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Culture to Do: May 29, 2024

The Diego Mongue Band is the final group performing live music at the NEPM Asparagus Festival on the Hadley Town Common, on Saturday, June 1 at 6 p.m.

NEPM Asparagus Festival
Hadley Town Common
Saturday, June 1 from 10 a.m. – 7 p.m.
For our 10th anniversary NEPM Asparagus Festival, we’re ready to go with a sensational lineup of music that will be rocking on this year’s all new, bigger and better Fabulous 413 Stage. At 11 a.m., families can head to the Fabulous 413 stage where Carrie Ferguson and the Grumpytime Club will engage children jubilant and whimsical original songs. The afternoon line-up starts at 1 p.m. with western Mass. singer-songwriters Lexi Weege & JJ Slater, followed by the cultural sonic fusion of TapRoots, then New Orleans jazz and soul artist Glen David Andrews. We’ll close with the blues of the The Diego Mongue Band.

Culomba
All Saints' Episcopal Church, South Hadley
Wednesday, May 29 at 7 p.m.
To celebrate the release of their newest album, Cherry Street, Culomba is opening their spring tour in South Hadley. This is a superb Massachusetts-based vocal ensemble specializing in close harmony singing from around the world. They draw from a deep well of repertoire, including American folk traditions, music of Georgia, Corsica, the Balkans, Ukraine, early European polyphony, and original compositions. The album’s name refers to CHERRY STREET, a beautiful new tune for Amazing Grace, composed by Culomba’s Adam Simon.

Orlando
Shea Theater, Turners Falls
Thursday, May 30 – Saturday, June 1 at 7:30 p.m.
An adaptation of the “longest and most charming love letter in literature,” written by Virginia Woolf for her lover, Vita Sackville-West, Orlando is a theatrical, wild, fantastical trip through 400 years of history. It’s the story of a young nobleman who is drawn into a love affair with Queen Elizabeth I. Though deeply funny, the play is also heartfelt and moving as Orlando seeks personal freedom through art, identity, gender, and time, becoming a 20th century woman in the process.

Berkshire International Film Festival
Thursday, May 30 – Sunday, June 2
The Triplex Cinema and the Mahaiwe Theater, Great Barrington
Lenox Town Hall
Here’s a huge and exciting film festival, with dozens of narrative, documentary, and short films playing in multiple venues in Great Barrington and Lenox, many with filmmakers in attendance. By way of example, in “Thelma,” deceived by a phone scammer pretending to be her grandson, a 90-year-old woman sets out on a quest to reclaim what was taken from her. In “First We Bombed New Mexico," Latina businesswoman and cancer survivor Tina Cordova ignites a grassroots movement demanding justice for residents who have suffered multigenerational cancers tied to the Trinity nuclear test. The closing night film is “Diane Warren: Relentless,” an intimate look at the life, career and process of one of the most accomplished songwriters of all time.

Great Barrington Public Theater: Dog People
Liebowitz Theater in the Daniel Arts Center,
Bard College at Simon’s Rock, Great Barrington
Friday, May 31 – Sunday, June 16
The Great Barrington Public Theater summer season opens with a world premiere that brings together two people and two dogs for one day in the park. The dogs are rescues, and their people need some second chances too. Who really rescues who? It’s a meaningful, affective story by respected actor-playwright Leigh Strimbeck, who developed the script as a member of Berkshire Voices, the playwriting cohort affiliated with GB Public. Associate Artistic Director Judy Braha directs.

The Victory Players: Puerto Abierto (Open Port)
Holyoke Media
Friday, May 31 and Saturday, June 1 at 7:30 p.m.
Here’s our chance to experience the fruits of MIFA’s Victory Players 2024 residency. Since May 20, musicians and composers have been working together in Holyoke under the direction of Tianhui Ng to explore the legacy of the Caribbean and Puerto Rico as a rich confluence of ideas and influences. The concert will include premieres of completed commissioned chamber music by composers Eric Lemmon, Cole Reyes, Nicholas Villane, and Julio Elvin Quiñones. Also, works-in-progress of newly commissioned composers Odaline de la Martinez, Sonia Morales, and Luis Quintana will be introduced.

Pothole Pictures: Yasujiro Ozu’s Late Spring
Memorial Hall Theater, Shelburne Falls
Friday, May 31 and Saturday, June 1 at 7:30 p.m.
Considered one of the great classics of world cinema, Yasujiro Ozu’s Late Spring celebrates its 75th anniversary this year. Charlemont resident, local art historian and film scholar Kathe Geist will be on hand both nights to lead a Q&A conversation about the film. Her decades long research on Ozu culminated in a 2022 book “Ozu: A Closer Look.” A Pothole Pictures tradition — enjoy live music starting at 7 p.m.

Lisa Michelle Anderson
The Dream Away Lodge, Beckett
Friday, May 31 at 8 p.m.
Rumored to have been a brothel and speakeasy during the great depression, The Dream Away Lodge has been a Berkshire legend for close to a hundred years. This two-hundred year-old farmhouse, tucked away at the edge of October Mountain State Forest, has, according to one of my NEPM work buddies, a fabulous vibe. Lisa Michelle Anderson — NOT pictured above — is described as being the person you become when you are raised on the music of Dolly Parton in Southeast Kansas and Minnesota, move to Australia, and learn to play the guitar.

3rd Annual Springfield Pride Parade Weekend
Thursday, May 30 – Saturday, June 1
The 3rd Annual Springfield Pride Parade Weekend is a vibrant celebration of diversity, love, and equality. Spanning over the course of a weekend, this event is a culmination of various festivities, including the iconic Pride Parade, educational seminars and an elegant gala, the weekend offers something for everyone.

2024 LGBTQIA+ Youth Community Panel
Springfield Technical Community College
Thursday May 30 at 1 p.m.
Hosted by Kenneth Kyrell, this event we delves into vital topics surrounding LGBTQIA+ youth. Engage in insightful conversations aimed at fostering an inclusive environment.

2024 You Ball Fundraising Gala – Parisian Masquerade
MGM Springfield – Aria Ballroom
Friday, May 31 from 6 – 10 p.m.
This year’s You Ball Fundraising Gala has a captivating theme: Parisian Masquerade, where the allure of Paris meets the intrigue of masked revelry. It’s an evening of celebration and philanthropy to honor and uplift the LGBTQIA+ community.

3rd Annual Springfield Pride Parade
Springfield Technical Community College to Stearns Square
Starts Saturday, June 1 at 12 p.m.
Enjoy colorful floats, energetic marches, and an atmosphere filled with joy and solidarity as we come together to honor and uplift LGBTQ+ voices.

Robert Frost: This Verse Business
Adams Theater, Adams
Saturday, June 1 and Sunday, June 2 at 4 p.m.
For nearly fifty years, Robert Frost “barded” around the country charming audiences with his celebrated verse and rascally sense of humor. Played by Emmy-winning actor Gordon Clapp (you may recognize him as NYPD Blue’s Detective Medavoy), Frost’s great wit and poetry are heard afresh in the award-winning one-man play. Clapp read Robert Frost’s biographies shortly after graduating from Williams College in 1971. “I'd always been obsessed with his poetry. And I decided I'm going to bring this guy to the stage,” he told Vermont Public Radio in 2023.

Brown Eyed Women
Hawks & Reed, Greenfield
Saturday, June 1 at 8 p.m.
Brown Eyed Women, the world’s only all-female Grateful Dead cover band, is coming to Greenfield! It’s an ensemble of powerful female players from popular bands around the country who celebrate the music of the Grateful Dead with a unique spin, and bring authentic jams and a soulful new approach to the familiar Dead catalog.

Weird Recycling
Bombyx, Florence
Sunday, June 2 from 10 a.m. – 5 p.m.
Take the opportunity to empty your closet, basement, and attic of unwanted belongings you’ve been holding on to and drop it off at Bombyx. Then stick around for activities, presentations, performances, crafts projects and time to connect with your neighbors.

Queering the Clark's Collection
The Clark, Williamstown
Sunday, June 2, from 11:15 a.m. – 12:15 p.m.
In celebration of Pride Month, a Clark educator leads a guided tour of the permanent collection. Together, the group contemplates questions like “What makes an artwork queer?” and “How does our understanding of queerness today shape how we understand the identities and lives of artists in the past?” Free with gallery admission. Capacity is limited.

An Evening with The Ballroom Thieves
Iron Horse Music Hall, Northampton
Sunday, June 2 at 7 p.m.
As acclaimed indie folk band The Ballroom Thieves wrote and recorded their upcoming album, one central question emerged as the theme: “What if we could all just be a little more tender?” The duo — Calin Peters (vocals, cello, bass) and Martin Earley (vocals, guitar) — started to ponder what they could do to be more self-aware of their mental health and of those around them in a world oversaturated by social media, pop-culture, and digital consumption. The result is a personal, lush, 10-track collection of thoughts on the human experience called Sundust.