Results tagged “riverfestival”

Here's a heads up on sunny summertime shows. Sure, after the first week we'll be complaining about the heat, the smell of the city as it melts, and the lack of shade...but it's always nice to have some music to look forward to. So stock up on the SPF for the following shows:

We here at the Gothamist Arts & Entertainment World Headquarters may disagree on what to think about Patrick Wolf, but there is a solidifying consensus that his performance at Hiro last night (his first NYC appearance in 4 years) was not too great. Our growing frustration with Hiro Ballroom is only magnified by how impressive their booking has been of late. For the first three quarters of the short set, the sound was grating. Nothing mixed together, vocals either came in too strong or not at all, and the intricate instrumentation on stage was impossible to decipher. It wasn't until the final song of the set, The Magic Position, where everything came together correctly, but by then the damage has been done. One of the saddest side effects of the closings of the many different downtown rock clubs is that the acts that should normally be playing in them are now getting gobbled up by larger, non-music venues where the concert attendee is considered an afterthought. Every time we have to suffer through a set at a place like Hiro, Annex or R&R, our anticipated longing for places like Sin-e and Tonic grows more and more.

THEATER: If you want to avoid the first, hottest days of Fringe fever, a quieter alternative would be Mary Gage's Evensong, which she wrote after interviewing 6 senior citizens in Michigan. Using a sort of jazz composition style, with solos and chorus, Gage weaves their very different tales and bits of life wisdom together into one coherent thread that affirms how much their generation struggled on behalf of this country, motivated by a belief in it that would be smarmy if it weren't quite real.

THEATER: The River to River Festival isn't just about outdoor concerts, and Canadians not only have great indie bands, they also have theatre troupes breaking into the experimental downtown scene. Bluemouth Inc.'s What the River Said, which is in both R2R and the Sitelines series, is a case in point; the play, which evokes "the struggle for acceptance in the calm before the family storm" is the third part of a trilogy originally performed along a creek near Toronto; you aren't likely to feel lost if you haven't seen the other parts, but you almost certainly will be eager for the full production to make it here. - Mallory Jensen

MOVIES: DUMBO's weekly evening film event, Movies with a View, begins tonight with The Wizard of Oz. Bring your iPod and play "Dark Side of the Moon" while the movie plays, it'll, like, totally synch up if you press play during the 3rd lion roar.

Today Martha Wainwright and Belle & Sebastian played at the River to River Festival in Battery Park. Rain and an electrical storm threatened the show...

The Downtown NYC River to River Festival is offering Meals to Music, which highlights many of the area's restaurants. For American Express Card holders, there is a special promotion for prix fixe meals from July 9th through July 23rd, offering a $20 lunch and a $30 dinner. For those of us without an AmEx, we can still join in the fun. See the River to River website for details on the various specials that each restaurant is offering. You may very well see Gothamist chowing down on a lobster or two at the "lobster feast at a reasonable price" on July 22nd at The Captain's Ketch.

Here at Ask Gothamist HQ, we've received tons of questions about fun summer activities, like the recent question about the New York Philharmonic Outdoor Concert Series.

See the Godfather of Soul James Brown tonight at Battery Park. It's part of the River to River Festival.