From a festival of new plays to a Wynton Marsalis concerto to an apple festival in Sonoma, there is a lot to see and do in the Bay Area this weekend and beyond. Here’s a partial rundown.
New Works Fest is back
Who doesn’t love sneak peaks at works on the way (here’s where we don’t confess how much time we spend watching moving trailers on YouTube)? In the world of theater, one of best forums for this returns this week, with TheaterWorks’ Silicon Valley’s acclaimed annual Festival of New Works.
Having hosted more than 70 world premiere productions over its 53 seasons, Palo Alto-based Theatreworks is considered one of the leading troupes in the country for new works. And its annual festival, now in 21st year, is a big part of that. For the next 10 days, the event will offer a readings of four emerging works, plus a variety of special events and gatherings.
Among the readings are “Five & Dime,” a musical based on the classic play “Come Back to the Five and Dime, Jimmy Dean, Jimmy Dean,” featuring nationally acclaimed transgender performer Shakina; “Hysterical,” Molly Bell’s rollercoaster ride of solo show; “Lieberling,” a dramedy focusing on two novelists, one Cambodian and one German; and “A Driving Beat,” featuring a hip-hop-fueled mother-son road trip.
Details: Friday through Aug. 18; Lucie Stern Theatre, Palo Alto; $25 single tickets, $60-$65 festival passes; theatreworks.org.
— Randy McMullen, Staff
Classical picks: West Edge Opera, Mendelssohn’s ‘Elija’
New works and old favorites continue to highlight the classical music calendar: here are the events you won’t want to miss.
Opera at West Edge: Now that West Edge Opera’s world premiere of “Bulrusher,” by composer Nathaniel Stookey and librettist Eisa Davis, is up and running, the company under General Director Mark Streshinsky has two additional productions waiting in the wings. “Legend of the Ring,” with music from four Wagner operas, is arranged by David Seaman and conducted by Jonathan Khuner, with a cast headed by soprano Tracy Cox as Brünnhilde. Closing the festival is “Jacqueline,” exploring the life and work of the great cellist Jacqueline du Pré, with music by Luna Pearl Woolf and libretto by Royce Vavrek.
Details: Through Aug. 18, Oakland Scottish Rite Center; $20-$160, $10 rush tickets; westedgeopera.org.
One of the greats: Oratorios don’t get much better than Mendelssohn’s “Elija,” and the San Francisco Choral Society is marking its 35th season this week with a single performance of this monumental work. Artistic Director Robert Geary conducts it with soloists including soprano Michelle Rice, mezzo-soprano Courtney Miller, tenor Brian Thorsett, baritone Eugene Brancoveanu, and members of the San Francisco Girls Chorus.
Details: 8 p.m. Aug. 10; Davies Symphony Hall, San Francisco; $50-$81; sfchoral.org.
In with the New: The Cabrillo Festival heads into its final weekend with the West Coast premiere of Wynton Marsalis’ “Concerto for Trumpet,” featuring Michael Sachs as soloist. Saturday’s program, titled “Creative Coast,” also includes Gabriella Smith’s “Lost Coast” for amplified cello, and the world premiere of “PARHELION” by sound artist Bora Yoon. Sunday brings “Passage,” featuring works by Clarice Assad, Juan Pablo Contreras, Pierre Jalbert, and Errollyn Wallen, with a special appearance by violinist Philippe Quint.
Details: 7 p.m. Aug. 10-11; Santa Cruz Civic Auditorium; Tickets start at $30; cabrillomusic.org.
— Georgia Rowe, Correspondent
A seedy festival comes to Sonoma
For fans of that other kind of apple the Bay Area is famous for, there’s no better place to be in August than the 2024 Gravenstein Apple Fair. Now in its 51st year, the event takes place in the orchard-dotted hamlet of Sebastopol and has every kind of apple-related delight you’d want: an Apple Alley with pies, fritters, slushies and fresh-pressed juice, tons of live music and farm activities, and for adults draft microbrews and a Craft Cider Tent promising the largest cider selection of any North Bay festival.
The music lineup is especially impressive this year, spanning two weekend days with nearly 20 bands ranging from bluegrass to cosmic funk to flamenco-gypsy jazz. Forty Sonoma County apple farms will have a presence — and if you just want to buy apples, you can get in free for 30 minutes to snag whole bags.
There’s an apple-pie baking contest, cute livestock and wandering entertainers, cheese-making and sheep-shearing demos and a panel discussion Saturday about protecting agricultural diversity, featuring Alice Waters and Albert Straus of Straus Family Creamery fame.
Details: 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. Aug. 10-11; Ragle Ranch Regional Park, Sebastopol; Tickets start at $23-$30; gravensteinapplefair.com.
— John Metcalfe, Staff
Free jazz in San Jose
Anyone who’s lived in the Bay Area long enough knows the second weekend in August delivers the twin towers of the summer music season – the Outside Lands music festival in Golden Gate Park and San Jose Jazz’s equally impressive Summer Fest. That’s right, two of the biggest musical bonanzas of the year have for some zany reason been scheduled for the Same. Freaking. Weekend. From Friday through Sunday, Outside Lands (sfoutsidelands.com) will serve up its dizzying array of pop, rock and hip-hop stars on several stages with headliners ranging from the Killers to Sabrina Carpenter to Sturgill Simpson and San Jose’s own EDM star Dan Griffith, aka Gryffin; while Summer Fest (summerfest.sanjosejazz.org) takes over several stages and venues in downtown San Jose with entertainers ranging from The Family Stone to Lisa Fischer (who also plays Berkeley’s Freight & Salvage Friday and Saturday) to Herbie Hancock and much, much more.
Summer Fest also has a free music component that perhaps not as many people know about. It’s called Summer Fest Club Crawl, and it serves up a variety of artists, DJs and bands at five downtown nightclubs – Poor House Bistro, Sushi Confidential, Signia at Hilton San Jose, the club in San Jose Marriott, and Rollati. The lineup includes artists like Lauren Halliwell’s Blues Chasers, singer Dana Salzman, the Love Supreme DJs, vocalist Jessica Johnson, and the Afro-Cuban outfit Sofrito. Also, the event will live-stream some events from its YouTube channel.
Details: Go to summerfest.sanjosejazz.org for more details.
— Bay City News Foundation
‘Shipping & Handling’ gets delivered
It’s been quite a journey for San Francisco writer Star Finch’s new play. Finch, who was announced Crowded Fire Theater’s playwright-in-residence in May 2020, hoped that “Shipping & Handling,” despite COVID lockdowns, would finally see its opening in September 2022.
Since then, Crowded Fire transitioned to a collective model and left its longtime venue Potrero Stage, and Finch wrote the acclaimed “Josephine’s Feast” for a Magic Theatre. Yet “Shipping & Handling” remained postponed, until now, with Crowded Fire finally presenting the play at San Francisco’s Fort Mason Center.
But Finch doesn’t see the false starts as detrimental to her tech-centric, artificial intelligence-themed story. “Strangely enough, the delays feel like we were being rerouted to land in this moment where we’re being bombarded with AI from every angle,” she says.
The show merges traditional and immersive theatrical experiences in what’s described as “a night out at the theater told in reverse.” It examines the complex history of Black theater, comparing creative strides and setbacks with the rise of generative AI, which has stoked fears of artists being replaced by automation.
Details: Through Sept. 7; Magic Theatre, Landmark Building D, Fort Mason Center, San Francisco; $20-$95 (with pay-what-you-can options); crowdedfire.org.
— Charles Lewis III, Bay City News Foundation
He’s just Kid-ding around
It’s always fun, and certainly interesting, when Kid Koala comes to town. The Canadian DJ, turntablist, producer, composer, musician, filmmaker, multimedia performer and comic book aficionado is known for creating musical stage productions that are unlike anything you’ve ever witnessed. He is back in San Francisco this week with his quirky multimedia concert production “The Storyville Mosquito,” being presented at SFJAZZ Center through Sunday. Kid Koala, born Eric San, emerged in the mid-1990s as a scratcher with mad turntable skills and a knack for incorporating odd musical samples (everything from Charlie Brown TV special snippets to comedy routines to people sneezing) to grand effect. He added his talents for stage and screen producing, storytelling and filmmaking to his arsenal to create multimedia shows like “Nufonia Must Fall,” about a lonely robot finding love, and now “Storyville Mosquito,” about an ambitious insect who leaves home with dreams of becoming a jazz star. The show features a cast of 14 performers, producers and musicians backed by large-screen projections. Basically, you are watching a concert that incorporates hip-hop, pop, rock, ambient and jazz music accompanied by the live creation of a new movie that’s projected on stage. Or a live graphic novel with cool tunes. Performances are 7:30 p.m. Thursday and Friday, 3 and 7:30 p.m. Saturday and 7 p.m. at SFJAZZ Center’s Miner Auditorium. Tickets are $30-$110; go to www.sfjazz.org.
— Bay City News Foundation
