Japan Society Under the Radar presentation of Duke Bluebeard’s Castle is one of dozens of experimental works in January performance festivals (photo by Yoji Ishizawa)
Every January, many of us begin the new year with resolutions to make positive changes in our lives; I find the best way to start that is by checking out the latest in cutting-edge and experimental theater, music, dance, opera, film, and other forms of entertainment. Performance festivals abound this month, at tiny venues you’ve never heard of, places you’ve always wanted to go to but haven’t yet, and well-known spaces you haven’t been to in years.
You now have the chance to fill those voids at such festival as Under the Radar, Prototype, Exponential, Out-Front!, Live Artery, Winter Jazzfest, and more, none of them costing nearly as much as a Broadway show. Below are only some of the highlights of this exhilarating time to try something that might be outside your comfort zone — or right up your alley.
New Ear Festival runs January 3-5 at Fridman Gallery on Lower East Side
NEW EAR FESTIVAL
Fridman Gallery
169 Bowery
January 3-5, $20-$30, Festival Pass $50-$70
new-ear.org
“Focused on fostering experimentation in time-based media and interdisciplinary collaboration in New York City and beyond,” Fridman Gallery’s New Ear Festival, which began in 2013, is back with a stellar lineup of musicians and installations, including Henry Threadgill, Ash Fure, and Kyp Malone.
Friday, January 3
Main Room: Henry Threadgill, Justin Cabrillos, relatively special theories of spAcial relativities, medium (Yaz Lancaster & GG200BPM); 8-Channel Audio: New Ear Spatial: Echoes; 4-Channel Video: “Landscape of the Medium” by Marleigh Belsley, 7:30
Saturday, January 4
Main Room: Members of Irreversible Entanglements, Shara Lunon, Kamari Carter & Gladstone Deluxe; 8-Channel Audio: New Ear Spatial: Echoes; 4-Channel Video: \[ the hurricanes in your mouth \] by Johann Diedrick, 7:30
Sunday, January 5
Main Room: Ash Fure, Brian Chase, Kyp Malone, Brian House & Sue Huang (feat. Robert Black); 8-Channel Audio: New Ear Spatial: Echoes; 4-Channel Video: Ash Fure, Studies for the Coming Heat, 7:30
The Brooklyn Exponential Festival is a treat for curious theatergoers
THE EXPONENTIAL FESTIVAL
Multiple venues
January 2 – February 2
www.theexponentialfestival.org
Brooklyn’s month-long Exponential Festival consists of nineteen shows in such venues as the Loading Dock, the Brick, and JACK, highlighting pieces by “participants [who] are committed to ecstatic creativity in the face of commercialism. Exponential is driven by inclusiveness and a diversity of artists, forms, and ideas coupled with utopian resource-sharing, mentoring, and the championing of risky, rigorous work in eclectic fields.”
Friday, January 3
through
Sunday January 5
haircut play :€, by Eulàlia Comas, Loading Dock, 170 Tillary St., $28.52
Thursday, January 9
through
Sunday, January 12
Neck Down, f.k.a. Rainbow’s End, by Nic Adams, We Are Here Brooklyn Studios, 563 Johnson Ave., $12.51-$49.87
Friday, January 10
through
Friday, January 17
MEOW!, by Matthew Antoci & Meaghan Robichaud, Loading Dock, 170 Tillary St., $28.52
Wednesday, January 15
through
Saturday, January 18
Sapphire, by Ella Lee Davidson, the Brick, 579 Metropolitan Ave., $25-$55
Friday, January 17, 7:30
and
Saturday, January 18, 3:00 & 7:30
Braiding Water, by Xiaoyue Zhang, JACK, 20 Putnam Ave., $25-$50
Thursday, January 23
through
Saturday, January 25
Happy Birthday, Curiosity Rover!, by Laura Galindo, Brick Aux, 628 Metropolitan Ave.,
Friday, January 24, 7:30
and
Saturday, January 25, 3:00 & 7:30
Tongues by Yibin Wang and Yejia Sun JACK, 20 Putnam Ave., $25-$50
UNDER THE RADAR
Multiple venues
January 4-19, free – $120
utrfest.org
Under the Radar is the glittering gem of performance festivals, two weeks of unique, unpredictable, and fascinating works, many hard to define but need to be seen. Founding director Mark Russell brought it to New York City in 2005, teamed up with the Public Theater’s Oskar Eustis in 2006, and has been presenting intriguing and exciting pieces from around the world ever since. The 2025 UTR, celebrating its twentieth anniversary, takes adventurous theatergoers on a thrilling ride, introducing audiences to high-tech generative AI (the four-part interactive and immersive TECHNE at BAM), a time loop in a small white closet (The 7th Voyage of Egon Tichy at New York Theatre Workshop’s Fourth Street Theatre), a political prisoner in Tehran being visited by her husband (Blind Runner at St. Ann’s Warehouse), actual Russian refugee children who live in US shelters and their American peers (SpaceBridge at La Mama), a pair of skeletons digging for bones in the underworld (Dead as a Dodo at the Baruch Performing Arts Center), a reimagining of a popular musical (Show/Boat: A River at NYU Skirball), a Harajuku makeover of a classic French fairy tale (Duke Bluebeard’s Castle at Japan Society), a pair of rice cookers delving into the last twenty years of Korean history (Cuckoo at PAC NYC), and a marathon funeral for a company’s longtime home (Soho Rep Is Not a Building. Soho Rep Had a Building… at walkerspace). Below are only some of the highlights.
Saturday, January 4
through
Tuesday, January 7
TECHNE: The Vivid Unknown, by John Fitzgerald and Godfrey Reggio, BAM Fisher, Fishman Space, $10
Saturday, January 4
through
Thursday, January 24
Blind Runner, by Amir Reza Koohestani and Mehr Theatre Group, St. Ann’s Warehouse, 45 Water St., $44-$54
Saturday, January 4
through
Sunday, January 26
The 7th Voyage of Egon Tichy [Redux], by Sinking Ship and Theater in Quarantine, New York Theatre Workshop’s Fourth Street Theatre, 83 East Fourth St., $30-$50
Tuesday, January 7
through
Friday, January 11
TECHNE: The Golden Key, by Marc Da Costa and Matthew Niederhauser, BAM Fisher, Fishman Space, $10
Tuesday, January 7
through
Saturday, January 11
SpaceBridge, by Irina Kruzhilina, La MaMa, Ellen Stewart Theatre, 66 East Fourth St., $10-$30
Wednesday, January 8
through
Sunday, February 9
Dead as a Dodo, by Wakka Wakka, Baruch Performing Arts Center, 55 Lexington Ave., $40-$55
A space traveler is trapped in a time loop in The 7th Voyage of Egon Tichy [Redux] (photo by Josh Luxenberg / Sinking Ship / Theater in Quarantine)
Wednesday, January 9
through
Sunday, January 26
Show/Boat: A River, by Target Margin Theater, NYU Skirball Center for the Performing Arts, 566 LaGuardia Pl., $60-$120
Sunday, January 12
through
Wednesday, January 15
TECHNE: Voices, by Margarita Athanasiou, BAM Fisher, Fishman Space, $10
Wednesday, January 15
through
Saturday, January 18
Duke Bluebeard’s Castle, by Shuji Terayama, Japan Society, 333 East Forty-Seventh St., $36-$48, 7:30
Thursday, January 16
through
Saturday, January 18
Cuckoo, by Jaha Koo, Perelman Performing Arts Center, 251 Fulton St., $58-$68
Thursday, January 16
through
Sunday, January 19
TECHNE: Secret Garden, by Stephanie Dinkins, BAM Fisher, Fishman Space, $10
Saturday, January 18
Soho Rep Is Not a Building. Soho Rep Had a Building…, Walkerspace, 46 Walker St., free, 10:00 am – 10:00 pm
Angie Pittman will present Black Life Chord Changes at Out-FRONT! Festival (photo by Brian Rogers)
OUT-FRONT! FESTIVAL
Judson Church, 55 Washington Square South
BAM Fisher Hillman Studio, 321 Ashland Pl.
January 7-13, free with advance RSVP (suggested donation $25)
pioneersgoeast.org
The third edition of Pioneers Go East Collective’s Out-FRONT! Festival features presentations from such choreographers and dance companies as jill sigman/thinkdance, Angie Pittman, and Kyle Marshall Choreography at Judson Church and the BAM Fisher Hillman Studio in addition to an evening of films. “As a grassroots artist-driven collective, we create a high-visibility platform for dance and interdisciplinary artists whose rigorous, playful, and fabulously outrageous creative practices speak to our community in unexpected and beautiful ways,” artistic director Gian Marco Riccardo Lo Forte said in a statement. “We engage known and lesser-known artists to shape a joyful space to celebrate queer art and stories of vulnerability and inclusion.”
Tuesday, January 7
and
Friday, January 10
Miranda Brown + Noa Rui-Piin Weiss: !!simon says~~!:));)$$, and Nattie Trogdon + Hollis Bartlett: Vessels, Judson Church, 7:00
Wednesday, January 8
and
Thursday, January 9
jill sigman/thinkdance: Re-Seeding (Encounter #4), Judson Church, 7:00
Friday, January 10, 8:30
and
Monday, January 13, 7:00
Blaze Ferrer: Dick Biter and Stuart B Meyers: thegarden, Judson Church
Saturday, January 11
Out-FRONT! Film Series: dance and experimental short films by Dominique Castelano, Jueun Kang, Kathleen Kelly, Haley Morgan Miller, Pioneers Go East Collective, and Maamoun Tobbo, Judson Church, 3:00
Angie Pittman: Black Life Chord Changes and Kyle Marshall Choreography: Joan, BAM Fisher Hillman Studio, 7:00
zoe | juniper will present latest work as part of new York Live Arts festival (photo by Anton Karaa)
LIVE ARTERY
New York Live Arts (unless otherwise noted)
219 West 19th St.
January 8-18, $28-$40
newyorklivearts.org
New York Live Arts’ annual Live Artery showcases works by emerging and established choreographers; this year’s impressive lineup includes Ogemdi Ude, zoe | juniper, Joseph Keckler, Leslie Cuyjet, Miguel Gutierrez, and, if you are lucky enough to get an invite, Shamel Pitts, A.I.M by Kyle Abraham, and Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company.
Wednesday, January 8
through
Saturday, January 11
My Body, My Archive, by Faustin Linyekula
Friday, January 10
through
Monday, January 13
The Marthaodyssey, by Jesse Factor
Saturday, January 11
Major, by Ogemdi Ude, 3:00
time/life/beauty, by Michael Sakamoto and Paul Miller aka DJ Spooky, $15, 6:00
Saturday, January 11
and
Sunday, January 12
For All Your Life, by Leslie Cuyjet, CPR — Center for Performance Research, 361 Manhattan Ave., $25
Sunday, January 12
Artist Salon, with Janani Balasubramanian, Gabriela Carneiro da Cunha, Kayla Farrish, Heather Kravas, and Tere O’Connor, free with advance RSVP, 11:00 am
The Missing Fruit (Part I), by Roderick George — kNonAme Artist, $15, 1:00
UNTITLED, by zoe | juniper, with Xiu Xiu, $15, 6:00
Sunday, January 12
through
Saturday, January 18
Super Nothing, by Miguel Gutierrez
Monday, January 13
Turn. Turning.TURNT, by Cynthia Oliver/COCo Dance Theatre, 6:00
A Good Night in the Trauma Garden, by Joseph Keckler, 8:00
SFX FESTIVAL
the wild project
95 East Third St.
January 9-11, $23.33
thewildproject.org
The seventh iteration of the Special Effects Festival (SFX), founded by Caden Manson and Jemma Nelson, takes place January 9-11 at the wild project with three evenings of new works “to rekindle the spirit of the avant-garde and create a shared space to gather for contemporary performance.”
Thursday, January 9
Illuminated Skies: A Night of Puppetry, with Cumulo by Emily Batsford, an excerpt from Shiny One by Jon Riddleberger, Cast from Heaven by Jacob Graham, and Where Did You Go, Connie? by Amanda Card, curated by Amanda Card, 7:00
Friday, January 10
Works by Wonderful Cringe (Nicholas Sanchez), Harlequin (Adonis Huff & Jelani Best), and Lele Dai, curated by Kyla Gordon, 7:00
Saturday, January 11
Gray Spaces, with Idiot Void (working title) by David Commander, double column by Marissa Joyce Stamps, and 5G Maitreya by Glenn Potter-Takata, curated by Lisa Clair, 7:00
WINTER JAZZFEST
Multiple venues
January 9-15
www.winterjazzfest.com
Founded in 2005, “Winter Jazzfest celebrates the music as a living entity, wherein history collides with the future in every note. Creative improvisation in the digital age continues to stimulate thought and emotion of its listeners, embracing innovation, defying instrumental boundaries and the old cliches of ‘What is Jazz?’” Among this year’s highlights are poet, writer, lyricist, and activist aja monet, pianist and composer Vijay Iyer, Sun Ra Arkestra, and two days of marathons at such venues as Le Poisson Rouge, Nublu, Mercury Lounge, Baby’s All Right, and the Bitter End.
Thursday, January 9
aja monet, Faye Victor, Sophye Soliveau, LPR, 158 Bleecker St., $45.42, 6:30
Makaya McCraven, Theon Cross, Ben Lamar Gay, Nublu, 151 Ave. C., $40, 11:00
Friday, January 10
Manhattan Marathon, multiple venues, including Endea Owens at LPR, Jenny Scheinman’s All Species Parade at City Winery, Vijay Iyer & Wadada Leo Smith at Performance Space NY, the Christian McBride Band at Mercury Lounge, and Sophye Soliveau at the Bitter End, $85
Saturday, January 11
Brooklyn Marathon, multiple venues, including Sun Ra Arkestra at Brooklyn Bowl, Vijay Iyer Trio +1 Featuring Adam O’Farrill at National Sawdust, Peter Apfelbaum’s New York Hieroglyphics at Loove Labs Annex, Matthew Shipp Trio at Loove Labs, Lion Babe at Baby’s All Right, and Ken Butler’s Curious Cave of Anxious Objects at Hybrid Visions, $85
Sunday, January 12
Impressions: Improvisatory interpretations on A Love Supreme, featuring the Ravi Coltrane Quartet with David Virelles, Jeff “Tain” Watts, and Dezron Douglas, with guests Allison Miller, Angelica Sanchez, Ben Williams, James Brandon Lewis, Joel Ross, Kalia Vandever, Kassa Overall, Kenny Warren, Linda May Han Oh, Mali Obomsawin, Melissa Aldana, Nasheet Waits, Orrin Evans, Rafiq Bhatia, Sam Newsome, Theon Cross, Tomoki Sanders, and more, Roulette, 509 Atlantic Ave., $63, panel 6:30, show 8:00
Monday, January 13
Strata-East Rising, A Landmark Concert with Charles Tolliver, Cecil McBee, Billy Hart, Billy Harper, Christian McBride, aja monet, Endea Owens, Steve Jordan, Keyon Harrold, Camille Thurman, and more, Le Poisson Rouge, 158 Bleecker St., $57.47-$105.06, 7:00 & 9:30
PROTOTYPE
Multiple venues
January 9–19
www.prototypefestival.org
Cofounding directors Kristin Marting and Beth Morrison have put together another outstanding group of shows for Prototype, which “is committed to surprising our audiences and confounding their expectations through content, form, and relevance.” This year they will be accomplishing that with eight presentations, including an art bath, concerts, a streaming hip-hopera, and five works at HERE, La MaMa, and the Village East. Watch out for Eat the Document, based on the novel by Dana Spiotta, exploring activists from the 1970s underground to 1990s suburbia, and Black Lodge, inspired by the lives and careers of William S. Burroughs, David Lynch, and Antonin Artaud.
Thursday, January 9
through
Friday, January 17
Eat the Document, alternative opera by composer John Glover and librettist Kelley Rourke, directed by Kristin Marting, HERE Arts Center, 145 Sixth Ave., $35-$150
Thursday, January 9
through
Sunday, January 19
TELEKINETIK, a Catapult Opera production by Khary Laurent, directed by George Cederquist, available on demand, free
Saturday, January 11
through
Tuesday, January 14
Positive Vibration Nation, rock guaguanco opera by Sol Ruiz, with Rey Rogriguez, Alejandro Sierra, Fernando Sanchez Abad, Margarita Arranz, Adonnas Jones, and Shira Abergel, HERE Arts Center, 145 Sixth Ave., $35-$150
Saturday, January 11
through
Wednesday, January 15
Black Lodge, goth industrial rock opera by composer David T. Little, librettist Anne Waldman, starring Timur and the Dime Museum and Isaura String Quartet, film by Michael Joseph McQuilken, BRIC Arts Media, 647 Fulton St., Brooklyn, $40.25-$155.25
Thursday, January 16
through
Sunday, January 19
In a Grove, chamber opera by composer Christopher Cerrone and librettist Stephanie Fleischmann, directed by Mary Birnbaum, and starring Metropolis Ensemble, La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club, Ellen Stewart Theater, 66 East Fourth St., $35-$75
PhysFestNYC
Stella Adler Center for the Arts
65 Broadway
January 9-19, $20
www.physfestnyc.org
PhysFestNYC was started last year as “a community-focused festival that celebrates, enriches, and envisions our field of physical theater . . . [which] tends to be experimental, innovative, and genre-breaking.” The second annual event, taking place January 9–19 at the Stella Adler Center for the Arts, consists of workshops, panel discussions, masterclasses, and live performances. Below are some of the highlights.
Tuesday, January 14
The Fluxus Brothers Present: Good Art Bad Art, performance art lecture demonstration with Ben Rosenthal, Morgan Rosenthal, and Morgan Fitzpatrick Andrews, $20, 7:00 & 8:30
Thursday, January 16
Pat Frisk/Duck, with Joanne Edelmann, and Stop, Replay, with Abhirami Rao, $20, 1:00
Friday, January 17
and
Saturday, January 18
Broken Box Mime Theater, $20, 7:00 & 8:30
The Triple Empathy Problem, with Noah Ortega and Asa Page, Here Is Siya, with Joey Antonio, and Do You Still Believe?, with Noel Olson, $20, 7:00 & 8:30
Saturday, January 18
It Goes Without Saying, created and performed by Bill Bowers, 20, 4:00
Saturday, January 18
and
Sunday, January 19
Please Ship This Wet Gift, with Marta Mozelle MacRostie, followed by a panel discussion, $20, 1:00
THE FIRE THIS TIME FESTIVAL
FRIGID New York at the wild project
195 East Third St.
January 23 – February 2, $25
www.firethistimefestival.com
Founded in 2009 by Kelley Nicole Girod, the Fire This Time Festival, now in its sixteenth year, “provides a platform for early career playwrights of African and African American descent.” The 2024 iteration comprises six ten-minute shows at the wild project, presented by FRIGID New York, that take on such topics as Billie Holiday, queer identity, the search for a missing sibling, and an unusual night for Hagar and Abraham.
Thursday, January 23
Friday, January 24, 31
Saturday, January 25
Saturday, February 1
Sunday, February 2
Pound Cake, by Brittany Fisher; OUT, by FELISPEAKS; Just One Good Day, by Jeanette W. Hill; But Not Forgotten, by D. L. Patrick; Security Watch, by TyLie Shider; and Immanentize the Eschaton, by Garrett Turner
[Mark Rifkin is a Brooklyn-born, Manhattan-based writer and editor; you can follow him on Substack here.]