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.

EDITOR’S NOTE: Boston area theaters have decided to pretty much ignore what is happening in America and beyond–mounting threats to democracy, the country’s slide toward authoritarianism, the climate crisis, growing economic inequality, ICE’s violent roundup of immigrants, the expansion of internment camps, ongoing genocide in Gaza, war crimes in the West Bank, transphobia, the grueling war in Ukraine, etc. I have decided to point out a production in Coming Attractions–staged in America or elsewhere–that grapples with today’s alarming realities. Sometimes the stagings will be available via Zoom, sometimes not. It is important to present evidence that theater artists–maybe not here, but elsewhere–are reflecting, and reflecting on, the world around us.

On the one hand, this is an admirable event, particularly in the politically quiescent Boston theater scene. Huzzah to SpeakEasy Stage!

“As midterm elections approach, Americans have plenty to say about the state of the country. Beyond protesting, casting ballots and watching results, what can people do with their political frustration, anxiety, and pent-up emotion? Boston’s SpeakEasy Stage theater company has an unconventional answer: turn it into a theater event.”

“Part public venting session, part communal release valve on Election Eve, PUBLIC RESPONSE offers a playfully profound take on a timely human need.”

“On Election Eve — Monday, Nov. 2 at 6:30 p.m. — participants write letters to politicians, public figures, and anyone else who deserves a piece of their mind. Then, in a twist only theater can deliver, some of the city’s biggest theater personalities bring the letters to life in larger-than-life dramatic readings.”

“PUBLIC RESPONSE opens a larger conversation about how Americans process an unusually charged election season—and the creative ways communities can make space for expression, connection and a much-needed laugh. It’s part of SpeakEasy’s new lineup of one-night-only events to bring people together beyond the traditional theatergoing experience.”

On the other hand, you don’t have to be a card-carrying member of the DSA to wonder why the company waited until Election Eve — Election Eve! — to gather an audience for a “playfully profound” experience dedicated to writing letters to politicians during this “unusually charged election season.”

Democracy has been under attack for years. MAGA and its authoritarian minions didn’t just start consolidating power and spreading fear. Meanwhile, the list of urgent issues Boston-area theater ignores keeps growing: the country’s slide toward authoritarianism, the climate crisis, widening economic inequality, ICE’s violent roundup and imprisonment of immigrants, the proliferation of internment camps and AI data centers, the ongoing genocide in Gaza, war crimes in the West Bank and in the war with Iran, transphobia, the grinding conflict in Ukraine, with Trump taking Putin’s side. This is not a shortage of material. It is a shameful failure to engage.

As Skye Perryman argues, neither the courts nor the midterms will rescue democracy without sustained public action. Those Election Eve letters may arrive too late to matter.

But, as my mother used to say with a disappointed shake of her head, better late than never. I just hope it is not too late.

For a more expansive effort to speak to the country’s crisis, check out my theater picks listing for the Women+ On The Edge of Democracy event at Shakespeare & Company in Lenox on Nov 1.

— Bill Marx

Film

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.

Halloween Hullabaloo
October 27–30
Somerville Theatre

Actor, filmmaker, and film programmer Julia Marchese’s selections include Night of the Living Dead, House (Hausu), Killer Klowns from Outer Space, Phantasm, Cujo, and Pet Sematary. October 30 brings House on Haunted Hill and Dragonwyck, with an appearance by special guest Victoria Price!

From left: Bárbara Lennie and Victoria Luengo in Bitter Christmas. Photo: Cannes Film Festival

IFFBoston Fall Focus, Part II
October 29–November 4
Brattle Theatre

• Thursday, October 29: The Debut, 7 p.m.
• Friday, October 30: Rehearsals for a Revolution, 6 p.m.; Bedford Park, 8 p.m.
• Saturday, October 31: La Gradiva, 11:45 a.m.; Ashes, 2:45 p.m.; Everytime, 5 p.m.; Coward, 7:30 p.m.; Split Rock, 10 p.m.
• Sunday, November 1: Tangles, noon; The Dreamed Adventure, 2:15 p.m.; Clarissa, 5:30 p.m.; Bitter Christmas, 8 p.m.
• Monday, November 2: Elsinore, 8 p.m.
• Tuesday, November 3: I Play Rocky, 7 p.m. (35mm).
• Wednesday, November 4: Behemoth!, 8 p.m.

Watsky x Infinity
October 26, at 7 p.m.
Somerville Theatre, Davis Square

In 2016, Watsky, a genre-bending rapper and poet known for verbal gymnastics, capped his creatively ambitious record x Infinity with a visual album comprising 18 interconnected music videos. To celebrate its tenth birthday, Watsky performs the album in its entirety alongside a synchronized projection of the album film. His debut essay collection, How to Ruin Everything, was a New York Times bestseller, and, as a COVID fundraiser, he set a Guinness World Record by freestyling for 33 continuous hours. His work spans film, television, and Broadway.

Girl Winter Film Tour
October 29
Regent Theatre, Arlington

A night of five women-centric short ski films continues the celebration of women in snow sports. Live music, a Q&A, and a poster signing with the athletes and filmmakers who brought the films to life will follow. All are welcome! For more information about the films, visit girlwinterfilmtour.com/films.

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. at Somerville Theatre, Davis Square

This 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.

Boston Jewish Film Festival
November 4–15
Coolidge Corner Theatre, Brattle Theatre, Riemer-Goldstein Theater, West Newton Cinema, Museum of Fine Arts, and Somerville Theatre

This year’s Boston Jewish Film Festival lineup spotlights women fighting against the odds alongside stories of righteous courage that challenge injustice and refuse to look away. The program includes seven narrative features, four feature documentaries, and four short films spanning a variety of genres and cultures, with special guests and performances accompanying the screenings. Film schedule and tickets.

Boston Open Screen
November 3; signup at 7 p.m., screening at 7:30 p.m.
Coolidge Corner Theatre

Share your film projected in a dark room with lively strangers. Whether you sold your home to finance your 35mm feature or made it last night in your parents’ basement, if your movie (or part thereof) is under 10 minutes, they will screen it.

A scene from Daughter of the Darkness. Photo: HFA

Great Expectations: British Postwar Cinema, 1945–1960
October 31
Harvard Film Archive

Two films from this series are well suited to Halloween:

Daughter of Darkness, 7 p.m. Closer to Buñuel’s Mexican films than to British cinema, this morbid tale follows a nymphomaniac Irish girl who brings death to the men attracted to her.

The Three Weird Sisters, 9 p.m. With a screenplay co-written by Dylan Thomas, this film follows three sisters as they attempt to poison their half-brother to save their crumbling home.

— Tim Jackson

Arpeggione performing score of Nosferatu during a screening at Epsilon Spires, Brattleboro VT. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Nosferatu: A Symphony of Horror
October 29 at 7:30 p.m.
Lesley University’s Marran Theater, 34 Mellen Street, Cambridge

Arpeggione will be performing a brand-new arrangement of Hans Erdmann’s original score by its co-artistic director Thomas Carroll, played live by ten musicians.

“Step back in time and experience Nosferatu as audiences did more than a century ago. Arpeggione will perform on historical instruments from the early 20th century, including harmonium, flute, clarinet, and strings. Arpeggione originated this production in Salem, Massachusetts, and has since performed it for sold-out or near-capacity audiences throughout New England.”

A scene from Grossness of Closeness. Photo: courtesy of Bright Film Festival

Finding Bright Film Festival
November 5–8
Capitol Theatre, Arlington

The Arlington International Film Festival returns with a new name and a declared mission to “Make Boston Weirder.” Under new executive director Jaina Cipriano, Finding Bright emphasizes handmade filmmaking, artistic risk, and unconventional storytelling, supplementing its screenings with immersive audience experiences. The lineup includes Objet A, YO: Love Is a Rebellious Bird, Fantastique, and Matapanki, along with programs of family, nature, horror, and experimental shorts.

Beyond the screen: an opening-night ice cream party, a candlelit tea party with filmmakers, an interactive “witch hunt,” and monster sketching during live readings. Schedule and tickets.

— Bill Marx

Pick of the Week

The Innocents
Amazon Prime and Kanopy

A scene from The Innocents. Photo: IFC Midnight

While considering international films suitable for Halloween, I thought of Takashi Miike’s chilling Audition (1999) and the unique Swedish vampire thriller Let the Right One In (2008). Instead, I chose instead the elegant Norwegian supernatural tale The Innocents, directed by Eskil Vogt, a collaborator with Joachim Trier on the latter’s The Worst Person in the World.

It features some wonderful performances by child actors. Nine-year-old Ida moves into an apartment complex with her parents and her older sister Anna, who is autistic. During the summer, they befriend two neighboring children, Ben and Aisha, and discover that they have extraordinary abilities, including telepathy and telekinesis. The horror comes from watching kids wield enormous power before they have developed the empathy or moral judgment to handle it. Like The Bad Seed (1956) or Children of the Damned (1964), it is an unsettling exploration of the boundary between childhood innocence and deliberate harm.

— Tim Jackson

Theater

Chadwick Stokes in rehearsal for 1972. Photo provided by A.R.T.

1972: a Rock Opera, by Chadwick Stokes with Jessie Nelson. Directed by Jessie Nelson. Staged by the American Repertory Theatre at Farkas Hall at 527 Holyoke Street, Cambridge, through October 27 through November 22.

Chadwick Stokes, best known for his bands Dispatch and State Radio, brings his long-awaited rock opera to fruition with co-creator Jessie Nelson, telling the story of Hannah, a pregnant woman who rides the rails in search of an abortion one year before the Supreme Court (then) made such procedures legal. Played by Gracie McGraw, Hannah finds support and empowerment from underground network the Janes, and Stokes’ current band the Pintos move the still-timely narrative with onstage music.

— Paul Robicheau

Fall Rep Festival, produced by Boston Playwrights’ Theatre at 949 Commonwealth Avenue in Boston November 5 through 22.

Two new plays in rep: Yide Cai’s White Phoenix, directed by Dmitry Troyanovsky,”compresses decades of China–America entanglement into one room and two actors playing four characters, turning geopolitics into a story about siblings separated by adoption and trying to find their way back.” Rachel Beth Greene’s jessica of venice, directed by Josh Glenn-Kayden, “reclaims Shakespeare’s Jessica, usually dismissed as a selfish daughter, through a curious Hasidic girl secretly reading The Merchant of Venice, drawing on Greene’s own upbringing in the observant Jewish world.”

“One play explores the concept of holding on; while the other tackles breaking away. Together, they ask what it costs to span the distance between two worlds, explored in Yide and Rachel’s just released Q&A, where they discuss their plays and each other’s work.”

Camp Siegfried by Bess Wohl. Directed by Genée Coreno. Staged by WAM Theatre at the Elayne P. Bernstein Theater, Shakespeare & Company, Lenox, MA, 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.”

Rafael Jordan and Karl Kenzler in the Huntington Theatre Company production of Harper Lee’s To Kill a Mockingbird. Photo: Liza Voll

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.” Arts Fuse review

The Getaway Driver by Deborah Salem Smith and Charlie Thurston. Directed by Chris Columbus.  Staged by Central Square Theater, 450 Massachusetts Avenue, Cambridge, October 29 through November 22.

“Based on the true story of Katherine Ann Power and Clare Schroeder,” this new drama follows two women bound by a single, life-altering moment. It’s 1970. College student Power joins an activist group to protest the war. When their resistance turns deadly, Schroeder must grow up in the shadow of her father’s murder while Power disappears and spends decades on the FBI’s Most Wanted List. Years later, when Power resurfaces seeking redemption, she must confront Schroeder and the past that shaped their lives. The play asks: How far is too far in the fight to do what’s right?”

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.

The Commute by Karin Anell. Staged by TC Squared Theatre at the Rockwell, Davis Square, Somerville, on Nov. 1.

Looks like a play that takes on AI—via a spin on Sartre’s No Exit! Four strangers find themselves trapped on the Red Line. An AI agent gone rogue assumes the main role toward the end of the drama. The production stars two-time Elliott Norton Award–winning actor Anthony T. Goss. The evening performance is followed by a panel hosted by Joint Family, discussing how AI is changing ordinary life and the threats and opportunities posed by emerging technologies.

The Wash by Kelundra Smith. Directed by Tasia A. Jones. Staged by the Front Porch Arts Collective at the Roberts Studio Theatre at the Calderwood Pavilion, Oct. 31 through Nov. 22.

Set in an Atlanta laundry cooperative in 1881, the script follows a group of underpaid washerwomen who risk their livelihoods to demand fair wages. Inspired by a historic strike in the aftermath of Reconstruction, this often humorous drama explores the friendships, conflicts, and collective resolve that turn working women into a force for change. The cast includes MaConnia Chesser, Lindsey McWhorter, Eliza Fichter, Kiera Prusmack, Marhadoo Effeh and Victoria Omoregie.

Patrick Page in All the Devils Are Here. Photo: Julieta Cervantes

All the Devils Are Here: How Shakespeare Invented the Villain, created and performed by Patrick Page. Directed by Simon Godwin. Staged by Octopus Theatricals at the Emerson Paramount Center, Robert J. Orchard Stage, Boston, October 28 through November 1.

Respected Shakespearean actor Patrick Page “turns his attention to the twisted motivation and hidden humanity at the heart of Shakespeare’s greatest villains. Moving swiftly through the Shakespeare canon, Page illuminates the playwright’s ever-evolving conception of evil by delving into more than a dozen of his most wicked creations.”

Women+ On The Edge of Democracy, presented by Shakespeare & Company in Studio 3 of the Elayne P. Bernstein Performing Arts Center, Lenox, November 1 at 5 p.m. Nine plays will be read as part of a 12-day International event.

“A groundbreaking initiative encouraging conversation about American democracy created by the Flynn Center in Vermont and The Susan Smith Blackburn Prize (Leslie Swackhamer, Executive Director), Women+ On The Edge Of Democracy sets out to form a collective portrait of a nation in doubt and transformation–seen through the eyes of women+ playwrights from around the world who have long chronicled America’s contradictions and dreams.”

“Ariel Bock, producing associate with Shakespeare & Company, said she’s pleased to be able to take part in an international movement.” ‘I’m glad we have the opportunity to present some of these amazing plays, and that we can be part of an effort to mobilize theater as a means to help start important conversations, and encourage all of us to vote as the election gets closer,’ she said.

Shakespeare & Company will present nine readings of 10-minute plays, selected from Women+ On The Edge Of Democracy anthology of 34 woman-identifying playwrights. The titles were chosen by a committee of Company Artists, and will be presented in two acts with talkbacks at the end of each act. The dramatists include Lynn Nottage, Sarah Ruhl,  Lauren M. Gunderson, and Bridget Carpenter.

— Bill Marx

Visual Art

A sampling of Laurent Grass’s Metaphysical Maze. Photo: MassMOCA

Opening November 7 at MassMOCA in North Adams, Metaphysical Maze “unites five works which look at shifting perceptions, invisible forces, and the resonance of landscape”: OttO (2018), Anima (2022), Orchid Island (2023), Geophonia (2024), and Cosmic Drive (2026). The massive installation, the largest ever in the United States by the prominent French conceptual artist Laurent Grasso, brings together the artist’s most characteristic films with painting, sculpture, and “architectural interventions.” The intent seems to be to thwart, distort, and pause the perception of time and the definitions of places and things. “Entering my exhibition,” Grasso says, “is like walking into a forest — an imaginary landscape where you wander without trying to identify every species of tree.”

Time figures in a different sense in Lydia Viscardi – Time Takes Time, opening October 31 at the Lyman Allyn Art Museum in New London, CT. Viscardi, who makes multimedia pieces that combine painting, collage, drawing, printed matter, vintage hand-embellished textiles, fabric, and found objects, sees her work as dealing with changes in the natural environment alongside the cycles of the seasons. “Counter to [environmental shifts],” the artist says, “the comforting rhythm of spring, summer, autumn, and winter provides a measure through which time can be seen and felt.”

I got to know the British artist Richard Long years ago while working on one of his exhibitions. Besides being a delight to talk to about such topics as the deep structures of culture, the aesthetics of industrial decline, the London art world, and his friends, the living sculptures Gilbert & George, he struck me at the time as British in an essential, almost pre-Conquest way, one deeper than the usual Masterpiece Theater clichés of accent, tea obsessions, and class fixation. His work at the time straddled three movements that came to dominate in the 1970s: earthworks, conceptualism, and minimalism. The elegant, clean, and precise simplicity of his stone circles, in particular, suggested to me connections to things ancient beyond memory, written or physical.

Artist Richard Long in 2017. Photo: Courtesy, Lisson. Photo: Jack Hems.

Richard Long: Gravityopens November 4 at the Yale Center for British Art. Long, now in his eighties, won the Turner Prize in 1989 and was knighted in 2018. He will create the installation Gravity on site for the Center’s Entrance Court. The Center says very little about what Gravity will look like and may not know much, but there are hints that the original title might have been Muddy Gravity, which suggests connections to Long’s mud works, which began in the 1980s, or to muddy gravity-flow deposits, deposits left by underwater sediment flows that can feature in fossil strata. We shall soon see.

Founded in 1959 by Luis A. Ferré, the Museo de Arte de Ponce is located on the southern coast of Puerto Rico. Damaged in the 2020 earthquakes, the museum’s 1965 building, designed by Edward Durell Stone, is under repair while selections from its collections travel off-island. The Sense of Beauty: Six Centuries of Painting from Museo de Arte de Ponceopens at the Wadsworth Atheneum on November 5, bringing to Hartford (and its large Puerto Rican population) European art from the 1500s to the 1800s and Puerto Rican art from the 1700s to the present. Among the artists on view are El Greco, Francisco de Goya, Claude Lorrain, Peter Paul Rubens, José Campeche, and Francisco Oller y Cestero. Perhaps the most famous work in the show, internationally known from thousands of postcards and reproductions, is Frederic Leighton’s brilliantly orange Flaming June.

Charles W. Andrews, Filipino Study, from Album of the Philippines, 1857. Color lithograph. The Hispanic Society Museum and Library, New York

Other kinds of island perspectives are featured in The Sun Never Sets: Photographs and Prints of Cuba, the Philippines, and Puerto Rico from the Hispanic Society Museum and Library, opening November 5 at the Colby Museum of Art on the Colby College campus in Waterville, ME. Probably not coincidentally, the three island territories of the title were part of the Spanish Empire before coming under U.S. occupation or control in the Spanish-American War, setting off another long, entangling imperial history. “The Sun Never Sets” is a reference to the sixteenth-century refrain “el imperio donde nunca se pone el sol,” or “the empire where the sun never sets,” a Spanish boast that had grown steadily thinner by the late 19th century, when most of the objects in the show were made.

Featuring photographs, prints, and albums depicting streets and harbors, plantations and public buildings, and the people who inhabited them in the fading years of empire, the selection includes many works from the Hispanic Society not previously exhibited. “These images are not neutral records,” the museum cautions. “Made for particular purposes and audiences, they reflect the perspectives of those who created and commissioned them.”

Sean Scully, the Dublin-born painter whom many consider one of the leading abstract artists alive today, moved to London’s Hampstead Heath nearly two hundred years after John Constable made Hampstead his London base in 1819. After traveling every day for two years across the same landscapes Constable painted, Scully came to recognize him as an artistic kindred spirit, “fostered under the same dark, wet light.”

In Shadows in Nature: Renowned Painter Sean Scully on the Enduring Legacy of John Constable, an artist conversation with Yale Center for British Art director Martina Droth, Scully will “reflect on Constable’s work and legacy while also offering insights and reflections into his own artistic practice.” Presented in conjunction with the Center’s exhibition John Constable: The Landscape Reimagined, the program will take place on October 28 starting at 5 p.m. Admission is free; the event will also be live-streamed via the museum’s website.

— Peter Walsh

Halloween-geared rock

Ak’chamel during a live performance in Thessaloniki. Photo: Simos Saltiel

Ak’chamel and Sunburned Hand of the Man
October 29, doors at 7 p.m.
Deep Cuts, Medford, Mass.

If Halloween is meant to be dark and scary, Ak’chamel sure fits that bill. Conjuring primitive, psychedelic rituals like witch doctors in tattered clon aks and headdresses draped in grassy clumps of hair, the Texas outfit tests avant-garde limits with cries of apocalyptic dread. Arrive early for another longtime underground phenomenon in Boston-based wanderers Sunburned Hand of the Man, raising a din with its own immersive experimentation.

Moe.
October 30-31, at 8 p.m.
The Wilbur, Boston

Three decades down the road, these veteran jammers from upstate New York bring their annual Halloween hi-jinks to Boston for a two-night Wilbur stand that culminates on the holiday with a theme built around the party-hearty 1970s teen movie “Dazed and Confused.” Who knows what that will entail, but long-haired stoner wigs seem more likely than a Led Zeppelin cover of that name. The band bolstered its impressive catalog of originals with the recent Circle of Giants, which features Ghosts of Jupiter keyboardist Nate Wilson, turning moe. into a sextet.

–Paul Robicheau

Blues on Halloween
Oct. 31
Regent Theater, Arlington

This annual blues bash pays tribute to the late WGBH blues host Mai Cramer, with proceeds benefiting the Ellie Fund. The star-studded cast includes Ronnie Earl and the Broadcasters, Delanie Pickering, Sugar Ray Norcia, and Monster Mike Welch.

— Noah Schaffer

Jazz

Trumpeter and arranger Greg Hopkins. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Greg Hopkins Nonet
October 29 at 7 p.m.
The Mad Monkfish, Cambridge

The night is being subtitled “Miles at 100, Greg at 80” and will include master arranger Hopkins’ take on the 1949–50 Miles Davis Birth of the Cool sessions, as well as McCoy Tyner’s Tender Moments and Herbie Hancock’s The Prisoner — “alongside an exciting collection of original compositions by Hopkins.” The band includes Hopkins on trumpet and flugelhorn; reed and flute player Shannon LeClaire; baritone sax and bass clarinet Ben Whiting; French horn Shelagh Abate; trombone Pete Fanelli; tuba Zack Grass; pianist Chris Neville; bassist Jesse Williams, and drummer Yoron Israel.

Santi Debriano
October 30 at 7 p.m.
Scullers Jazz Club, Boston

Bassist and composer Santi Debriano’s distinguished career as sideman and leader includes a daunting who’s who, from Archie Shepp, Sam Rivers, and Randy Weston to Oliver Lake and Joe Lovano. He comes to Scullers with the requisite band of heavy cats: saxophonist Abraham Burton, guitarist Tom Guarna, and drummer Robby Ameen.

Club d’Elf  in costume for an earlier Halloween gig. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Club d’Elf
October 30 at 8 p.m.
Groton Hill Music Center, Groton, MA

The Gnawa-influenced trance-dub-jazz jam masters do their fully costumed Halloween show at Groton Hill for the second year running: Club d’Elf ringmaster Mike Rivard (bass & sintir), keyboardist Paul Schultheis, turntablist Mister Rourke, percussionist and vocalist Fabio Pirozzolo, and drummer Dean Johnston, with special guest Scott Metzger, of Joe Russo’s Almost Dead. Audience costumes are encouraged. Note from Paul Robicheau: The presence of Metzger makes sense, since Club d’Elf’s excellent new album, Loon and Thrush, floats a couple of Grateful Dead songs along the way.

Use the Force
October 30 at 9 p.m.
The Substation, Roslindale

The quintet Use the Force celebrates Halloween by giving their own jazz-funk spin to movie and TV soundtracks, from “The Addams Family Theme” to familiar fare by the likes of John Williams and others. “Think Harry Potter wallowing in butterbeer in New Orleans and Darth Vader busting out the head spins at a dance party.” The accomplished band includes mastermind Brian Friedland on keyboards, saxophonist Rick Stone, guitarist Nick Grondin, bassist Sean Farius, and drummer Giuseppe Paradiso.

Benny Green
October 31 at 7 p.m.
Scullers Jazz Club, Boston

Pianist Bennie Green’s solo piano recitals at Scullers have become a regular thing. Good for us!

Pianist and composer Joe Alterman. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Joe Alterman Trio
November 5 at 7 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge

We’ll leave aside for the moment Joe Alterman’s participation “Black-Jewish Jazz,” Episode 152 of “Amusing Jews,” and just say that he’s a delightfully skilled pianist and composer. He’s at the Regattabar with bassist Brad Barrett and drummer Austin McMahon.

Zahili Zamora Afro-Cuban Jazz Quartet
November 6 at 5 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge

Pianist and composer Zahili Zamora’s take on the Afro-Cuban tradition can be unusually introspective and affectingly lyrical. Her quartet includes bassist Gerson Lazo Quiroga, drummer Zack O’Farrill, and saxophonist Yosvany Terry.

Pianist Donal Fox. Photo: Lou Jones

Donal Fox
November 7 at 7 p.m.
Regattabar, Cambridge

The pianist and composer Donal Fox came to the fore with his mashups of Bach and Scarlatti with jazz from the likes of Monk and Ornette. His improvisational savvy, dynamic grooves, and keyboard marksmanship have since ranged far and wide. He’s calling this program “Bearing Witness to Humanity,” inspired by the late artist John Wilson’s exhibit last year at the Museum of Fine Arts and, later, at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. The Regattabar show, writes Fox, “will weave an emotional journey of hope, resistance, and celebration,” featuring his arrangement of Frederic Rzewski’s “The People United will Never be Defeated,” variations on the Ukrainian National Anthem, and Fox’s “Star-Spangled Banner Fractured.” He’s joined by a band that will include saxophonist Jacques Swartz Bart and bassist John Lockwood, with a drummer TBA.

JCA Orchestra
November 8 at 2 p.m.
Lilypad, Cambridge
November 9 at 8 p.m.
Berklee Performance Center, Boston

The Jazz Composers Alliance Orchestra opens its 41st season with two consecutive concerts, the first at the tiny Lilypad in Cambridge, the next at the capacious Berklee Performance Center. Resident composers David Harris, Darrell Katz, Bob Pilkington, and Mimi Rabson conjure “the noises the Green Line makes, a meeting in a bar of a Bulgarian, an Arab, and an Ethiopian, and a setting of a Charles Coe poem about inviting Duke Ellington to dinner.”

— Jon Garelick

Roots and World Music

Sound and Music in the Muslim World
Oct. 27
New England Conservatory

This free daylong conference and evening concert organized by NEC doctoral candidate Hasan Imam Hamdani explores the vast range of both sacred and everyday sound and music across the many cultures that make up the Muslim world. Conference topics address the significance of sound in Muslim contexts, oral tradition and memorization, music education in Muslim communities, and understanding Islam through art. The 6 p.m. concert features guitarist Hamdani and sitarist Jawwad Noor performing Hindustani classical music, Firas Zreik performing Arabic music on the qanun, Mehmet Ali Sanlikol’s Turkish-inspired sounds and American musical forms, and the Moroccan gnawa rhythms of Samir Langus.

The Strayaways. Photo: courtesy of the artist

The Strayaways
Oct. 28
The Burren

This brand-new trio is a special treat for Celtic fiddle fans: Irish legend Kevin Burke is teaming up with 30-something American fiddler Dylan Foley. Rounding out the all-star group is singer/songwriter/guitarist/bouzouki player Eamon O’Leary.

Micky Dolenz: 60 Years of the Monkees
Oct. 30
The Cabot, Beverly

Micky Dolenz, the last surviving member of the Monkees, has reenergized his live shows in recent years with a cracking band and interesting setlists. This tour celebrates the debut of the still-underrated pop combo whose use of music as a visual medium still looms large over popular culture.

Sawaari
Nov. 1, 4 p.m.
Upstairs at McCarthy’s

Percussionist Fabio Pirozzolo’s monthly matinee series continues with the welcome reconvening of a Boston ensemble that explores the music of many lands from the Mediterranean to the Middle East. Joining Fabio Pirozzolo are Mike Rivard (sintir and double bass), Andy Bergman (sax, clarinet), and Mal Barsamian (oud).

The Platform Grand Opening
Nov. 6–7
The Platform, Cambridge

In a city starved for small performance venues, here is some wonderful news: The Platform, a Kendall Square complex of three spaces, is ready for its opening. The Global Arts Live-hosted facility will be featuring dozens of dance, music, and art events over the next few months. Up first is a Nov. 6 event for Global Arts Live members with outdoor aerial dance by BANDALOOP and an indoor performance by Compagnie Hervé Koubi, a free Nov. 7 daytime family-friendly event with multiple BANDALOOP performances, and a Nov. 7 premiere by Compagnie Hervé Koubi of its new work Sol Invictus.

Marty Stuart and His Fabulous Superlatives. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Marty Stuart and His Fabulous Superlatives
Nov. 6
The Cabot, Beverly

While mainstream country continues to drift away from its roots, Marty Stuart is holding on strong. He’s got one of the best working bands in all of popular music and a great 2025 record of surf instrumentals called Space Junk. Don’t be surprised if one of country’s greatest historians pays tribute to New England’s musical legacy with a Dick Curless cover.

Dennis Brennan Band
Nov. 6
Regent Theater, Arlington

The beloved Regent manager Leland Stein is celebrating his 25th anniversary at the historic Arlington venue. Appropriately, the milestone is being celebrated by some of Boston’s finest musicians as the Dennis Brennan Band returns with its classic edition: guitar masters Duke Levine and Kevin Barry, bassist Richard Gates, and drummer Billy Beard all backing the quintessential blue collar Boston singer/songwriter/rocker Brennan.

— Noah Schaffer

Rock, Indie, and Alternative

Marshall Crenshaw. Photo: Todd Chalfant

Marshall Crenshaw
November 11 at 7:30 p.m.
City Winery, Boston

Marshall Crenshaw has written any number of perfect pop songs, including “Someday, Someway,” “Cynical Girl,” and “Dime a Dozen Guy.” He returns to City Winery on the heels of The Bootleg Sounds of Marshall Crenshaw: 1984-87 (Arts Fuse review).

— Jon Garelick

BEAT: Belew/Vai/Levin/Bozzio, performing the music of King Crimson
November 6, at 8 p.m.
Boch Center Wang Theatre, Boston

It’s not actually King Crimson given the absence of Robert Fripp, but this virtuoso group delivers the next best thing in mining that band’s 1980s repertoire. Two of that era’s members, Adrian Belew (guitar, vocals) and Tony Levin (bass, Chapman stick), are joined by guitar savant Steve Vai as well as drummer Terry Bozzio, who steps in for Tool’s Danny Carey on BEAT’s latest (and possibly last) tour. Carey was a big draw, but Bozzio’s no slouch. He served with Frank Zappa (expect a nod in the setlist), as have all members but Levin. And Bozzio will dominate the stage with his “sick jazz kit,” a still-towering, monstrosity of tuned drums and cymbals.

–Paul Robicheau

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Classical Music

Alarm Will Sound in action. Photo: Michal Ramus

in vain
Presented by Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum
October 29, 7 p.m.
Calderwood Hall, Boston

The Thursday before the midterm elections, the Garnder Museum presents Alarm Will Sound in Georg Friedrich Haas’s seminal study of authoritarianism and resistance, in vain.

Haydn’s The Creation
Presented by Boston Symphony Orchestra
November 5 at 7:30 p.m., 6 at 1:30 p.m., and 7 at 8 p.m.
Symphony Hall

Philippe Jordan returns to Boston to lead the BSO in Haydn’s masterful adaptation of John Milton and Genesis. Soloists Louise Alder, Bogdan Volkov, and David Steffens are joined by the Tanglewood Festival Chorus.

A Streetcar Named Desire
Presented by Boston Lyric Opera
November 5 & 6 at 7:30 p.m., and 8 at 3 p.m.
Emerson Colonial Theatre

BLO’s 50th-anniversary season continues with a rare performance of André Previn’s 1998 adaptation of Tennessee Williams’ iconic play. Brittany Renee sings Blanche DuBois and Thomas Glass is Stanley Kowalski. Daniela Candillari conducts.

Gil Rose conducting BMOP. Photo: Dave Jamrog

Delight of the Muses
Presented by Boston Modern Orchestra Project
November 6, 7:30 p.m.
Jordan Hall

Gil Rose and BMOP open their season with music by Anthony De Ritis, Charles Wuorinen, Samuel Barber, and Matthew Aucoin. Soprano Julia Bullock joins the ensemble in music by the last two: the former’s Knoxville: Summer of 1915 and two arias from the latter’s No One’s Rose.

Zander conducts Russian favorites
Presented by Boston Philharmonic Youth Orchestra
November 6, 8 p.m.
Symphony Hall

The BPYO opens its final season with a night of explosive Russian music. Stravinsky’s Petrushka and Tchaikovsky’s Symphony No. 5 are the night’s big items, while the curtain goes up with Glinka’s exuberant Ruslan & Ludmila Overture. Benjamin Zander conducts.

Pianist Igor Levit. Photo: Boston University

Igor Levit plays Beethoven
Presented by Vivo Performing Arts
November 8, 3 p.m.
Symphony Hall

Pianist Levit, one of the day’s greatest Beethoven interpreters, makes his Symphony Hall solo recital debut playing four sonatas by that composer: Nos. 1, 17 (“The Tempest”), 25, and 21 (“Waldstein”).

— Jonathan Blumhofer

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Author Events

Emily St. John Mandel
Exit Party
October 26 at 6 p.m.
First Parish Church, Cambridge, MA
Tickets are $49.09 with book.

“A glittering puzzle box of a novel. . . . [The] novel brilliantly ties the notion of parallel timelines to a political theme, positing a dark twinship between chaos and totalitarianism. . . . This is [Mandel’s] best novel since Station Eleven, a cause for rejoicing among her fans and an inspiration for newbies to dive into the backlist. Both a thrilling read and a virtuoso demonstration of the moral and philosophical possibilities of speculative fiction.” — Kirkus (starred review)

Thomas Frank
The Creativity Con
October 26 at 7 p.m.
Harvard Book Store, Cambridge, MA
Free.

“This biting analysis from bestseller and Baffler cofounder Thomas Frank (The People, No) exposes how America’s decades-long fixation on creativity and innovation helped construct an unequal postindustrial society. . . . Frank’s wry critique exposes how creativity and innovation are ‘a marker of ghastliness,’ wielded as a justification for policy that benefits only the so-called enlightened few. It’s a sharp look at how prized American values mask inequality” — Publishers Weekly

Kojo Koram with Quinn Slobodian and Shaleen Title
The Next Fix
October 27 at 7 p.m.
Brookline Booksmith, Brookline, MA
Tickets are $35.91 with book; free without.

“From America’s plantation-turned-prison known as Angola in Louisiana to the psychedelic boom of Silicon Valley, The Next Fix tracks a seismic shift in global drug policy. Kojo Koram—legal scholar and acclaimed author of Uncommon Wealth—travels across five continents to examine how criminalized substances are being rebranded as commodities in a new billion-dollar industry. Legal cannabis dispensaries now trade in what once led to life sentences. Psychedelics have become fertile ground for biotech. But for all these developments, prisons still swell with underprivileged users and addicts, and enforcement falls hardest along lines of race and class.”

Marie Lu in conversation with Fin Leary
Mortal Things
October 28 at 7 p.m.
Porter Square Books, Cambridge, MA
Free.

“Set in a world of insatiable immortals, their eternal rivalries, and the humans trapped between them, Mortal Things is a cinematic and sweeping new fantasy from #1 New York Times-bestselling author Marie Lu, perfect for fans of Heartless Hunter and A Darker Shade of Magic.

“Rose Lin Fairchild didn’t believe in gods, but one chose her anyway.

“Rose despises Raven, the god of Death. His mysterious commands. His mercurial moods. His closed heart. But most of all, she loathes that she was forced to become his Harbinger, a human mercenary tasked to fulfill their god’s every want and whim. Still, she would do it again, because being a Harbinger is the only thing keeping her best friend alive.”

Paris Marx
Road to Nowhere: What Silicon Valley Gets Wrong about the Future of Transportation
November 3 at 7 p.m.
Harvard Book Store, Cambridge, MA
Free.

“Combining historical research with investigative reporting and lucid analysis, Paris Marx cuts through the industry hype to expose the immeasurable costs of Big Tech’s AI arms race. A tremendous contribution to a debate that is of existential importance to us all.” — Naomi Klein, bestselling author of Doppelganger

Joanne Chang
The Joy of Cookies: New Classics and Old Favorites to Share
November 4 at 6 p.m.
Brattle Theatre, Cambridge, MA
Tickets are $42.99 with book; $16.74 without.

“Joanne Chang says it all started with a chocolate chip cookie. Specifically, the Nestle Toll House chocolate chip cookie—the first she ever baked as a child with her mom: perfect, gooey, and warm. She baked cookies for her fellow Harvard students and study group and became known as the ‘cookie girl.’ When she left her career as a management consultant to pursue her baking passion, she did it with a tray of cookies, jokingly declaring to her former colleagues that one day, these cookies will be famous! Now, the critically lauded baker, co-owner of the acclaimed Flour bakery, and beloved cookbook author is here to celebrate the joy of cookies that she’s shared all her life.”

Maya Rupert
The Real Ones: How to Disrupt the Hidden Ways Racism Makes Us Less Authentic
November 5 at 7 p.m.
Porter Square Books, Cambridge, MA
Free.

“In this deeply relatable book, Rupert weaves together pop culture and politics, workplace advice and personal stories. She shares the off-camera experiences on the presidential campaign trail in a post-Obama political landscape. She sees what Taylor Swift and Beyoncé fans expect from our biggest stars—one is admired as the authentic girl next door, the other is required to be a queen. She exposes the trap too many face in the workplace, when we are asked to bring our full selves to work—but not too much. Rupert sees a world where success is at the expense of our authenticity, not because of it.

“The Real Ones offers an entirely fresh take on race—that authenticity is a privilege kept from people of color. When we are constantly confronted with the question, ‘Who do you think you are?’ we cannot begin to ask ourselves ‘Who am I?’ In the end, Rupert upends our understanding of authenticity, so that readers can stop questioning who we are, and finally thrive.”

Chinese American writer Catherine Bai. Photo: courtesy of the artist

Proximity: An AGNI Portfolio of Writing and Art by Women of Color
November 7 at 11 a.m.
Free.

“Catherine Bai is a Chinese American writer. Her fiction has appeared or is forthcoming in West Branch, Pleiades, and Best Debut Short Stories. Her poetry has appeared in Luna Luna Magazine and The Journal of Compressed Creative Arts. She has received support from the Vermont Studio Center, the Periplus Collective, the Café Royal Cultural Foundation, and the Helene Wurlitzer Foundation of New Mexico.

“Deepa Bhasthi is a writer and International Booker Prize–winning literary translator. Her fiction, essays, columns, and journalism have been published extensively in Indian and international publications, anthologies, and visual art book projects. She lives and works in Kodagu, in southern India.

“Leila Farjami, an Iranian-American poet, translator, and psychotherapist, is the author of Daughter of Salt. Her poems have appeared in Ploughshares, the Iowa Review, the Missouri Review, Pleiades, and elsewhere.

“Working at the forefront of genderqueer visual politics for more than four decades, photographer Lola Flash’s work challenges gender, sexual, and racial preconceptions and other stereotypes. An active member of ACT UP during the time of the AIDS epidemic in New York City, Flash was notably featured in the 1989 ‘Kissing Doesn’t Kill’ poster.

“Nathalie Handal is described by Claire Messud as a ‘contemporary Orpheus.’ She has lived on four continents and is the author of more than ten books, translated into over fifteen languages, including Roma Roam and Life in a Country Album, winner of the Palestine Book Award. She is a professor at New York University Abu Dhabi and writes the column ‘The City and the Writer’ for Words Without Borders.”

Pitchapalooza: American Idol for Books
November 9 from 7–8 p.m.
Porter Square Books, Cambridge, MA
Free.

“Pitchapalooza is American Idol for books (only without Simon). Twenty writers will be selected at random to pitch their book. Each writer gets one minute—and only one minute! In the last month, three writers have gotten publishing deals as a result of participating in Pitchapalooza.”

— Matt Hanson