this week in music

UNDER THE RADAR

Judith Malina of the Living Theatre and Silvia Calderoni of Motus collaborate on THE PLOT IS THE REVOLUTION, a special Under the Radar presentation on January 9 at La MaMa (photo by End & Dna)

The Public Theater and other venues
425 Lafayette St. between East Fourth St. & Astor Pl.
January 4-15, free-$25
212-967-7555
www.undertheradarfestival.com

The eighth annual Under the Radar: A Festival Tracking New Theater from Around the World offers another diverse collection of live performances that provide a welcome alternative to conventional theater. Running January 4-15, this year’s fest includes such promising productions as Hideki Noda’s The Bee, an English-language drama at Japan Society about a horrible surprise waiting for a businessman upon returning home from the office; Bambï & Waterwell’s Goodbar, a live concept album reimagining of Looking for Mr. Goodbar, at the Public Theater; Suli Holum & Deborah Stein’s Chimera, about a woman who is her own twin, at HERE; and Stefan Zeromski Theatre’s unique musical take on Bernard-Marie Koltès’s In the Solitude of Cotton Fields, set to live Polish punk rock, at La MaMa. The Public will also be home to the LuEsther Lounge, presenting free live music throughout the festival. Among the other free events are the installation Gob Squad Resource Room at the Goethe-Institut’s Wyoming Building (the Gob Squad Arts Collective will also be presenting the interactive Super Night Shot at the Public); Camille O’Sullivan’s Feel, in which the Irish singer will play a different character for songs by Jacquel Brel, Nick Cave, Tom Waits, David Bowie, and others, at the Public; and the panel discussion “Performance and Context: The Black Box and the White Cube,” January 8 at 1:00 at the Public. In addition, a post-show discussion will follow the January 7 performance of Motus’s Alexis. A Greek Tragedy at La MaMa, a preshow talk will precede the January 8 performance of the Living Word Project’s Word Becomes Flesh at the Public, a panel will follow the January 11 performance of biriken & Ayça Damgaci’s Lick But Don’t Swallow! at La MaMa, chelfitsch’s Toshiki Okada (Hot Pepper, Air Conditioner, and the Farewell Speech) will lead a workshop for theater and dance professionals on January 14 at 1:00 at Japan Society, and “Everyone’s a Critic! Exploring the Changing Landscape of Arts Writing” will take place January 15 at 1:00 at the LuEsther Lounge. As always, Under the Radar offers adventurous theatergoers a chance to see a bunch of very different works, from an excellent selection of international companies.

ROBERT BURNS AND “AULD LANG SYNE”

Robert Burns, “Auld Lang Syne” (detail), autograph manuscript written within a letter, dated (September 1793), to George Thomson

Morgan Library & Museum
225 Madison Ave. at 36th St.
Tuesday – Sunday through February 5, $15 (free Fridays 7:00 – 9:00)
212-685-0008
www.themorgan.org

Tonight at midnight, people around the world will break out into the same song, “Auld Lang Syne,” welcoming in 2012, but how many of those revelers know the true story about the famous tune? The Morgan Library is currently hosting a splendid little exhibition that examines the details behind the music and lyrics of the popular ditty, whose three-word title translates to “old,” “long,” “since.” It was Scottish poet Robert Burns who combined the familiar music and lyrics for publisher James Johnson in 1796, although there were different versions both before and after, from a 1667 lover’s lament and a 1760s Caledonian country dance to William Shield’s 1782 opera, Rosina, and Rudyard Kipling’s 1900 Boer War revision. The show, which comprises original letters, manuscripts, portraits, rare books, and even an arrangement by Beethoven, also features a strong online component where you can read and listen to snippets of the evolution of the complete song, so you’ll be able to surprise your fellow partyers tonight by breaking out into all four Burns stanzas, including “We twa hae run about the braes, / And pu’t the gowans fine; / But we’ve wander’d mony a weary foot, / Sin auld lang syne.” In addition, the Morgan will be celebrating the eve of Burns Day on January 24 with the special concert “Days of Auld Lang Syne: Euan Morton Sings Songs of Scotland,” in which the singer and actor will perform Scottish works, accompanied by composer Bryan Reeder on piano. (Also currently on view at the Morgan are “Charles Dickens at 200,” “Treasures of Islamic Manuscript Painting from the Morgan,” and “David, Delacroix, and Revolutionary France: Drawings from the Louvre.”

NEW YEAR’S EVE MUSIC

Matt & Kim will ring in the new year at the Hammerstein Ballroom (photo by twi-ny/mdr)

If you’re looking to catch some great music on New Year’s Eve, you’re too late for Patti Smith and her Band at the Bowery Ballroom or Deer Tick at Brooklyn Bowl, but there are still tickets left for some other very cool shows. VHS or Beta will be playing a DJ set at DROM, the always entertaining Matt & Kim are headlining the Hammerstein, the relentless Ted Leo & the Pharmacists are at Maxwell’s, Cheryl and Midnight Magic will be making midnight magic at Public Assembly, O’Death will be breathing life into the new year at Spike Hill, the Fleshtones will be shaking some flesh at the Bowery Electric, Assembly of Dust will conclude its New Year’s Eve Weekend at Mercury Lounge, Gogol Bordello will be partying it up at Terminal 5, and the Dark Star Orchestra will take audiences on a long, strange trip at the Wellmont.

THE MACCABEATS: A HANUKKAH CELEBRATION

B. B. King Blues Club & Grill
237 West 42nd St. between Seventh & Eighth Aves.
Sunday, December 25, $35-$50, 7:30
212-997-4144
www.bbkingblues.com
www.maccabeats.com

The Festival of Lights and Christmas overlap this year, so it only seems appropriate that the Maccabeats, the all-male a cappella group from Yeshiva University, will be performing a special Hanukkah concert on Christmas night. Since 2007, the Yeshiva bochers have been singing traditional songs and parodies that follow Torah u-Madda, a combination of secular and religious knowledge. This philosophy is central to their debut album, Voices from the Heights (Sameach Music, March 2010), which includes versions of such prayers as “Aleinu,” “Oseh Shalom,” and “Lecha Dodi” (set to Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah”), the Israeli national anthem, “HaTikva,” and such English-language songs as “Go the Distance,” “Bad Day,” and a cover of Matisyahu’s “One Day.” But the college boys might be best known for their inventive reimagining of Justin Bieber’s (and Taio Cruz’s) “Dynamite,” transforming it into the Hanukkah sensation “Candlelight.” (Ever on the cutting edge, they’ve also turned OneRepublic’s “Good Life” into “Book of Good Life” and Pink’s “Raise Your Glass” into “Purim Song.”) Chanina Abramowitz, David Block, Michael Greenberg, Noey Jacobson, Josh Jay, Nachum Joel, Ari Lewis, Mordy Prus, Jeff Ritholtz, Buri Rosenberg, Meir Shapiro, and Yonatan Shefa will be at B. B. King’s in Times Square on December 25, bringing a little Hanukkah into your Christmas. As they sing on their new cover of Matisyahu’s “Miracle,” “New York City, wanna flex your muscle.”

THE MOUNTAIN GOATS: HAVE YOURSELF A MERRY LITTLE CHRISTMAS


John Danielle of the Mountain Goats wishes Jenn Wasner of Wye Oak (and her cats) a merry little Christmas in this live solo performance for A.V. Club in Chicago. The Mountain Goats will be in New York City this spring, participating in “The Music of the Rolling Stones: Hot Rocks 1964-1971” at Carnegie Hall on March 13 and the Ecstatic Music Festival with Anonymous 4 at Merkin Concert Hall on March 24. You can find Wye Oak’s A.V. Club cover of Brenda Lee’s “Christmas Will Be Just Another Day” here.

KLEZ FOR KIDZ FAMILY CONCERT

The Museum at Eldridge Street will host Klez for Kidz family concert on Christmas Day (photo by Rachel Rabhan)

Museum at Eldridge Street
12 Eldridge St. between Canal & Division Sts.
Sunday, December 25, adults $12, children under twelve $6, 1:00
Admission: free
212-219-0302
www.eldridgestreet.org

Continuing its 125th anniversary, the Museum at Eldridge Street will present a special Klez for Kidz family concert on Christmas Day featuring Klezmerfest! Led by clarinetist Greg Wall, the New York City-based band, part of the Simcha All-Stars, brings back the sounds of the old country, playing festive Eastern European and Yiddish dance music, including freylachs, bulgars, doynas, and chassidls. The afternoon will conclude with the audience participating in a musical shtetl wedding. As always when you’re at the historic Lower East Side institution, be sure to marvel at the recently restored building, which last year added a new stained-glass window by Kiki Smith and Deborah Gans. And there will also be hot chocolate, cider, and eggnog available all day long.

HANUKKAH AT THE MUSEUM OF JEWISH HERITAGE

Husband-and-wife-team Aaron Hartman and Alicia Jo Rabins, the leaders of Girls in Trouble, will give a special Hanukkah concert at the Museum of Jewish Heritage on December 21

Museum of Jewish Heritage — A Living Memorial to the Holocaust
36 Battery Pl.
646-437-4202
www.mjhnyc.org

The Museum of Jewish Heritage will be celebrating the Festival of Lights with two special presentations this week. On December 21 at 7:00 ($15), Brooklyn’s Girls in Trouble, led by singer-violinist Alicia Jo Rabins and her husband, bassist Aaron Hartman, will play dark tales of biblical women featured on their two JDub albums, their eponymous 2009 debut and this year’s Half You Half Me, which include such songs as “I Was a Desert,” “I Fell Off My Camel,” “We Are Androgynous,” “Bethesda,” and “Waltz for a Beheading.” (Sadly, JDub Records, which focused on music by Jewish artists, recently announced it is closing because of financial difficulties.) The concert is being held in conjunction with the museum’s current exhibit “Emma Lazarus: Poet of Exiles.” On Christmas Day, MJH will be hosting “I Lift My Lamp: A Statue-esque Hanukkah,” with arts and crafts for children ages three to ten, family-friendly tours, and a trio of film screenings, beginning at 11:00 with An American Tail (Don Bluth, 1986) and continuing at 1:00 with Alfred Hitchcock’s 1942 espionage thriller Sabaoteur and at 3:00 with Ghostbusters II (Ivan Reitman, 1989). In addition to the Emma Lazarus exhibition, also on view are “Deadly Medicine: Creating the Master Race,” “Voices of Liberty,” and “Let My People Go! The Soviet Jewry Movement, 1967-1989.”