Rakoff wrote My Salinger Year in 2014, describing her tumultuous year as an editorial assistant for a major publisher. She never expected it to become a blockbuster film in 2020. Join Joanna for a beautiful summer evening at The Vilna, complete with dinner, a film screening, and conversation, as we delve into this compelling, heartwarming story. Tickets: $25 (includes dinner)

A scene from Cloud.

Cloud
August 1 – 7
Brattle Theater in Cambridge

Premiere of Kiyoshi Kurosawa’s psychological horror thriller. The title, Cloud, refers to the digital space known as the cloud in this peculiar horror story about how hatred spreads online. Yoshii suddenly becomes a “target” when he hears a voice saying “I’ll kill this guy” while looking at an online screen. A man wearing a mask then appears at his door. A suspense thriller that depicts a “collective madness.” Trailer

Kurasawa
August 1 – 14
Coolidge Corner Theater in Brookline

Akira Kurosawa’s films have influenced many of the world’s major directors, Spielberg, Scorsese, Lucas, Coppola, and Leone to name a few. He defined the samurai genre, spotlighting elegant storytelling and exquisite camerawork. A roundup not to be missed – eleven of his films, digitally restored, make up this series: Throne of Blood, The Hidden Fortress, Rashomon, Sanjuro, Yojimbo, Stray Dog, Red Beard, Ikiru, High and Low, Seven Samurai, and Ran. Schedule of Films

— Tim Jackson

A scene from Art Spiegelman: Disaster Is My Muse. Photo: courtesy: Zipatone Films)

Boston Jewish Film: Art Spiegelman: Disaster Is My Muse 
Presented by Brookline Booksmith at Coolidge Corner Theatre
July 24 at 7 p.m.
Free

“This insightful documentary delves into the life and work of Art Spiegelman, the Queens-raised artist who revolutionized comics by exploring dark, complex themes. Shaped by his Holocaust-survivor parents and inspired by MAD magazine’s irreverent satire, Spiegelman’s most famous work, MAUS, is a poignant Holocaust narrative that redefined the medium. The film showcases his resistance to fascism, from Nazis to Trump, and features rich illustrations from his comics, highlighting his significant impact as an artist and cultural critic.” Followed by a conversation with director/producer Philip Dolin, moderated by Emmy Waldman, PhD.

— Matt Hanson

Pick of the Week

Bring Them Down, streaming on Mubi and Amazon Prime

A scene from Christopher Andrews’ Bring Them Down.

British writer-director Christopher Andrews begins his film with a car accident in which a woman is killed. It then jolts forward to the misty hills of Connemara, Ireland where two shepherding clans are clashing over a pair of rams that are missing from one family’s flock. At home, Michael O’Shea (Christopher Abbott speaking Gaelic in many scenes) is continually berated by his handicapped and cantankerous father. He takes it on himself to right the perceived wrong (stolen animals) for the honor of his family. Slowly, he is driven to violent extremes by the taunts of Jack, the son of the thieving clan (Barry Keoghan at his best). The conflict grows progressively more disturbing with each new revelation via shifting perspectives in time. The film builds to a mythic mano a mano conflict. Rugged rural Irish farm life is the backdrop for the brutish behavior of two proud, flawed families. The title refers to both the rams that are herded into pens located on expansive mountain vistas and to the Old Testament vengeance that’s rooted in human frailty and the vicissitudes of fate.

— Tim Jackson

Theater

A scene from the Bread & Puppet’s Domestic Resurrection Revolution In Progress Circus!

Our Domestic Resurrection Revolution in Progress Circus!, performed, written, and staged by Bread & Puppet at the company’s farm at Glover, VT, through August 31 at 3 p.m.

A “serious and silly circus.” “Ladles and Jellyspoons! The one and only Bread & Puppet Circus is back with Anti-Empire Art that acknowledges our beloved Mother Dirt, who makes us and unmakes us, and who presents urgently needed domestic resurrection services for the victims of this latest genocide. We are joined by Palestinian cranes on their way to Washington to replace the excrement in the White House with organic bird droppings, green frogs who teach the art of hopping over seemingly insurmountable problems, and gaggles of kindergarten butterflies who frolic to their hearts’ desire.”

Out of Character written & performed by Ari’el Stachel. Directed by Tony Taccone. Berkshire Theatre Group Presents a Berkeley Repertory Theatre staging at the Unicorn Theatre, 6 East Street, Stockbridge, through July 26.

“This one-person solo play takes audiences on an intimate journey through identity, mental health, and self-acceptance.”

Que Diablos! Fausto, adapted by Jesús Valles from Christopher Marlowe’s play, Doctor Faustus. Directed by Armando Rivera. A Teatro en El Verano touring production that will be performed in parks across the state of Rhode Island, including Payne Park, Dexter Park, Roger Williams Park, Jenks Park, and more, through August 1.

“In the depths of the earth between heaven and hell, demons and humans fiercely fight for souls. One such human, Faust, lets his desire for knowledge and power lead him into a deal with the devil himself! A darkly comedic, bilingual take on the 17th-century classic.”

A scene from The Heron’s Flight. Photo: Double Edge Theatre

The Heron’s Flight, written and performed by Double Edge Theatre. Directed by Jennifer Johnson and Travis Coe. At 948 Conway Rd, Ashfield, MA, through August 3.

This is a “performance which travels through the gardens, barns, and waterways of Double Edge’s Farm Center. A great blue heron perches silently in a tree, then breaks the surface of the cool green water. Familiar and mythological creatures gather for a Midsummer Feast — an explosive celebration of love, dance, and flight. Walk with us toward transformation in an impossible world as we embrace the knowledge of the land — that each season of life is beloved.”

The Garbologists by Lindsay Joelle. Directed by Rebecca Bradshaw. Staged by Gloucester Stage Company at 267 East Main Street, Gloucester, through July 26.

The plot of this comedy, according to the GSC website: “When Marlowe joins Danny’s route, the two get off to a rocky start with constant sparring and squabbling over everything from trash hunting to 19th century printmaking. Danny, a white, blue-collar, NYC sanitation worker, values seniority and ‘house rules.’ While Marlowe, a Black, Ivy-league educated sanitation rookie, is determined to prove a point and make amends. These two worlds collide and improbable bonds form.” Art Fuse review

A young Tennessee Williams. Courtesy of the New York Public Library.

Camino Real by Tennessee Williams. Directed by Dustin Will. Staged by Williamstown Theatre Festival at its MainStage Theatre, 1000 Main Street, Williamstown, through August 3.

Be forewarned: the WTF website is about as hard to navigate as Williams’s fantasy land. According to the WTF publicity, the play was “written in the lead up to the McCarthy trials. Camino Real, Williams said, is ‘…a play that is less written than painted. A play that is painted? Why not! At least I could try. I did. And here it is.’ The Camino Real is a dead end, a police state in an imagined Latin-Mediterranean-American country, and an inescapable condition. Characters from history and literature such as Don Quixote, Casanova, and Camille inhabit this phantasmagoric plaza where corruption and alienation have nearly destroyed the human spirit. Enter Kilroy, a prize-winning boxer and all-American fella with ‘a heart as big as the head of a baby.'”

Not About Nightingales by Tennessee Williams. Directed by Robert O’Hara. Staged by Williamstown Theatre Festival at its MainStage Theatre, 1000 Main Street, Williamstown, through August 3.

WTF bills this early Williams script as “a homoerotic Prison Drama.” “A front row seat to America’s prison industrial complex whose atrocities are too often avoided and denied.”

As You Like It by William Shakespeare. Directed by Steve Mahler. Staged by Commonwealth Shakespeare Company on the Boston Common, July 23 through August 10.

Free Shakespeare under the starry skies. This year it is one of the Bard’s oft-produced romantic comedies, though the action is more sophisticated than it looks. The cast includes Nora Eschenheimer, Michael Underhill, Remo Airaldi, Brooks Reeves, and Maurice Emmanuel Parent.

W.H. Auden on the play: “Civilization is a dance between the ocean of barbarism, which is a unity, and the desert of triviality, which is diverse. One must keep a dialectical balance, and keep both faith — through will, and humor–through intellect. Jaques has the latter, Rosalind has both, so she is able to get the returning exiles to join in the rite of dance.”

Kufre n’ Quay by Mfoniso Udofia. Directed by John Oluwole ADEkkoje at the Boston Arts Academy’s Main Stage Theatre, 174 Ipswich St., Boston, through July 26.

“In her fifth installment of the Ufot Family Cycle, Kufre n’ Quay, playwright Mfoniso Udofia tells the coming of age story of a 12-year-old African boy who arrives in New York’s Little Senegal and joins a youth center. Set in Harlem in 2019, Kufre, son of Iniabiasi and grandson of Abasiama, forms a friendship with an African American girl. The play explores the ways in which we navigate the contrast between African and Black American culture. ”

Fuzzy and Teddy Yudain (The Puppeteer) in Great Barrington’s production of fuzzy. Photo: Daniel Rader.

fuzzy: a new musical. Music and Lyrics by Will Van Dyke. Book and lyrics by Jeff Talbott. Directed by Ellie Heyman. Staged by Barrington Stage at the St. Germain Stage, 36 Linden Street, Pittsfield, through July 26.

The world premiere of a musical about “a furry little puppet’ who tries to go home again — to take care of his ailing mother. “What begins as a reluctant reunion,” says the Barrington Stage website, “becomes a touching tangle of the complex ties that bind us.”

The Understudy by Theresa Rebeck. Directed by Paula Plum. Staged by Hub Theatre Company at Club Café, 209 Columbus Ave. Boston, through August 2.

A satiric look at life in the theater that “explores what happens when the drama isn’t just on the stage.” “Crammed with craziness and calamities,” according to the Hub Theatre Company’s publicity, this is “a laugh-filled love letter to the unsung heroes of the stage.”

The Piano Lesson by August Wilson. Directed by Christopher V. Edwards. A Shakespeare and Company co-production with Actors’ Shakespeare Project at the Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre, Lenox, July 25 through August 24.

Right up there with Fences as one of August Wilson’s most produced plays. The Actors’ Shakespeare Project staged the show, which won the 1990 Pulitzer Prize for Drama, earlier this season. Here is the set-up on the ASP’s website: “Tensions are crackling under the floorboards of Doaker Charles’ household when his fast-talking nephew Boy Willie blows in from Mississippi with a scheme to set their descendants up for generations. The plan: sell the family’s ornate antique piano carved by an enslaved ancestor and use it to buy the land where his ancestors were enslaved. But half of the piano also belongs to Berniece, who refuses to let her brother pawn off the heirloom. As the siblings dig in their heels, they will search deeper into their lineage and uncover shocking revelations.”

Playwright Jeremy O. Harris. Photo: Facebook

Spirit of the People by Jeremy O. Harris. Directed by Katina Medina Mora. Staged by Williamstown Theatre Festival at its MainStage Theatre, 1000 Main Street, Williamstown, through August 3.

Developed in partnership with Works & Process at Guggenheim New York, this is a world premiere of a work by the author of the much talked about Broadway production Slave Play. WTF quotes the dramatist t as saying “you can’t call a play Spirit of the People in this moment and not hold some responsibility–or hold yourself to some responsibility–to ask questions about what the spirit of the people is right now.” Warning: this production contains nudity and haze. 

A Case for the Existence of God by Samuel D. Hunter. Directed by Daniel Elihu Kramer. Staged by the Chester Theatre Company at the Town Hall Theatre, 15 Middlefield Road, Chester, July 24 through August 3.

According to the Arts Fuse review of the 2024 SpeakEasy Stage production of A Case for the Existence of God: “The play invites the audience members to introspect as it probes the pasts, presents, and futures of its two male characters, Keith, a Black gay man who labors at the mortgage game, and his client (and later friend) Ryan (Jesse Hinson), a straight Caucasian man on a quest to acquire a parcel of property and, in so doing, to claim a piece of the American dream that has slipped through his family’s fingers. Both men are new dads, too. They sit, slumped on office chairs in a cubicle, the weight of their familial responsibilities sitting like tons on their shoulders. As in many of Hunter’s plays, Case is set in the playwright’s native Idaho. We learn that the landscape there — reflected in the flat, parched speech — is similarly semi-arid, rambling, with ‘nothing out there’ except vast stretches of emptiness that his characters can’t help but absorb.”

— Bill Marx

Visual Art

Although climate change concerns have focused much attention on the health and future of tropical wilderness such as the Amazon Basin, the boreal forest—also known as the taiga or snow forest, and defined by its coniferous stands composed mostly of pines, spruces, and larches—is actually the world’s largest biome, containing two to three times as much carbon as tropical forests. Ringing the Northern Hemisphere just below the Arctic Circle, the taiga, as the Peabody Essex Museum reminds us, is “home to 3.7 million people, 85 species of vertebrates, 32,000 species of insects, and two billion migratory birds.” Covering a third of Earth’s forested areas, it is one of the planet’s last remaining stretches of true wilderness.

The Peabody Essex Museum’s exhibition, Knowing Nature: Stories of the Boreal Forest, opens on July 26. Organized by the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, the show unfolds, the museum says, “through first-person stories, commissioned objects, interactive experiences, and exquisite photography and videography” to weave together “themes of climate change, Indigenous perspectives, and the relationship between people and nature.” In the past, the Peabody Essex had a much stronger emphasis on natural history, along with its collections of local and marine history, non-Western and Indigenous art, early American decorative art, and architecture. This exhibition seems to mark a return to those hybrid roots, with the explicit goal of building “empathy” and inspiring action.

Glacial moraine with vetch. Photo: Tom Walker

The Ogunquit Museum of American Art continues its 2025 summer slate of exhibitions with Gisela McDaniel: ININA, opening August 1. This will be the first solo museum exhibition of this diasporic, Indigenous CHamoru artist (the CHamoru are the Indigenous people of the Mariana Islands, which include the American territory of Guam). The exhibition explores McDaniel’s affirmational approach to portraiture, in which she reverses the typical dynamic between artist and sitter. Her subject-collaborators are empowered to choose how they are depicted, and the three-dimensional, multimedia portraits incorporate personal belongings as well as recordings of conversations captured during the painting sessions.

The Portland Museum of Art hosts a Regenerative Arts Summit from July 30 to August 1. Inspired by regenerative agriculture, which seeks to restore soil health and biodiversity, the summit brings together artists, ecologists, healers, and change-makers to “co-create a better world for all.” The three-day program features performances, conversations with movement leaders, hands-on activities, and excursions to coastal and woodland areas around Portland. Tickets start at $108.55 (with a sliding scale) and are available via the PMA website.

In the bucolic Berkshires, the Clark Art Institute will host the Williamstown Theatre Festival Reading Series: White Girls Gang on July 29 at 7 p.m. Public play readings—without costumes, scenery, or stage action—are typically part of developing new work for performance. The Williamstown series gathers playwrights, directors, and actors for a week of rehearsals culminating in a single public presentation. The first reading in this year’s series, White Girls Gang, written by Arianna Simons and directed by Gus Heagerty, is “about a book club gone disastrously wrong.” The play features Audre Lorde and “five screaming white women.”

For generations, families with small to mid-size children have found the Japanese art of paper folding to be an ideal parent-child activity. To introduce the current cohort, Bates College Museum of Art has organized a Parent-Child Origami Workshop, inspired by the animals (but not the mayhem) in the exhibition Ralph Steadman: And Another Thing. The first session takes place on July 24 at 10 a.m., with additional sessions on July 31 and August 1. Parents and children are welcome. All materials are provided, but space is limited and advance registration is required through the museum website.

Learn to Crochet! Crochet Coral Workshop at Williams College Art Museum.

August 1 at 5 p.m. the Williams College Art Museum is the sponsor of Coral Crochet Workshop, part of the Berkshires Satellite Reef, itself part of the worldwide Crochet Coral Reef by artists Christine and Margaret Wertheim and the Institute for Figuring. This “communal art project” aims to create a life-sized coral reef made entirely out of crochet.

This, the final workshop in the Berkshires project, will take place at the Berkshire Art Center in Pittsfield. All ages and skill levels are invited and participants will receive a free crochet kit. The completed reef will be exhibited in the spring of 2026 “as an immersive installation” at the Williams College ‘62 Center for Theatre & Dance.

— Peter Walsh

Television

A scene from Conversations With a Killer: The Son of Sam Tapes.

Conversations with a Killer: The Son of Sam Tapes (July 30, Netflix): Joe Berlinger, award-winning director of numerous true crime documentary films and series—including the iconic Paradise Lost trilogy, which he created with his longtime partner Bruce Sinofsky—is once again doing what he does best: delving into the mind of a famous serial killer and the culture around him. This time, it’s David Berkowitz, aka the Son of Sam—a man who terrorized New York City in the ’70s and murdered six women. I was a teenager when this happened, and I recall the nightly TV news reports and interviews with terrified New Yorkers who worried they might be the next seemingly random victim.

Berlinger’s brilliant and absorbing series has also profiled Jeffrey Dahmer and Ted Bundy, combining archival audio tape interviews, photographs, and video with contemporary interviews of key figures and experts, including law enforcement officials, attorneys, journalists, and more. The director also helmed the excellent Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile, a Bundy biopic thriller written by Michael Werwie, which starred Zac Efron as the charming, prolific killer of young women. With interest in true crime exploding in the podcast and social media worlds, there is a growing fascination with psychopathic personality disorders. Berlinger’s newest series taps into that curiosity. Berkowitz’s conflicting confessions included insistence that he was goaded by a dog possessed by a demon, involvement with a satanic cult, and admissions to numerous acts of arson.

The Sandman, Season 2B (July 24, Netflix): The next and absolutely final installment of this long-awaited series, based on the hugely popular graphic novel serial written by Neil Gaiman, debuts in what can only be called auspicious times.

The first season received broad critical acclaim and was embraced by Gaiman’s fanbase. It premiered in 2022 and I absolutely loved it.

However, circumstances have changed, and my initial enthusiasm for the next chapter has faded (and I am not alone). Recent allegations have surfaced accusing Gaiman of mistreatment and abuse of at least one live-in nanny, as well as claims that this fits a larger pattern of inappropriate sexual behavior by the acclaimed author (whom I once interviewed for the Boston Phoenix during a charity reading at the Brattle Theatre). Formerly loyal fans have, in large numbers, passionately denounced Gaiman in response to these allegations and have disavowed their previous admiration.

Earlier this month, Netflix premiered the first half of Season 2. Soon, the final five episodes will be released. Dear Reader, I admit I have not yet been able to watch the second season, my disappointment about this situation runs that deep. If I do, my review will be posted here.

— Peg Aloi

Roots and World Music

Michael Harrist (bass), Tev Stevig (guitar), and Brian O’Neill (drums) —- make up Czarna Wolgastar, the intergalactic balkan surf jazz arm of Mr. Ho’s Orchestrotica.

Midsummer Reverb-A Retro Futurist Surf Spectacle
July 23
The Burren

If the new documentary “Sounds of the Surf” makes you want to discover our local surf music scene, here’s an excellent opportunity. Matt Heaton and the Electric Heaters always bring the reverb and thunder, while Czarna Wolgastar is the noir-inclined concoction of three members of Mr. Ho’s Orchestrotica: guitarist Tev Stevig, bassist Michael Harrist, and drummer Brian O’Neill.

BT-ALC Big Band featuring Fred Wesley
July 24
Soundcheck Studios, Pembroke
July 25
Jimmy’s Jazz and Blues Club, Portsmouth

One of the musical highlights of 2024 was the meeting of Boston’s always funky BT-ALC Big Band with Fred Wesley, the James Brown and Parliament Funkadelic trombonist and musical director who remains a towering musical presence. Leaders Brian Thomas and Alex Lee-Clark brilliantly rearranged many of Wesley’s signature pieces for the band. The night was recorded for a new album that just came out. Wesley is coming back for another round of shows with the large ensemble.

Lowell Folk Festival
July 25-27

Every year the streets of downtown Lowell are filled with music, food ,and crafts from around the country and around the world for this free bash. Among the many highlights this go aound are Martha Spencer and the Wonderland Country Band, a fresh and exciting old-time unit, the unique Celtic/Quebecois trio Cecelia, the always dynamic Chicago blues of Lil’ Ed and the Blues Imperials, Mali’s Bamba Wassoulou Groove, the multi-generational bluegrass of Crooked Road Revival, and much more.

— Noah Schaffer

I’m With Her, featuring Sara Watkins, Aoife O’Donovan and Sarah Jarosz, will play Newport Folk Festival. Photo: Alysse Gafkjen

Newport Folk Festival
July 25-27
Fort Adams State Park, Newport, R.I.

The long-sold-out 2025 edition of the fabled folk fest honors its reputation by mixing returnees like Margo Price, Lucius, and Jeff Tweedy with promising newbies such as Ken Pomeroy, Saya Gray, and particularly the Dylan-esque Jesse Welles, while also spanning the mainstream country of Luke Combs and the jams of Goose. Other surprises: alt-rockers Yeah Yeah Yeahs in acoustic form with strings, agit-rappers Public Enemy, and ’70s folk-rocker turned soundtrack king Kenny Loggins. And who knows if special guests might show up to join Bleachers frontman/producer Jack Antonoff (Taylor Swift does live nearby) or the weekend-closing “Songs for the People.”

– Paul Robicheau

Jazz

George W. Russell. Jr at the piano. Photo: courtesy of the artist

George W. Russell Jr. Band
July 24 at 6 p.m.
Long Live Roxbury Brewery & Taproom, Boston
FREE

The accomplished pianist and composer George Russell Jr. (chair of Berklee’s Harmony and Jazz Composition Department) fronts a group with saxophonist Gregory Groover, bassist Wes Wirth, and drummer Sean Skeete. It’s part of the Long Live Roxbury free Thursday night music series.

Cambridge Jazz Festival
July 26-27 from noon to 6 p.m.
Danehy Park, Cambridge, Mass.
FREE

The 10^th edition of this annual free event features (Saturday) Zahili Zamora Quartet; Ron Reid’s Precious Metals Project; singer Spha Mdlalose with drummer Lumanyano Bizana; Eguie Castrillo y Su Orchestra’s “Salsa Dance Party”; and (Sunday) “Sound of Soul,” with Ron Savage, Bill Pierce, Bobby Broom, Consuelo Candelaria-Barry, and Ron Mahdi; the Berklee Institute of Jazz and Gender Justice ensemble; a sixtieth birthday retrospective from Grammy-winning drummer, composer, producer and Berklee professor Terri Lyne Carrington; and Elan Trotman and friends, featuring Aric B., for a “Motown Dance Party.”

The album cover of Lucía

Lucía
July 26 at 7:30 p.m.
Shalin Liu Performance Center, Rockport, Mass.

The twentysomething Mexican singer Lucía (born Lucía Gutiérrez Rebolloso), winner of the 2022 Sarah Vaughan International Jazz Vocal Competition, released a startlingly assured self-titled debut album last spring, with an all-star cast — pianist Edward Simon, bassist Larry Grenadier, drummer Antonio Sánchez, and saxophonist David Sánchez. Her supporting band at Rockport is also impressive: the formidable pianist and composer Zahili Gonzales Zamora (also see above, the Cambridge Jazz Festival), bassist Guillermo Lopez, and dummer Jullian Miltenberg. “Velvety” is the cliché at hand to describe Lucía’s sumptuous alto, but that word doesn’t convey the intelligence of her interpretations of Great American Songbook and Latin standards, as well as a curveball or two, like Olivia Rodrigo’s “Lacy,” and the facility that allows her to make the Dinah Washington chestnut “What a Difference a Day Makes” her own, taking it from the classic ballad treatment to its origins as a bolero.

Olson Pingrey Quartet
July 28 at 7 p.m.
Oliver Colvin Recital Hall, Berklee College of Music, 1140 Boylston Street, Boston
FREE

The OPQ bills itself as a “chordless quartet,” but we’re assuming that indicates the absence of a chording instrument (piano, guitar) and not the nature of the compositions. Whatever you call it, the husband/wife team of trombonist Rand Pingrey and baritone saxophonist Kathy Olson conjure mellifluous contrapuntal flow and swing. They’re joined by bassist Fernando Huergo and drummer Austin McMahon.

Ellwood Epps Quartet
July 29 at 8 p.m.
The New School of Music, Cambridge, Mass.

Trumpeter Ellwood Epps works the zone between free improv and jazz in his writing for this new quartet with fellow trumpeter Forbes Graham, bassist Nathan McBride, and drummer Luther Gray. Epps explains, “I am hearing sounds that we won’t get to experience if there are too many explicit or written instructions, or if the music is simply left to be whatever happens. The sound in between requires a kind of mystery that I’m learning to work with.” The show was last scheduled in April but postponed due to illness.

Trombonist and composer Angel Subero. Photo: Sue Auclair

Angel Subero & The Project
July 31 at 6 p.m.
Long Live Roxbury Brewery & Taproom, Boston
FREE

The Long Live Roxbury’s free Thursday night jazz shows continue with another Latin jazz supergroup: the distinguished trombonist and composer Angel Subero fronting the Project, with pianist Nando Michelin, bassist Oscar Stagnaro, drummer Gen Yoshimura, and percussionist Manolo Mairena.

Kat Edmonson
July 31 at 7:30 p.m.
Shalin Liu Performance Center, Rockport, Mass.

The captivating singer and (sometimes) songwriter Kat Edmonson (“Lucky”) holds forth at Rockport. Edmonson’s “small” light voice is a deceptive cover for reserves of power and stage-savvy command.

Portrait of musician Terence Blanchard at his home in New Orleans, LA. Photo: Cedric Angeles

Terence Blanchard
August 1 at 8 p.m.
Groton Hill Music Center, Groton, Mass.

The master trumpeter and composer revisits his lauded 2005 Blue Note album Flow with a new lineup: guitarist Charles Altura, pianist Julian Pollack, bassist Dale Black, and drummer Mark Whitfield II. Here’s a chance to catch this band prior to their Newport Jazz Festival appearance.

Newport Jazz Festival
August 1-3
Fort Adams State Park, Newport, R.I.

All three days of this year’s Newport Jazz Festival have been sold out for weeks. But you can try the “waitlist” for three-day tickets and individual days at the festival site. The pop entries this year strain the concept of crossover and “jazz adjacent” (the Roots, Flying Lotus, De La Soul, Janelle Monáe, Willow, and . . . Sophie Tukker?). Otherwise it’s a typical list of jazz heavyweights with a few new faces: John Scofield & Marcus Miller, Lakecia Benjamin, Ron Carter, Christian McBride, Darius Jones, Cécile McLorin Salvant, Preservation Hall Jazz Band, Aaron Parks Little Big, and Marcus Gilmore’s salute to his grandfather, “Centennial Tribute to Roy Haynes,” and a whole lot more.

Grace Kelly
August 2 at 5 p.m. and 8 p.m.
Shalin Liu Performance Center, Rockport, Mass.

Saxophonist, singer, and award-winning songwriter Grace Kelly is celebrating 20 years as a performer. (She made her debut at Scullers, at 12.)

Yoron Israel. Photo: Becky Yee

Yoron Israel and High Standards
August 3 at 5 p.m.
Highland Park, Roxbury, Mass.
FREE

In preparation for the release of a new album, Inspiration, the busy Boston drummer (and chair of Berklee’s percussion department) Yoron Israel plays this free Jazz at the Fort show, part of Berklee’s Summer in the City series in conjunction with the City of Boston. The band features players from the album: pianist Laszlo Gardony (in whose trio Israel has played for decades), singer Leah Hinton, saxophonist Ian Buss, and bassist Avery Sharpe, long of McCoy Tyner’s bands.

— Jon Garelick

Classical

Christopher Wilkins and the Boston Landmarks Orchestra. Photo: courtesy of the artist

The Best of Boston
Presented by Boston Landmarks Orchestra
DCR Hatch Shell, Boston
July 23, 7 p.m.

Christopher Wilkins leads BLO in the Hatch Shell premiere of Amy Beach’s unjustly neglected Piano Concerto. Asiya Korepanova is the soloist. Also on tap are works by John Williams, Leonard Bernstein, Florence Price, and John Harbison.

María Dueñas plays Mendelssohn
Presented by Boston Symphony Orchestra
Koussevitzky Shed, Lenox
July 25, 8 p.m.

The Spanish virtuoso joins the BSO for a performance of Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto. The program also includes that composer’s Calm Sea and Propserous Voyage, the Adagio from Mahler’s Symphony No. 10, and the Air from Bach’s Orchestral Suite No. 3.

Emanuel Ax performs piano for Celebrity Series of Boston at NEC Jordan Hall. Photo: Robert Torres

John Williams’ Piano Concerto
Presented by Boston Symphony Orchestra
Koussevitzky Shed, Lenox
July 26, 8 p.m.

Emanuel Ax presents the world premiere of a new concerto written for him by John Williams. Filling out the program is Mahler’s Symphony No. 1.

Peter and the Wolf
Presented by Boston Landmarks Orchestra
DCR Hatch Shell, Boston
July 30, 7 p.m.

Musical storytelling is at the heart of this BLO offering, which includes Prokofiev’s favorite alongside selections by Benjamin Britten, Fritz Kreisler, Louis Moreau Gottschalk, and Vivaldi.

— Jonathan Blumhofer

Author Events

Jessa Crispin at Harvard Book Store
What Is Wrong with Men: Patriarchy, the Crisis of Masculinity, and How (Of Course) Michael Douglas Films Explain Everything 
July 22 at 7 p.m.
Free

“How to be a Man? That question — and all the anxiety, anger, and resentment it stirs up — is the starting point for a crisis in masculinity that today manifests as misogyny, nativism, and corporate greed; gives rise to incels and mass shooters; and leads to panic over the rights of women and minorities. According to Jessa Crispin, it is the most important question of our time, and the answer to it might be found in an unlikely place: the films of Michael Douglas.

“In the 1980s, the rules for masculinity began to change. The goal was no longer to be a good, respectable family man, carrying on the patriarchal traditions of generations past. Not only was it becoming unfashionable, but increasingly difficult: the economic and political shifts — a slashed social safety net, globalization — made it harder to find a breadwinning income, a stable home life, and a secure place in the public sphere.

“So, then, how to be a man? From the early eighties to the late nineties, Michael Douglas showed us how: he was our president, our Wall Street overlord, our mass shooter, our failed husband, our midlife crisis, our cop, and our canary in the patriarchal coal mine. His characters were a mirror of our cultural shift, serving as the foundation for everything from the 1994 Crime Bill to Trump’s ultimate rise. With wry wit and wisdom, Crispin examines the phenomenon of the Michael Douglas character as a silver-screen seismograph registering the tectonic movements within our society that have fractured it in shocking ways.”

Nicky Gonzalez in conversation with Claire Luchette – Porter Square Books
Myra
July 22 at 7 p.m.
Free

“’A mesmerizing, hallucinatory adrenaline rush of a novel.’—Claire Luchette, author of Agatha of Little Neon It’s been years since Ingrid has heard from her childhood best friend, Mayra, a fearless rebel who fled their hometown of Hialeah, a Cuban neighborhood just west of Miami, for college in the Northeast. But when Mayra calls out of the blue to invite Ingrid to a weekend getaway at a house in the Everglades, she impulsively accepts.”

Gary Shteyngart at The Brattle Theatre – Harvard Book Store
Vera, or Faith: A Novel
July 24 at 6 p.m. (doors open at 5:30)
Tickets are $35, including copy of book

“Both biting and deeply moving, Vera, or Faith is a boldly imagined story of family and country told through the clear and tender eyes of a child. With a nod to What Maisie Knew, Henry James’s classic story of parents, children, and the dark ironies of a rapidly transforming society, Vera, or Faith demonstrates why Gary Shteyngart is, in the words of The New York Times, ‘one of his generation’s most original and exhilarating writers.'”

Aatish Taseer in conversation with Ellen Barry – Porter Square Books
A Return to Self
July 29 at 7 p.m.
Cambridge Edition, Cambridge MA
Free

“In 2019, the government of Prime Minister Narenda Modi revoked Aatish Taseer’s Indian citizenship, thereby exiling him from the country where he grew up and lived for thirty years. This loss, both practical and spiritual, sent him on a journey of revisiting the places that formed his identity, and asking broader questions about the complex forces that make a culture and a nationality, in the process.

In Istanbul, he confronts the hopes and ambitions of his former self. In Uzbekistan, he sees how what was once the majestic portal of the Silk Road is now a tourist façade. In India, he explores why Buddhism, which originated there, is so little practiced. Everywhere he goes, the ancient world mixes intimately with the contemporary: with the influences of the pandemic, the rise of new food cultures, and the ongoing cultural battles of regions around the world. How do centuries of cultures evolving and overlapping, often violently, shape the people that subsequently emerge from them?

In thoughtful prose that combines reportage with romanticism, Taseer casts an incisive eye at what it means to belong to a place that becomes an unstable, politicized vessel for ideas defined by exclusion and prejudice, and gets to the human heart of the shifts and migrations that define our multicultural world.”

Jayne Anne Phillips in conversation with André Bernard – The Mount – Lenox
Night Watch
July 31 from 5- 6 p.m.
Tickets are $27- $42 depending on membership

“Epic, enthralling, and meticulously crafted, Pulitzer Prize-winning novel Night Watch (Knopf, 2023) is a stunning chronicle of surviving war and its aftermath. Jayne Anne Phillips’s novel opens in 1874—the wake of the Civil War—when twelve-year-old ConaLee finds herself on a buckboard journey with her mother, Eliza, who hasn’t spoken in over a year. They are delivered to the Trans-Allegheny Lunatic Asylum in West Virginia where, far from family, a beloved neighbor, and their mountain home, they begin to forge a new path forward. In this conversation with André Bernard, Phillips will explore the craft of interweaving history and storytelling, delving into the research, character development, and narrative depth that bring the past so vividly to life.”

Picture + Panel: Resistance and Resilience with Mattie Lubchansky and Denali Sai Nalamalapu – Porter Square Books
August 4 at 7 p.m.
Free

“Picture + Panel is a monthly conversation series that brings fantastic graphic novel creators to the Greater Boston area. Discover terrific authors and fascinating stories that combine text and art through conversational confabulation. Produced in partnership by the Boston Comic Arts Foundation, Porter Square Books, and the Boston Figurative Arts Center, Picture + Panel provides thought-provoking discussions for adults about this unique form of expression.

All BCAF events are free to attend. If you wish to pay it forward, a $5 suggested donation helps sustain BCAF’s comics advocacy and educational programming in the Greater Boston area.

Mattie Lubchansky is a cartoonist and illustrator. She is also an Ignatz winner, a Herblock Prize finalist, and the author of Boys Weekend, The Antifa Super-Soldier Cookbook, and her latest work, Simplicity. She lives in beautiful Queens, NY, with her spouse.

Denali Sai Nalamalapu is a climate organizer from Southern Maine and Southern India. Denali lives in Southwest Virginia. They have written for Truthout, Prism, and Mergoat Magazine, and their climate activism has been covered in Shondaland, Vogue India, Self, The Independent, and elsewhere. They studied English Literature at Bates College and completed a Fulbright grant in Malaysia. Their debut graphic novel is Holler: A Graphic Memoir of Rural Resistance. You can find them at @DenaliSai on Instagram.”

Writer Rax King Photo: courtesy of the artist

Rax King with Luke O’Neil – Brookline Booksmith
Sloppy, Or: Doing It All Wrong
August 5 at 7 p.m.
Tickets are Free or $22.37 with in store book pickup

“‘Most writers are boring people. King, though, seems different: Bettie Page meets Carrie Bradshaw.’—Washington Post

With Rax King’s trademark blend of irreverent humor and heartfelt honesty comes a new collection of personal essays unpacking bad behavior. Sloppy explores sobriety, begrudging self-improvement, and the habits we cling to with clenched fists.

In “Proud Alcoholic Stock,” King examines her parents’ unwavering dedication to 12 step programs and the texture her family history has lent to her own sobriety. “Shoplifting from Brandy Melville” is a lighthearted look at, what else?, shoplifting from Brandy Melville—one of her few remaining indulgences now that she doesn’t drink. King writes about her overspending and temper control issues as well as her poorly managed mental health. These seventeen essays capture the personal and generational vices that make us who we are. From being a crummy waitress to using uppers to force friendships, from obsessing over the Neopets forums to lying for no discernable reason, these essays approach bad habits with emotional intelligence, kindness and—most importantly—humor.”

— Matt Hanson