Santa and the solstice will soon be here. Get yourself in the spirit with these splendid events.
Superwolves Howl at Kaatsbaan | December 17-19
Singer-songwriter, actor, and modern-day icon Bonnie “Prince” Billy aka Will Oldham (Palace Brothers) and Matt Sweeney (Iggy Pop, Chavez) debuted as a duo in 2005 on the Drag City record label with Superwolf, an effort widely hailed as an instant classic. Sixteen years later, the pair return with the album’s highly anticipated followup, Superwolves, a release whose title now serves as that of their collaborative project itself. Joined by musical accomplices Emmett Kelly (the Cairo Gang, Ty Segall) and Dave Pajo (Slint, Tortoise), the twosome takes over Kaatsbaan Cultural Park in Tivoli for this three-show residency. Warming up each 8pm performance is a different opener: Ben Vida (December 17), Weak Signal (December 18), and Sargent Seedoo (December 19). Tickets are $70.
“A Christmas Carol” in Rosendale | December 17-18
On December 17 at 7pm and December 18 at 2pm and 7pm, the Rosendale Theatre will present its first live theater production since reopening: a new adaptation of the classic Charles Dickens story “A Christmas Carol.” The show is an interactive retelling of the story using live original music, puppetry, visiting professional actors, local actors, and volunteer “cast” members from the audience. Tickets are $20 general audience and $15 for children 15 and under.
Winter Solstice Celebration at Opus 40 | December 18
Saugerties’s magical and historic sculpture and nature park Opus 40 will host “Starry, Starry Night,” a celebration of the winter solstice, on December 18 beginning at 3pm. The event will include a performance by a local choral group, a fire pit, pine tree decorating, lantern making and a lantern walk, hot chocolate, snacks, night-time telescope viewing courtesy of the Mid-Hudson Astronomical Association, and more. See the Opus 40 website for ticket prices and further information.
Mikhail Horowitz at Nancy’s in Bearsville |
December 18
On December 18 at 2pm, the Golden Notebook welcomes local literary raconteur and linguistic ruffian Mikhail Horowitz to Nancy’s Artisanal Creamery in Bearsville to celebrate the release of hist latest book, Slapstick Gravitas: Selected Spells, Centos, and Lists. “Over the course of his 70 years,” reads the book’s description, “Mikhail Horowitz reports being an English Romantic poet of the early 19th century, a Chinese hermit poet of the Tang Dynasty, a neo-Beat jazz poet of the Third Millennium, a proto-Surrealist and Oulipo poet of Paris between the wars, and a postmodern poet and spoken word performer in an increasingly medieval America. This volume offers a generous selection of his various avatars, featuring poems and prose pieces that are bracing, ludic, and often madly obsessive.” At the free event, the author will read from and sign copies of the work.
“A Radio Christmas Carol” at Bard Fisher Center | December 18-19
The SITI Company theatrical troupe returns to the Fisher Center at Bard College’s Annanadale-on-Hudson campus to stage a new live presentation of Orson Welles’s 1939 radio play adaptation of Dickens’s immortal “A Christmas Carol” on December 18 at 7:30pm and December 19 at 2pm. Part of the facility’s “LAB” series and Co-directed by Anne Bogart and Darron West, the two special in-progress performances are a preview of the world premiere coming up at the Fisher Center in December 2022. Orchestra/parterre section tickets are $25.
Holiday Market in Hopewell Junction |
December 18-19
An indoor holiday makers market featuring food trucks; beer, wine, cider, and other spirits; artisanal food; fresh flowers; and gift items by local artisans and makers comes to the IPark 84 Food Hub and Art Gallery in Hopewell Junction on December 18 at 19 from 11am to 4pm. Fine art will be available for purchase inside the gallery, which hosts unique local artists from in and around the New York area. Also part of the family fun is live music, crafts for kids, and “unique photo op[s]” with Santa himself. Admission is free. Call (203) 699-6242 for additional information.
The Klezmatics Live at Bethel Woods | December 19
The Bethel Woods Center for the Arts in Bethel welcomes Grammy-winning klezmer superstars the Klezmatics to the center’s Event Gallery space on December 19 at 7pm. Formed on New York’s Lower East Side in 1986, the group combines traditional Eastern European Jewish music with elements of Arab, African, Latin, and Balkan music, jazz, and punk—to highly danceable effect. Tickets are $38.
Tony Trischka at the Towne Crier | December 19
Instead of crassly commercial network TV fare, how about a holiday show that looks genuinely tasteful and heartwarming? On December 19 at 7pm, in honor of On a Winter’s Night, his 2015 locally recorded live acoustic holiday-themed album, banjo virtuoso Tony Trischka makes his way to the cozy confines of the Towne Crier in Beacon to once again sing and strum to celebrate the season. Teaming up with Trischka for this exemplary evening of bluegrass and Americana will be multi-instrumentalist and shape-note singer Tim Eriksen (Cold Mountain soundtrack), bassist Larry Cook, and drummer Sean Trischka. On the set list are songs from 1844’s Sacred Harp hymnbook and several that even predate the Revolutionary War. Tickets are $20 and $25.
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This article appears in December 2021.
