MASS MoCA Announces Fall Season of Concerts, Events & Performances

MASS MoCA – the sprawling, ever-innovative arts center in North Adams – has announced its schedule of concerts, events and performances for the fall season.

Here’s what’s coming to MASS MoCA in autumn 2012:

MUSIC: THE BANDANA SPLITS
Saturday, October 6, 8pm
Club B-10
$12 in advance; $16 at the door; $10 students; 10% member discount
This charming trio of vocalists — Dawn Landes, Lauren Balthrop and Annie Nero — have a sound reminiscent of the great girl groups of the ‘50s and ‘60s inspired by the Ronettes and the Caravelles. Their debut record is packed with sure-fire hits, including an amazing version of “You Don’t Have to be a Baby to Cry.”

EVENT: NERD NITE
Saturday, October 13, 8pm
Club B-10
$14 in advance; $18 at the door; $10 students; 10% member discount
It’s like the Discovery Channel—with beer! Born in Boston, Nerd Nite is a phenomenon that has quickly gone global, spreading from Austin to Amsterdam, Liberia to Leipzig, and now to North Adams. Enjoy funny-yet-smart presentations including “Mumblecore: The Film Movement that Didn’t Roar” and “Hey, Where’s My Robot Girlfriend? The Singularity, Sperm Bots and the Future of Sexual Technology.”

KIDS’ EVENT: LOSER’S LOUNGE: MUPPET MUSIC EXPERIENCE
Saturday, October 20, 3pm
Hunter Center
$12; $8 children
Why are there so many songs about rainbows? Ask The Loser’s Lounge, NYC’s favorite all-star tribute ensemble as they get their collective Kermit on with a salute to the Muppet musical oeuvre. It’s time to play the music, it’s time to light the lights…

MUSIC: LAURA MARLING
Friday, October 26, 8pm
Hunter Center
$16 in advance; $19 at the door; 10% member discount
Just 16 years old when she leapt into the public eye in 2006 as a seemingly fully formed artist, the talented English folk singer Laura Marling has mesmerized ever since with her extraordinary songwriting, equally enchanting voice and such stellar albums as “Alas I Cannot Swim,” “I Speak Because I Can” and “A Creature I Don’t Know.”

DANCE: LeWITTICISMS
Thursday, November 1, 6pm
Galleries
$8; $5 students
Williams College’s Contemporary Dance Ensemble (CoDa) presents an evening of dance and music inspired by Sol LeWitt’s wall drawings on display. In addition to student performances, the evening features new work by composer and artist Tristan Perich, whose work is inspired by the aesthetic simplicity of math, physics and code.

MUSIC: BEN PEROWSKY’S MOODSWING ORCHESTRA featuring TK Wonder
Saturday, November 3, 8pm
Club B-10
$12 in advance; $16 at the door; $10 students; 10% member discount
One of the most accomplished drummers of his generation, Ben Perowsky is able to move between jazz, experimental music and cutting edge pop and rock. His Moodswing Orchestra carves a path between hypnotic grooves and body-shaking trances. They’ll be joined by frequent collaborator and engaging MC, TK Wonder.

CULTURE BREAK: BOOK CLUB: ITALO CALVINO
Thursday, November 8, 6pm
Galleries
$12; $7 members; students FREE
Join in MASS MoCA’s new book club focusing on works of fiction related to our current exhibitions. Our first session will examine “Invisible Cities,” so grab a copy of Italo Calvino’s great work and explore the far reaches of memory and imagination described in this dream-like text. Join curator Susan Cross as she discusses the exhibition inspired by and titled after the book, along with Williams College Professor of English Gage McWeeny who will address some of the book’s major themes and sumptuous details. Wine and cheese will be served.

MUSIC: ALSARAH & THE NUBATONES
Saturday, November 10, 8pm
Club B-10
$12 in advance/$16 at the door; $10 students; 10% member discount
Powerful Sudanese-American singer Alsarah fronts this extraordinary band bound together by a collective love for Nubian music and the genuine belief that soul transcends all cultural and linguistic barriers. They blend a selection of Nubian songs of return from the ’70s to today with original, Western soul-inspired material and vintage Sudanese pop.

DANCE: EMILY JOHNSON: NIICUGNI (LISTEN)
Friday, November 16, 8pm
Hunter Center
$12; 10% member discount
Centered on movement, story and sound, and housed within a light/sound installation of handmade, functional fish-skin lanterns, “Niicugni” equates the land we live on with the cells that comprise our bodies. During her residency, Johnson will work on this piece with fellow performer Aretha Aoki, then present this work-in-progress showing. The sound is composed and performed by multi-instrumentalist James Everest and violinist/electronic musician Bethany Lacktorin; lighting design by Heidi Eckwall.

THEATER: TIM CROUCH: MY ARM
Sunday, December 2, 8pm
Club B-10
$12 in advance; $16 at the door; $10 students; 10% member discount
Sundance Institute’s vaunted Theatre Lab Program – at MASS MoCA for a two-week residency – presents a reading of “My Arm,” a combination of live performance and the animation of everyday objects supplied by the audience before the performance. It’s the confession of a man who has lived for 30 years by the courage of his lack of conviction, all the while becoming a celebrated medical specimen and an icon of the New York art scene.

THEATER: SEAGULL (THINKING OF YOU)
Saturday, December 8, 7:30pm
Hunter Center
$14; 10% member discount
“Seagull (Thinking of you)” is a new live performance that works with, against, and beneath Chekhov’s classic “The Seagull.” Director Tina Satter’s unique contemporary voice takes on the beauty and darkness of Chekhov’s play in a beautiful act of theatrical rethinking, drawing on Chekhov’s letters, various “Seagull” translations, quasi-biographical facts from early productions of the play in Russia and Chekhov’s perverse sense of comedy to consider anew what makes the human heart beat and why we ever try to say something out loud. With a Russian folk-metal-influenced score.