We’re Doing the Wiz Live!
NEPM Studios, 44 Hampden St., Springfield
Saturday, Oct. 4 at 7 p.m.
Enjoy an evening with Ian Coss and Sakina Ibrahim, co-creators of "Radiotopia Presents: We’re Doing The Wiz," the acclaimed podcast about the high school musical that changed their lives, right here in western Mass. The two Pioneer Valley Performing Arts alums look back on their starkly different experiences on the front lines of the school’s bussing experiment, and what if anything has really changed in the 20 years since.
Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra with Wynton Marsalis: Afro!
Frederick C. Tillis Performance Hall
Wednesday, Sept. 17 at 7:30 p.m.
In October 1975, the Fine Arts Center’s inaugural concert featured the Boston Symphony Orchestra. Tonight, they’re starting their second half century with a performance by the most celebrated and prestigious ensemble in Black classical music. Wynton Marsalis's brand-new piece, Afro!, explores the deep roots of jazz in African Music. The Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra will be joined by the extraordinary vocalist Shenel Johns and Ghanaian American djembe virtuoso Weedie Braimah.
12th Annual Amherst Block Party
North Pleasant Street, Amherst
Thursday, Sept. 18 from 5 – 9 p.m.
Here’s a beloved community tradition that brings thousands of residents, students, and visitors together to celebrate everything that makes downtown Amherst special. With live music, aerialists, acrobats, stilt walkers, delicious food, shopping, and interactive experiences, this high-energy street festival has something for everyone. It starts on the corner of Amity Street and North Pleasant Street and ends on the corner of Hallock Street.
Windborne
Iron Horse, Northampton
Thursday, Sept. 18 at 7 p.m.
Windborne is known for their powerful vocal arrangements and their ability to shift effortlessly between different styles of traditional music within the same concert. While their musical knowledge spans many continents and cultures, they remain deeply rooted in the American singing traditions they have embodied since childhood. They educate as they entertain, telling stories about the music and explaining the characteristics and stylistic elements of the traditions in which they sing.
Even Cowboys Get the Blues by Ankita Sharma
The Barn at Lee, (345 Spring Street, Lee)
Thursday, Sept. 18 and Friday, Sept. 19 at 7:30 p.m.
A piece of dance-theater examining rurality, social media, and American mythology, Even Cowboys is performed by a denim-clad cast of puppets and humans. It’s high noon in the Wild West, and a young cowboy is galloping through the American expanse. The wind at his back, he heads for a blustery ridge. Upon arrival, he glances at the purple mountains ahead, before taking out his phone and scrolling TikTok till the sun goes down. Did you catch the Fabulous 413 segment yesterday?
Ashfield FilmFest
Ashfield Town Hall
Friday, Sept. 19 at 6:30 p.m. Screening of Fanny: The Right to Rock
Saturday, Sept. 20 at 6:30 p.m. Short Film Competition
On August 12, 1881 Cecil B. DeMille was born in Ashfield, Massachusetts. He went on to be declared by many “the greatest showman on earth.” In 2007 Baby Cecil was also born in Ashfield. He has gone on to be the Grand Prize Trophy of The Ashfield FilmFest. All the short films in the competition have a direct connection to Western Massachusetts. Entries include music videos, documentaries, comedies, animation, and social commentaries.
FreshGrass Festival
MASS MoCA, North Adams
Friday, Sept. 19 – Sunday, Sept. 21
FreshGrass is a wonderland of traditional and cutting-edge roots music that fills the fields, courtyards, and galleries of MASS MoCA over the course of three days. With emerging artists, farm-fresh food, local brews, and pop-up jam sessions, FreshGrass is a fantastic family-friendly weekend. Headliners include Greensky Bluegrass on Friday, Old Crow Medicine Show on Saturday, and Peter Rowan & Sam Grishman Project with the FreshGrass All-Stars on Sunday. Plus! The Fabulous 413 will be broadcasting live from the festival on Friday.
The Cello Player
Adams Theater, Adams
Friday, Sept. 19 at 7:30 p.m.
The Cello Player is a dance-music piece produced by American Modern Opera Company (AMOC) and led by cellist Coleman Itzkoff and dancer/choreographer Or Schraiber. It excavates the complexity of ancient relationships: the tortured conception of friendship as a messy amalgam of love, hatred, insecurity, and neediness. Learn more: Tune in to Thursday’s Fabulous 413.
Cooking with Eric Carle
Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, Amherst
Opens Saturday, Sept. 20
Eric Carle’s career in book publishing began with commissions for Red Flannel Hash and Shoo-Fly Pie (published in 1965), a compilation of folk recipes from across the United States. When he switched over to his signature collage style, Carle continued to feature food in many of his books. From The Very Hungry Caterpillar to Walter the Baker, creatures and characters munch on all kinds of food in Eric Carle’s artwork.
Hiroya Tsukamoto
Trinity United Methodist Church Community Gallery, Springfield
Saturday, Sept. 20 at 7:30 p.m.
Hiroya Tsukamoto is a Japanese-born composer, acoustic guitarist, and singer-songwriter known for his unique blend of folk, jazz, and world music. A graduate of the Berklee College of Music, he has toured internationally, has performed at the Blue Note and the United Nations in New York City, and has won awards at the International Fingerstyle Guitar Championship. His music features inventive fingerstyle techniques, often with a looping pedal that creates a rich orchestral sound.
Bandtoberfest: A Fall Celebration
Amherst Town Common
Sunday, Sept. 21 from 2 – 5 p.m.
The UMass Wind Ensemble and Symphony Band will perform movie music, marches, polkas and other classics of the wind repertoire. Plus, local beer, wine, and cider from Abandoned Building Brewery of Easthampton, Black Birch Vineyard of North Hatfield, and Carr’s Ciderhouse of Hadley. Food will be available from nearby restaurants and food trucks. Free and open to the public.
Melody Fader, piano
33 Hawley Street, Northampton
Sunday, Sept. 21 at 4 p.m.
Pianist Melody Fader enjoys a busy career as a soloist, chamber musician, vocal accompanist, and interdisciplinary collaborative artist in New York City. She has performed around the United States as a soloist and chamber musician, and in such New York venues as Alice Tully Hall, The Joyce Theater, The New York Times Center, and Carnegie’s Weill Recital Hall. Her Northampton program will include works by Mozart, Mendelssohn, Chopin and the premiere of "Dance! Suite for solo piano" by Rami Levin. Stay for a post-concert reception.
Music Mondays
Sweeney Concert Hall, Northampton
Mondays Sept. 22, Oct. 20, and Nov. 24 at 1 p.m.
Treat yourself to one or all of these lovely free mid-day half-hour chamber concerts featuring Liam Shannon, baritone in September; James Limerick Kerr, guitar in October; and Natalie Rae Padilla, violin and Ellen Redman, flute in November. The first concert will include Beethoven’s 'An die ferne Geliebte.' I heard it up in Marlboro in August. It’s stunning!
NAB TICKETS NOW
Music @ Amherst
Karen Slack and the Pacifica Quartet
Buckley Recital Hall, Amherst College
Friday, Oct. 3 at 7:30 p.m.
Single Tickets go on sale Friday, Sept. 19 at 12 a.m.
I mentioned the M@A ticket sales schedule in last week’s issue: single tickets for concerts go on sale exactly 14 days before each performance date. Soprano Karen won the 2025 Best Classical Solo Vocal Album Grammy award for “Beyond the Years – Unpublished Songs of Florence Price.” Her M@A program will include songs from that album. She will be joined by the Pacifica Quartet, quartet-in-residence at Indiana University’s Jacobs School of Music, known for its virtuosity, exuberant performance style, and often-daring repertory choices. They’re also Grammy award winners.
Phantoms by Firelight: The Grand Finale Season
Old Sturbridge Village
Fridays, Saturdays, and Sundays from Oct. 10 – 26
I’m letting you know about this one early, because this is the final season for one of the region’s most popular fall installations, and ticket prices go up after Sept. 30. As nightfall cloaks Old Sturbridge Village in darkness, wander fire-lit paths and step inside historic buildings, gather by the crackling bonfire for eerie tales, and revel in the dazzling spectacle of fire dancers, soaring acrobats, and haunting melodies.
Dar Williams
The Academy of Music, Northampton
Friday, Feb. 20, 2026 at 8 p.m.
Dar Williams has rarely made it into Culture to Do. Why? Her concerts sell out fast. So here’s a “nab tickets now” notice about the only western Mass. show on her Hummingbird Highway tour. Dar Williams’ lyrics contain bouquets of optimism, delivered on melodies alternating between beguiling lightness and understated gravity. Williams strongly believes that “real happiness doesn’t have to feel like Snoopy dancing with Woodstock; it can just be knowing you have the resilience to meet whatever comes to you. I will call that a good life.” She released her Hummingbird Highway album on Sept 12.