Berkshire Museum

Barrington Stage Company adds a reading of the musical Butterflies, Speech & Debate on the St. Germain Stage, and its annual youth production, Bye Bye Birdie, at the Pittsfield Museum.

The 10X10 Upstreet Arts Festival returns to downtown Pittsfield for the sixth year and features music, theatre, dance, film, visual art, spoken word, comedy and more, including BSC’s 10X10 New Play Festival.

In Norman Rockwell's 1961 Saturday Evening Post illustration "The Connoisseur" a dignified gentleman gazes on a simulacrum of a Jackson Pollock painting. It provided the impetus for a mishegos attempt to locate the representational populist illustrator as responding to the avant-garde art of that formative era.

Highlights of Festival 2016 include a world premiere engagement And Still You Must Swing created by tap dance powerhouses Dormeshia Sumbry-Edwards, Derick K. Grant, and Jason Samuels Smith; former New York City Ballet principal dancer Wendy Whelan and choreographer Brian Brooks in an evening of new duets and solos, accompanied by eminent string quartet Brooklyn Rider and titled Some of a Thousand Words; rare U.S. appearances by France-based Compagnie Hervé KOUBI and South Korea-based contemporary ensemble Bereishit Dance Company; the powerful all-male company Che Malambo of Argentina; and the return of the eminent Seattle-based company Pacific Northwest Ballet.

Hey Charles- I like that! With my white beard and ample belly, I could join the club with you and Santa. Below is one of a long line of my holiday poems, first written in 2005 and updated this year. Merry Christmas!

Music at The Colonial Theatre includes, legendary reggae band, The Wailers (part of the 10X10 Upstreet Arts Festival); Grammy Award-winning pop/rock singer, songwriter, musician, Richard Marx; Grammy Award-winning Walking In Memphis singer, Marc Cohn and “the godfather of British blues,” John Mayall.

Each year, the Berkshire Museum, hosts the Festival of Trees. Both a fundraiser and a social event, this years theme is 'Westward Ho Ho Ho!' The goal is for the eighty participants to decorate their holiday trees in the theme of the event. The theme coincides with the museums 'American West' and 'Go West' exhibition.

Now in his final weeks as director of the Clark Art Institute Michael Conforti hosted a media event promoting a blockbuster season for Northern Berkshire County. There were presentations by Joe Thompson for Mass MoCA, Tina Olsen for the Williams College Museum of Art, and Mandy Greenfield for the Williamstown Theatre Festival. Notably absent from the media event were North Adams based arts presenters Downstreet, The Eclipse Mill Gallery, The Rudd Museum of Art and the fall annual Williamstown Film Festival.

In March, WAM Theatre will be a beneficiary of Jayne Atkinson’s special event, Can You Hear Me Baby? Stories of Sex, Love and OMG Birth!, which is concluding this year’s Berkshire Festival of Women Writers. Adapted from true stories that come from the hearts of mothers and fathers, this event brings together birth stories and original music to dramatize the joy, challenges, personal courage, and profundity of birth. Can You Hear Me Baby? takes the stage at the Berkshire Theatre Group’s Unicorn Theatre in Stockbridge, MA on March 27 at 7pm and March 28 at 2 and 7 pm. Proceeds will benefit the National Perinatal Association, Berkshire Festival of Women Writers, and WAM Theatre.

Barrington Stage Company, has announced casting for the 10-minute plays for the 4th Annual 10X10 New Play Festival, with performances February 12 through March 1, as part of the 2015 10X10 Upstreet Arts Festival.

On a miserable January day the media gathered for lunch on stage at Barrington Stage Company in Pittsfield. Artistic director Julianne Boyd announced programming for the Boyd-Quinson Mainstage. There are still slots to fill on the Mark St. Germain second stage. Once that is complete Boyd will move on to schedule the cabaret largely based on who is available for the 99 seat basement venue. The company will again collaborate with the Berkshire Museum to present a youth oriented production.

The 10X10 Upstreet Arts Festival returns to downtown Pittsfield for the fourth year from February 12-22, 2014, and features music, theatre, dance, film, visual art, spoken word, comedy and more, including BSC’s 10X10 New Play Festival. Directors for the 10X10 New Play Festival are BSC Artistic Director Julianne Boyd and Artistic Associate and Director of New Play Development Stephanie Yankwitt.

Alexander Calder's brilliant abstract works revolutionized modern sculpture and made him one of the most celebrated artists of the 20th century. This wonderful exhibition brings together 40 of the artist's mobiles (kinetic) and stabiles ( stationary) to explore how Alexander Calder introduced the visual vocabulary into American cultural vernacular. At this once in a generation show, the power of his poetic mastery of elegant form, balance and motion is underscored by his infectious personality of delight and whimsy.

The festival kicks off on Thursday, Oct. 9, with Jazz About Town, with sponsored and affiliated events that span the long Columbus Day weekend and including a "jazz craw,” when venues present Berkshires’ established performers in casual settings.

This week representatives of the Clark Art Institute, Williams College Museum of Art, Williamstown Theatre Festival and Mass MoCA met with the media to promote plans for a spectacular Northern Berkshires season. The Clark reopens following extensive expansion and renovation. Mass MoCA offers the first full season of its Anselm Kiefer building. Jenny Gersten has planned a blockbuster program for WTF. WCMA plans special events like a Think and Drink series. In high season it may be hard to book a hotel or dine at the best restaurants.

Several months ago we spoke in depth with Joe Thompson about a bill pending on Beacon Hill to grant $25 million toward the final phase of developing the North Adams campus of Mass MoCA. This week, early August, 2014 the bill has been signed by outgoing Governor Deval Patrick a Berkshire neighbor of the museum. Thompson, as he discusses here, must raise an additional $30 million for the project which will take several years.

No it ain't Mardi Gras in New Orleans but Pittsfield is giving it a shot. Shake off the funk with the annual city wide Ten by Ten Festival. There's lots to do so bundle up and break out of the cabin.

Yesterday there was a late afternoon media scramble when a Barrington Stage Company press conference announcing the 2014 season was followed within minutes by an unanticipated release by Williamstown Theatre Festival. It's taken some sorting but we now have an unusually early and clear picture of the summer season. We have a fairly complete clip and save rundown. Berkshire Theatre Group has yet to announce and WTF will soon post its program of the Nikos Stage.

During a bone crunching cold snap the Berkshire theatre media gathered on stage for a lunch and press conference hosted by Julianne Boyd the artistic director of the now twenty-year-old Barrington Stage Company. In addition to discussing the program for the coming season Boyd confirmed that last summer's hit musical On the Town is headed for Broadway with either a summer or fall opening.

Barrington Stage Company (BSC) announces casting and the creative team for its 10×10 New Play Festival, with performances February 13 through March 2, as part of the 2014 10×10 Upstreet Arts Festival.

The September/ October edition of Art New England includes a section devoted to the Berkshires. To celebrate there was a reception hosted by the Eclipse Mill Gallery in North Adams. We got a chance to catch up with publisher Tim Montgomery whom we knew back in the day when he was in sales for the legendary Rock of Boston the pioneering WBCN. Several years ago he acquired the publication and continues its mandate as the foremost publication covering New England.

The Berkshire Museum has been named a Smithsonian Affiliate, a prestigious designation that marks the beginning of a long-term collaboration between the two institutions. The relationship will facilitate the loan of Smithsonian artifacts and traveling exhibitions as well as the opportunity to develop innovative educational collaborations.

A blessing and curse the life and career of the artist Matuschka has been defined by a single iconic image. It has both opened and closed reports on work that came before and after the cover of the New York Times Magazine in 1993. The media entirely focuses on that image and her somewhat complex and freaky life. Attempts to evaluate her as an artist are few and far between.

Julianne Boyd, the artistic director of Barrington Stage in Pittsfield called for a morning chin wag about the upcoming season. That led to a lively discussion of the current state of theatre and impact of criticism. Now in its 8th season the company has just completed raising $7 million. This is part one of an extended dialogue.

Here is the complete and final rundown, at least for now, of shows, cabaret, benefits and events for the 2013 season of Barrington Stage Company in Pittsfield, Mass. The fun begins on May 22 and winds down on October 13.