Stormy Solo Cello Transcendence with Tamas Varga at Merkin Concert Hall

Last week at Merkin Concert Hall, the Vienna Philharmonic’s principal cellist, Tamas Varga played a transcendent, majestic solo concert built around Kodaly’s Sonata for Violincello. Aaron Jay Kernis, who was in the audience, demurred that he’d never heard the piece before Varga had commissioned him and two others to write solo works to accompany the Hungarian composer’s “great masterwork,” as he called it. He wasn’t kidding.

It’s a symphony for solo cello, requiring all sorts of extended technique: harmonics, simultaneous pizzicato and bowing, and maddening metric shifts, among other things. But Varga dug in with relish. Complicating matters is that the two lowest strings are downtuned, something that the rest of the pieces on the bill shared. Varga cut loose churning rivers of low-register chords before rising to a regal theme that sounded suspiciously sardonic. Distantly Bartokian acidity and Romany-tinged flair were muted in the adagio section but burst into bracing focus in the climactic third movement, which ended cold and unresolved. Throughout the work, Varga’s pacing enhanced the suspense, through a couple of wry Beethovenesque false endings, stormy gusts, brooding lulls and finally the flames that leapt from his bow.

The new pieces were fascinating as well. Kernis’ Blues for Mr. Z was the most allusive yet most resonantly colorful of the three. The composer related that just as Kodaly had drawn on the folk music of his native Hungary, he’d decided to incorporate some austere minor-key blues, which turned out more often than not to be implied rather than explicitly evoked.

Varga opened with a meticulously altered stroll through Gregory Vajda’s Captain Hume’s Last Pavin for Violincello. Inspired by a seventeenth-century rant by British composer Tobias Hume, it built toward several possible resolutions that never arrived. Laszlo Vidovszky’s Two Paraphrases for Violincello Solo, based on two themes from the Kodaly work, built enigmatically ambered variations and ended with a shout out to the composer’s shape note system which is ubiquitous in Hungarian music education. Did Kodaly get the idea from the American shape note system, which was very popular in religious and choral music in the early 1800s? That merits further study.

Varga closed with a plaintive, calmly paced, Bach-influenced miniature written by his son, who couldn’t make it to the show…because he was in school. How many young composers have such a brilliant advocate for their work as Varga? And how many brilliant cellists have kids who can write as poignantly as Varga’s son?

This concert was part of the High Note Hungary series staged by the Hungarian Cultural Center, who have been putting on some incredible shows around town over the last couple of years. The best way to stay on top of what’s happening is to get on their email list: this one was a late addition to the calendar.

Two Sides of Evocative, Brilliant Violist and Composer Ljova

Ljova, a.k.a. Lev Zhurbin is one of the world’s most dynamic, versatile violists. As you would expect from someone who’s as busy as a bandleader as he is a sideman, he wears many, many hats: film composer, lead player in a Russian Romany party band, arranger to the stars of indie classical and the Middle East…and loopmusic artist. Ljova’s next New York show is a great chance to see him at full power with Romashka, the wild Romany-flavored band who are playing a killer twinbill with western swing stars Brain Cloud at 8 PM on March 23 at Flushing Town Hall. Cover is $16, $10 for seniors, and kids 19 and under with school ID get in free.

Ljova’s latest album, Solo Opus, is a somewhat calmer but no less colorful one-man string orchestra ep, streaming at Bandcamp. The first three numbers feature Ljova overdubbing and looping his six-string fadolin; the finale is the only viola track here. The album open with The Comet, a broodingly gorgeous, hypnotically epic tone poem written in the wake of the fateful 2016 Presidential election. It’s his Metamorphosen: with its disquieting layers of echo effects, it brings to mind his work with iconic Iranian composer and kamancheh player Kayhan Kalhor. As sirening phrases encroach on the center, could this be a commentary on the perils of a political echo chamber?

Does Say It build from “a gorgeously bittersweet, Gershwinesque four-chord riff to a soaring, bittersweet anthem,” as this blog described it in concert in December? Again, Kalhor’s work is a point of reference, as is the gloomiest side of Russian folk music, particularly when Ljova works the low strings for cello-like tonalities. But there are echoes that could be Gershwin-inspired as the aching melody moves up the scale to a big climatic waltz.

Lamento Larry is a moody interweave of simple, anthemic phrases, rising from a Bach-like interweave of lows to anxious, higher atmospherics, then an echoey blend of the two. Ljova closes the album with the wryly dancing, distantly bluegrass-tinged, pizzicato Lullaby for JS, complete with muffled conversation and tv noise in the background.

Transcendent, Troubled, Richly Relevant Sounds with the Chelsea Symphony Saturday Night

Saturday night the Chelsea Symphony – New York’s most intimate orchestral experience – left the audience spellbound with a program that was a fearlessly relevant as it was stylistically vast.

The coda was a poignant, kinetically evocative version of Ravel’s Tombeau de Couperin that was more dynamic than a famous recording by George Solti and the Chicago Symphony, and had more slink and dark ripple than another by the Cleveland Orchestra under the baton of Pierre Boulez. With a calm meticulousness on the podium, the Chelsea Symphony’s Matthew Aubin brought the war veteran composer’s angst-ridden, distantly Andalucian-influenced WWI-era shout-out to people and an era gone forever into sharp, envelopingly wistful focus. Solos throughout were strikingly direct, especially Jason Smoller’s long, plaintive passage, horn player Emily Wong voicing reason through battlefield smoke a little later. 

There isn’t enough room in the New York Philharmonic for all the great musicians in New York: the Chelsea Symphony is one of the places where they can be found. What differentiates the Chelsea ensemble is that since their season is shorter, they have more time for rehearsals – a grand total of five for this particular bill – and this year, the orchestra have dedicated themselves to socially aware programming. No art for art’s sake this year: it’s all about keeping the music grounded in reality.

Chelsea Symphony bassist and composer Tim Kiah introduced the world premiere of his suite Fascist Baby, contemplating how we can keep our children from going over to the dark side. By implication, certainly, no child is born a fascist: the title is a question rather than an epithet. Kiah’s answer to that question, he said, would be to scare that kid a little, but also to offer hope, precisely what his suite accomplished. From a massed scream in the introduction, through calmer, more bittersweet passages utilizing the entire sonic spectrum a la Gil Evanas, to stabbing, Shostakovian horror and then backing away, solace seemed to trump menace.Conductor Reuben Blundell seemed as swept up in the suspense as to how it would turn out as everybody else was.

He also conducted the night’s second piece, Haydn’s First Cello Concerto, with soloist Erich Schoen-Rene. For those who might have preferred sedate, civilized Haydn, this was not the answer, but for those who wanted to revel in the composer’s irrepressible humor, playful jousting and “gotcha” phrases, this was a real romp. It was also the only point during the evening when there were any issues: in this case, tuning, probably weather-related. St. Paul’s Church on 22nd St. is a charming place to see an orchestra, but drafty 19th century buildings can be challenging for string sections when it’s cold outside.

The night’s centerpiece was what may have been the American premiere of Fernande Decruck’s 5 Poems for Soprano and Chamber Orchestra. The Chelsea Symphony have singlehandedly springboarded a revival of the mid-20th composer’s symphonic work, and Aubin has become the world’s leading Decruck scholar. He’s right in calling her extraordinary: one of the few women composers whose work was frequently played throughout Europe in the 1940s, her career was tragically cut short.

In a stroke of synchronicity, both the original 1944 version of this piece as well as the Ravel had been premiered by the same French ensemble, the Ochestre Colonne. Additionally, Decruck and her multi-instrumentalist husband, who played in the New York Philharmonic, lived in the London Terrace apartments in Chelsea, just a few blocks away, during the 1930s.

Introducing the piece, Aubin mentioned a possible political subtext: although the suite derives from liturgical themes, religion barely factors into Decruck’s oeuvre. Rather, the five sections came across as more of a harrowing, relentlessly elegaic commentary on the horrors of war, and as much of a condemnation of those who collaborated with the enemy. Soprano Kate Maroney kept those dynamics front and center, finally rising to an accusatory peak over an insistently somber backdrop. The bass section in particular stood out here, both in the stern first part and later in a surreal, hypnotically brooding one-chord bolero of sorts. Both years ahead of its time and timeless, there’s never been a better moment for this music to be resurgent. If this was recorded, the Chelsea Symphony ought to release it.

The Chelsea Symphony’s next concerts are May 18 at 8 PM, repeating on the 19th at 2 at the DiMenna Center, featuring Shostakovich’s harrowing Symphony No. 5 as well as works by Dvorak, Courtney Bryan and Eric Ewazen. Suggested donation is $20.

Shimmering and Shattering Mozart This Week From the New York Philharmonic

Last night the New York Philharmonic went from a whisper to a scream in a performance of two iconic Mozart works that even by this orchestra’s standards were revelatory. The Philharmonic are pairing the Requiem with Mozart’s final piano concerto, No. 27 in B Flat, featuring soloist Richard Goode tomorrow night, March 15 at 8 PM, as well as March 16 at 8 and March 19 at 7:30 PM. If you’ve never seen these pieces before, go – this is a rare chance to get a foundational understanding. If you have, these performances may reorient you, profoundly.

This was not a particularly loud Requiem. Notwithstanding that harrowing jolt where Mozart realizes that things are not going to end well – “Rex! Rex!” the choir implores – and that several later passages are as grand as guignol gets, the orchestra didn’t play them that way. In the early going, conductor Manfred Honeck put his hand to his ear, an admonition to remain hushed, and both the orchestra and the Westminster Symphonic Choir standing against the back wall stayed as sotto-voce and dead serious as they possibly could have been. Many ensembles can’t resist the temptation to make Halloween out of it, but this Requiem fulfilled its function as elegy and also as liturgical music, true to the commission Mozart accepted. Employing his motet Ave Verum Corpus as a solemn summation to this uncompleted version was a respectful acknowledgment that we’ll never know how the composer wanted it to end.

As David Bernard has astutely observed, eighty percent of the Requiem is either repetition or Mozart understudy Franz Sussmayr. How do you save repetition from being redundant? Change the dynamics. What a difference Honeck’s choice made when the introductory theme came around again, this time closer to pine box than velvet. Contrasts between mens’ and women’s voices were striking and distinct, other than in the two bewildering series of quasi-operatic, Handelian eighth note volleys that are so out of place that one assumes it was Sussmayr, not Mozart, who came up with them.

Among the four vocal soloists, soprano Joelle Harvey’s forceful delivery was particularly impactful, as was mezzo-soprano Megan Mikhailovna Samarin’s more understated, moody approach, in her Philharmonic debut. Tenor Ben Bliss and bass Matthew Rose exchanged roles as voices of doom and hope against hope. Snippets of somber Mozart Masonic funeral music made an apt introduction and brought everything full circle.

Much as the Requiem was played through a stained glass window, darkly, the Piano Concerto sparkled with coy humor. Goode’s floating articulacy on the keys, through jaunty, fleeting crescendos, jeweled cascades and some jousting with the orchestra, was unselfconsciously joyous. Likewise, the orchestra were seamless unless a particular moment called for some goofy peek-a-boo from an individual voice – Mozart uses the flute a lot for that. There were a few slight transitory glitches early on, but things like that typically get ironed out after opening night.

A Mighty, Majestically Orchestrated, Ambitious Album and a Vanguard Stand This Week From Alto Saxophone Titan MIguel Zenon

You might not expect Miguel Zenon to open his latest album with a cantabile pastorale, but that’s exactly what he’s done. The alto saxophonist has made some amazing records over the years – his smoldering Oye! Live in Puerto Rico from 2013 is a favorite – but his most recent one is his most ambitious yet. You could say that Yo Soy la Tradicion is his Sketches of Spain, a collaboration with the magical, microtonally-inclined Spektral Quartet streaming at their music page.

Jazz sax and strings have a history that dates back to Charlie Parker; this is a lot closer to Astor Piazzolla at his most adventurous, or Bartok, than orchestrated swing. Zenon has yet another weeklong stand at the Vanguard starting tomorrow, March 12 with his quartet and continuing through the 17th, with sets at 8 and 10:30.

The Spektral Quartet – violinists Clara Lyon and Maeve Feinberg, violist Doyle Armbrust and cellist Russell Rolen – open the album with the rather stark, almost severely precise intro to Rosario, inspired by the Catholic rosary tradition; then Zenon flips the script and builds a bubbly dance overhead that brings to mind the similarly paradigm-shifting work of Argentine bandoneonist JP Jofre. It’s catchy, almost to the point of sentimentality.

Cadenas (Chains) draws on European 20th century minimalism as well as Puerto Rican line dances, the strings’ hypnotic, insistent acerbity balancing Zenon’s folksy, airy delivery. Then the sax and quartet switch roles, a neat touch.

Yumac may have roots in rural Puerto Rican folk music – the ttile is the town of Camuy, home to popular 50s songwriter German Rosario, spelled backwards – but the music comes across as a more harmonically complex take on Ernesto Lecuona’s anthemic mashup of Afro-Cuban themes and western classical orchestration.

Milagrosa is more balmy, an unexpectedly successful mashup of spaciously sequenced postbop sax and alternately rhythmic and lush string passages, with a crescendo midway through that’s as majestic as anything Zenon has ever written.

The album’s most gorgeous track is Viejo, shifting from troubled, massed Julia Wolfe-like insistence, to an unabashedly lyrical ballad with an elegaic cello solo followed by Zenon’s broodingly wafting melody. Zenon’s tone is more biting than Paul Desmond’s, but the lyricism here is very similar.

If Bartok had a thing for Spain instead of Tunisia, he might have written Cadenza: there are also echoes of wistul, uneasy Debussy. Again, Zenon brightens the ambience, this time with flamenco allusions. Imagine Ligeti trying to reduce a flamenco tune to simplest terms: that’s the outro.

The album’s most epic track is Promesa, a diptych of sorts that refers to the Catholic festival of the Three Kings. A pensive cello solo takes centerstage over a lush backdrop that recedes to a steady, minimalist pulse, Zenon building the longest solo here from gentle pastoral colors to lively, blues-tinged spirals. Then the atmosphere shifts to artfully pulsing variations on a lively alguinaldo jibaro country dance theme.

Piazzolla, or for that matter, Lecuona would have been proud to have written the anthemic final number, based on a variant of that style from the town of Villalba. Obviously, Zenon’s Vanguard stand this week isn’t likely to showcase a lot of this material; on the other hand, with a guy who’s been known to reinvent classic Sylvia Rexach boleros, you never know.

Iconic and Obscure Treasures From The Tesla Quartet at Lincoln Center,

In their first Lincoln Center performance since an impromptu 2008 Alice Tully Hall gig, the Tesla Quartet treated a sold-out audience to a well-loved classic along with a more obscure treat last night, as part of the ongoing Great Perfomers series.

Violinists Ross Snyder and Michelle Lie, violist Edwin Kaplan and cellist Serafim Smigelskiy began with an especially dynamic performance of Beethoven’s final major work, the String Quartet in F major, Op. 135. A tiptoeing hush rose to a vigorous, emphatic stroll through the elegant cheer of the opening allegretto movement, echoed in the vivace second movement as the ensemble shifted between a muted minuet and forceful, fullscale enthusiasm.

From a whispery beginning to aching, unexpectedly stark, vibrato-infused washes, the lento third movement covered an equal expanse of sonic and emotional terrain. After that saturnine interlude, the remarkably spacious series of sharp phrases that began the next movement were quite the surprise, and packed a quiet wallop. Sometimes just a little extra energy completely transforms a piece of music, as the four musicians did with the brooding bittersweetness and sudden detour toward horror afterward. After that, the return to a jaunty stroll seemed to be a red herring: leave it to Beethoven to get all gothic on us!

Respighi’s String Quartet in D major is much lesser known but shouldn’t be – it has all the color of his various Roman cinematic suites. Snyder acknowledged that he discovered it at a “boot camp for string players” upstate: a cd purchased from a now-closed Borders book and record store completely floored him with its idiosyncracies and color. Which should come as no surprise: Respighi was a string player himself.

Gentle hints of a tarantella flitted here and there in the resonant, nocturnal opening movement, the group shifting effortlessly from a balletesque pulse to a wistful, Ravel-esque lushness. The contrast between the subtle echo effects in the background behind Snyder’s bittersweet melody was deftly executed.

The quartet worked hints of Romany flavor, subtle dissonances and a moody waltz to a dark crescendo fueled by Smigelskiy’s assertive presence. They let the enigmatic dance in the third movement speak for itself for a bit, but it wasn’t long before they dug in as they had with the Beethoven, setting the stage for the lively, anthemic series of triplets, acerbic rises and candlelit lulls afterward in the final movement.

They encored with their own lush arrangement of Debussy’s The Girl with the Flaxen Hair.

The Tesla Quartet’s next American concert is a program TBA on March 23 at 8 PM at the Stamford United Methodist Church, 88 Main St. in Stamford, New York. The next free classical music event at the Lincoln Center atrium space on Broadway just north of 62nd St. is a conversation with New York Philharmonic maestro Jaap van Zweden on March 20 at 7:30 PM. The earlier you get there, the better. 

Live Music Calendar for New York City and Brooklyn for March and April 2019

Daily updates – if you go out a lot, you might want to bookmark this page and check back regularly. If you’re leaving your hood, make sure you check http://www.mta.info for service changes considering how the trains are at night and on the weekend.

If you don’t recognize a venue where a particular act is playing, check the comprehensive, recently updated list of over 200 New York City music venues at New York Music Daily’s sister blog Lucid Culture.

This is not a list of every show in town – it’s a carefully handpicked selection. If this calendar seems short on praise for bands and artists, it’s because every act here is recommended if you like their particular kind of music. Many different styles to choose from.

Showtimes listed here are set times, not the time doors open – if a listing says something like “9ish,” that means it’ll probably start later than advertised. If you see a show listed without the start time, that’s because either the artist, their publicist or the venue in question sent incomplete info – those acts are usually listed last on a particular date.  Always best to check with the venue for the latest information on set times and door charges, since that information is often published here weeks in advance. Weekly events first followed by the daily calendar.

If you see a typo or an extra comma or something like that, remember that while you were out seeing that great free concert that you found out about here, somebody was up late after a long day of work editing and adding listings to this calendar ;)

On select Wednesdays and Sundays, an intimate, growing piano music salon on the Upper West Side featuring iconoclastically insightful, lyrical pianist Nancy Garniez – a cult favorite with an extraordinarily fluid, singing, legato style – exploring the delicious minutiae of works from across the centuries, beverages and lively conversation included!  email for details/address

Mondays at 7 PM multi-instrumentalist Dennis Lichtman’s popular western swing band Brain Cloud at Barbes followed at 9:30 PM by a variety of south-of-the-border-style bands playing cumbias, boogaloo, salsa, maybe all of the above.

Mondays at the Jazz Standard it’s all Mingus, whether with the Mingus Orchestra, Big Band or Mingus Dynasty: as jazz goes, it’s arguably the most exhilarating show of the week, every week. The first-rate players always rise to the level of the material. Sets 7:30/9:30 PM, $25 and worth it.

Also Monday and Tuesday nights Vince Giordano’s Nighthawks, a boisterous horn-driven 11-piece 1920s/early 30’s band play Iguana, 240 W. 54th St ( Broadway/8th Ave) , 3 sets from 8 to 11, surprisingly cheap $15 cover plus $15 minimum considering what you’re getting. Even before the Flying Neutrinos or the Moonlighters, multi-instrumentalist Giordano was pioneering the oldtimey sound in New York; his long-running residency at the old Cajun on lower 8th Ave. is legendary. He also gets a ton of film work (Giordano wrote the satirical number that Willie Nelson famously sang in Wag the Dog).

Mondays at the Vanguard the Vanguard Jazz Orchestra – composer Jim McNeely’s reliably good big band vehicle – plays 9/11 PM, $30 per set plus drink minimum.

Mondays in March, 10 PM noir guitar legend Jim Campilongo leads his trio at the big room at the Rockwood, $10

Mondays in March Rev. Vince Anderson and his band play Union Pool in Williamsburg, two sets starting at 10:30 PM. The Rev. is one of the great keyboardists around, equally thrilling on organ or electric piano, an expert at Billy Preston style funk, honkytonk, gospel and blues. He writes very funny, very politically astute, sexy original songs and is one of the most charismatic, intense live performers of our time. It’s a crazy dance party. Paula Henderson from Burnt Sugar is the lead soloist on baritone sax, with frequent special guests.

Tuesdays in March, clever, fiery, eclectic ten-piece Balkan/hip-hop/funk brass maniacs Slavic Soul Party  at 9 PM at Barbes (check the club calendar). Get there as soon as you can as they’re very popular. $10 cover.

Wednesdays in March, 9ish the Binky Griptite Orchestra (formerly Sharon Jones’ brilliant oldschool soul backing band) at Threes Brewing Outpost, 113 Franklin St (Greenpoint/Kent Aves) in Greenpoint, free

Three Wednesdays in March: 3/13, 3/20 and 3/27, 9 PM atmospherically anthemic Indian-influenced spacerock band Humeysha at C’Mon Everybody, $10

Thursdays at 8:30 in March, the Brooklyn Raga Massive – a rotating cast of A-list Indian, jazz and rock musicians who love to jam out classic Indian themes from over the centuries to the present day – play the Jalopy, $15 adv tix at the bar at the main space. Tons of special guests followed by a wild raga jam!

Fridays and Saturdays at 5 PM adventurous indie classical string quartet Ethel plus frequent special guests playing a mix of classical and more contemporary material at the balcony bar at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, free w/museum adm

Fridays in March, charmingly inscrutable Parisienne jazz chanteuse Chloe & the French Heart Jazz Band at Club Bonafide, $20.  Schedule is 3/1 at 6, 3/8 at 9:30, 3/15 at 8, 3/22 at 5:30 and 3/29 at 6. She’ll also be there on 3/17 at 8, 3/24 and also 3/31 at 6 . Somebody give this woman a regular time slot, huh?

Fridays at 7:30 PM tenor saxophonist Ken Fowser leads his band at the Django. Jukebox jazz in a JD Allen vein but not as dark and more straight-ahead/groove-oriented: as postbop party music goes, nobody’s writing better than this guy right now.

Free classical concerts on Saturdays at 4 PM on March 23 and 30, returning to weekly Saturdays in April at Bargemusic;  usually solo piano or small chamber ensembles. If you get lucky, you’ll catch pyrotechnic violinist/music director Mark Peskanov and/or the many members of his circle. Early arrival advised.

Saturdays in March, 6 PM Shelley Thomas – best known as a spectacular, haunting singer specializing in music from across the Middle East and the Balkans, but who is also an accomplished oudist – with a series of ensembles at Barbes

Most Sundays at 5:15 PM, a free recital on the amazing, powerful, dynamic new organ at St. Thomas Church at 5th Ave and 53rd St. featuring some of the world’s greatest organists. The space is magnificent and the music usually is too. Right now the church fathers are programming pretty much everybody who used to work here and play the mighty old Aeolian-Skinner organ that finally had to be replaced. Check the concert calendar for details. 

Sundays at 9:30 PM paradigm-shifteing Romany jazz/psychedelic rock guitar mastermind Stephane Wrembel leads his band at Barbes

3/1 Ty Segall at Warsaw is sold out – but in that space unless he really turns down you’re not going to hear anything anyway…

3/1, 7 PM sax quartet Nois make their New York debut with three world premieres by New York based composers Nathan Hudson, Howie Kenty and Ed Rosenberg III, plus Gemma Peacocke’s ‘Dwalm’, ‘Thirteen Changes’ from Pauline Oliveros and Georg Friedrich Haas’ ‘Saxophonquartett’ at Arete Gallery, $15

3/1, 7:30/9:30 PM epically brilliant, Shostakovich-inspired jazz pianist/composer Fabian Almazan leads his ensemble at the Jazz Gallery, $25

3/1, 8 PM purposefully atmospheric guitarist Gyan Riley followed at 10 by amazingly fun, noirish, psychedelic surf/cinematic  trio Hearing Things at Barbes

3/1-2 at 8 pianist Jean-Yves Thibaudet and the NY Philharmonic  perform Grieg’s Piano concerto No. 1 plus the Peer Gynt Suite and Dvořák’s Eighth Symphony at Avery Fisher Hall, $34

3/1, 8 PM hypnotically invigorating, shamanistic Korean percussion ensemble Noreum Machi at Flushing Town Hall, $16/$10 srs/under 18 free w/ID

3/1-2, 8 PM improvisations from a vast cast from the John Zorn circle with the man himself (sax) Michael Nicolas (cello) Ikue Mori (electronics) Mary Halvorson (guitar) Cyro Baptista )percussion) Brian Marsella (keyboards) Sylvie Courvoisier (piano) Ned Rothenberg (sax) Ches Smith (drums) Tomas Fujiwara (drums) Jim Staley (trombone) Jon Irabagon (sax) Chris Tordini (bass) Brandon Lopez (bass) Miles Okazaki (guitar) and special guests at Happy Lucky No. 1 Gallery, $20

3/1, 9 PM creepy, psychedelic circus rock/Russian folk-punk band Mad Meg at the Bitter End

3/1, 9 PM oldschool soul ballads with singer Camille Atkisson’s Empire Beats at Hill Country

3/1, 11 PM energetic fifth-wave garage rockers the Lord Calverts at Otto’s

3/2, 4 PM cinematic, psychedelic quirk-pop keyboardist Michael Hearst presents “Curious, Unusual and Extraordinary” songs from his many bands followed at 6 by haunting, magical Middle Eastern classical singer Shelley Thomas, at 8 by similarly haunting, charismatic oldtimey-style banjo player and corrosively political songwriter Curtis Eller’s American Circus and at 10 by epic ranchera/bolero brass crew Banda de los Muertos at Barbes at Barbes

3/2, 6 PM hauntingly torchy songwriter Daphne Lee Martin at the small room at the Rockwood. Next door at the big room jaunty female-fronted original retro rocksteady band the Big Takeover plays at 9 for $10

3/2, 6 PM atmospheric, cinematic drummer/composer Tim Kuhl and his group at Pete’s

3/2, 6 PM purist swing singer Catherine Russell and her amazing band at Bethany Baptist Church – 275 W Market St, Newark, free

3/2, 7 PM crystalline-voiced, noir-tinged third-stream jazz chanteuse Tessa Souter at Joe’s Pub, $18. She’s also at 55 Bar on 3/8 an hour earlier for the tip jar

3/2, 7:30 PM firebrand Malian rock chanteuse/bandleader Awa Sangho at the Lincoln Center Atrium, free, early arrival advised

3/2, 7:30 PM  Innov Gnawa play a traditional Moroccan Lila trance/healing ceremony – a real rarity in this country on a public stage – at National Sawdust, $25 adv tix req

3/2, 8 PM a rare solo set by bass goddess/soul singer Felice Rosser’s of Faith followed at 9 by irrepressible storyteller/psychedelic guitarist/new wave cult hero Wreckless Eric at El Cortez, $15

3/2, 8 PM experimental sacred music duo ARIADNE followed by a very rare US performane by French musique concrète pioneer and IRCAM vet Christine Groult at Issue Project Room, $15/$12 studrs

3/2, 8 PM, repeating 3/3 at 3 PM the NJ Symphony Orchestra with pianist Jeffrey Kahane play Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 4 plus Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 1 at NJPAC in Newark, $20 tix avail

3/2, 8 PM darkly colorful, perennially interesting bassist Linda May Han Ohleads her Quintet at the Miller Theatre, $20 tix avail

3/2. 9 PM ten-piece country/carnivalesque/acoustic rock powerhouse M Shanghai String Band at the Jalopy, $!0

3/2, 9 PM terse, acerbic trumpet improviser Steph Richards at the Owl

3/2, 9 PM edgy, uneasy female-fronted retro new wavers the New Tarot at the Knitting Factory, $10

3/3, 4 PM a live score and film screening of the silent classic East and West (1923), featuring klezmer jazz piano legend Pete Sokolow – composer of the original score for the 1991 remastered film – with the great Michael Winograd on clarinet to celebrate the 121st birthday of the film’s star, Molly Picon, at the Center for Jewish History, 15 W 16th St., $15 adv tix rec

3/3, 6 PM tuba duo Avant Garde Working Class with Joe Daley and Jesse Dulman followed at 7 by Karen Ng and Henry Fraser doing a clarinet/bass duo at Downtown Music Galley

3/3, 6 PM guitarslingers Jason Loughlin and John Shannon play Chet Atkins classics and obscurities at Pete’s

3/3, 7 PM elegant French/Afghani-inspired duets: jazz harpist Isabelle Olivier jams it out with guitarist Rez Abbasi followed at 9:30 by Romany jazz/psychedelic rock guitar mastermind Stephane Wrembel at Barbes

3/3, 7:30 PM lyrical jazz piano icon Fred Hersch solo at Mezzrow, $20, you might want to get there early

3/3, 7:30 PM pianist Edith Monaco plays works by Prokofiev, Granados and Moussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition at Zankel Hall at Carnegie Hall, $20

3/3, 8 PM perennially tuneful, pensively lyrical Americana janglerocker Mike Ferrio of Tandy and Good Luck Mountain at 11th St. Bar

3/3, 9 PM intense, charismatic oldschool soul belter Sami Stevens at the big room at the Rockwood

3/3, 11 PM ferociously tuneful ska-punks Uncle Djuzeppe folllowed by haunting Balkan psychedelic rockers Alec K Redfearn & the Eyesores at Muchmore’s, $tba 

3/3, 9:30 PM bouncy, incisive Romany jazz group Gaucho at Joe’s Pub, $20

3/3, 10 PM chanteuse/uke player Dahlia Dumont’s Blue Dahlia play edgy, smartly lyrically-fueled, jazz-infused tunes in English and French with classic chanson and Caribbean influences at Barbes. The following night, 3/4, 6 PM they’re at the small room at the Rockwood

3/4, 7:30 PM early music chorale Calmus and adventurous early music ensemble the Sebastians play works by Handel, Bach, Tavener, Schutz, Palestrina and Rheinberger at Music Mondays, Advent Church, northwest corner of 93rd and Broadway, free

3/4, 8 PM popular newgrass road warriors Chathan County Line at City Winery, $20

3/4, 9:30ish Los Mochuelos plays classic Colombian vallenato music at Barbes. 3/19 at 9 they’re at Bar Chord

3/5, 7 PM Venezuelan group El Tuyero Ilustrado – cuatro player Edward Ramírez and singer and percussionist, Rafa Pino – play their new take on traditional  joropo tuyero sounds at the Americas Society, $20

3/5, 7:30 PM pianist Han Chen plays music by Liszt, Ravel and Ades at CUNY Elebash Hall, 365 5th Ave north of 34th St., free

3/5, 8 PM brilliant acoustic guitarist and sardonic alt-country songwriting pioneer Robbie Fulks – of Fuck This Town infamy -at City Vineyard, $15

3/5, 7 PM rising star trumpeter Adam O’Farrill “with his new nine-piece ensemble Bird Blown Out of Latitude, performing new music born from the disorientation of personal displacement.” trumpeter Aaron Burnett and the Big Machine follow with special guest, the pyrotechnic Peter Evans at National Sawdust, $25 adv tix rec

3/5, 8 PM masterful improvisational camaraderie with Shipp/Lowe/Cleaver/Ray – Matthew Shipp, Allen Lowe, Gerald Cleaver, Kevin Ray – at  at Roulette, $18 adv tix rec

 3/5-9, 8:30 PM postbop/improv jazz drum maven Ches Smith leads a series of ensembles at the Stone at the New School, $20. Many killer lineups: the best could be 3/8 with Kris Davis (piano), Marc Ribot (guitar), Leon Boykins, Devin Hoff (bass)

3/5-9, 8:30/11 PM iconic fire-and-ice jazz singer Karrin Allyson and band at Birdland, $30 at the bar

3/6, 1 PM pianist Changyong Shin plays a program TBA at the Greene Space, free, rsvp req 

3/6, 7 PM the New School Studio Orchestra directed by Darcy James Argue play his epic, paradigm-shifting material at the New School’s ground-floor auditorium, 63 5th Ave, free

3/6, 7 PM Mantra Percussion play a program TBA at Pregones Theater, 571-575 Walton Ave(at 149th St) in the Bronx, free

3/6, 7:30 PM avant-rock band Boio, the genre-obliterating Warp Trio, and Forward Music Project – Amanda Gookin’s multimedia project of solo cello works developed to empower women and girls –  followed by Contemporaneous playing works by violet Barnum and Henry Threadgill – a homage to Butch Morris – at Roulette, $18 adv tix rec 

3/6, 7:30 PM iconic art-rockers the Bang on a Can All-Stars play world premieres of indie classical/art-rock dance music by Nicole Lizée, Josué Collado Fregoso, Henry Threadgill, and Trevor Weston, plus “three classics from Bang on a Can history by Annie Gosfield, Arnold Dreyblatt and Glenn Branca, with a rare performance of Branca’s massive “three dimensional” Movement Within, written specifically for the Bang on a Can All-Stars, in his unique tuning system and on his own original instruments” at Merkin Concert Hall, $25

3/6, 8 PM a night of first-class female improvisers: cinematic multi-instrumentalist/violinist Laura Ortman, multi-keyboardist Liz Kosack, haunting jazz pedal steel virtuoso Susan Alcorn and cellist Okkyung Lee at Union Pool, $12

3/6, 8ish wickedly torchy noir songwriter Julia Haltigan at Coney Island Baby, $10

3/6, 8 PM Gene Yellin’s new, long-awaited bluegrass band at Barbes

 3/6, 9 PM heavy riff/stoner boogie band Frankie & the Witch Fingers followed by Aussie heavy psych band the Psychedelic Porn Crumpets at the Knitting Factory, $12 

3/6, 9 PM sharply lyrical southwestern gothic/Americana songwriter Tom Shaner  at LIC Bar

3/6, 9 PM sharply lyrical janglerock/Americana/soul songwriter Matt Keating and guitarist Steve Mayone’s catchy project the Bastards of Fine Arts at 11th St. Bar

3/6, 10 PM powerhouse New Orleans soul/blues shouter Rev. Sekou at Drom, $10 adv tix rec

3/7, 7 PM Zikrayat play slinky, cinematic classics from the golden age of Arabic song at Drom, $15

3/7, 7:30 PM a killer twinbill with two of the best, most unselfconsciously poignant solo string composer-performers out there: violinist/percussionist Christopher Tignor and Julia Kent playing the album release show for her new one at National Sawdust, $22 adv tix rec

 3/7, 7:30 PM cellist Geirþrúður Anna Guðmundsdóttir with pianist Tomomi Sato play works by Boccherini, Beethoven, and Rachmaninoff at Scandinavia House, $20

3/7, 7:30 PM Bella’s Bartok – akin to a more mellow Gogol Bordello – at Symphony Space, $20 for 30 and under

3/7, 7:30 PM intense, microtonal string ensemble the Sirius Quartet play works by composers: Brian Field, Ian Erickson, Jennifer Castellano, Marga Richter, Mari Tamaki, and Sam Post along with their own stuff at the DiMenna Center, $25

3/7, 7:30 PM the Tesla Quartet play works by Beethoven and Respighi at the Lincoln Center Atrium, free, early arrival advised

3/7-9, 7:30 PM Dušan Týnek Dance Theatre’s  Le Jardin Qui Rit – a surrealistic dance homage to Hieronymus Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights with live score by Aleksandra Vrebalov at the Baruch College auditorium, $30/$15 stud/srs

3/7, 8 PM New York’s most charismatic, darkly compelling lyrical songwriter/storyteller/keyboard genius Rachelle Garniez at Barbes

3/7, 8 PM ferocious, female-fronted Afrobeat band Underground System followed by wild Palestinian hip-hop/dancehall reggae/habibi pop band 47soulat Bric Arts, $15 adv tix rec. Underground System are also at C’Mon Everybody on 3/22 at 11 for five bucks less.

3/7-8, 8 PM, repeating 3/10 at 4 PM Jiva Dance Company’s elegantly apocalyptic performance The Four Horsement with music by Rajkumar Bharathi and lyrics by Shiv Subramanian at Dixon Place, $28

3/7, 8 PM the US debut of edgy, dynamic, uneasily ethereal improvisational extended-technique pianist Irene Aranda in the Black Box Theatre at 244 Rehearsal Studios,  244 W 54th St., $20. 3/8 at 8:30 PM she’s solo at 8:30 at I-Beam, followed by feral bassist Brandon Lopez at 9:30, $15

3/7, 8 PM percussive, trance-inducing, bitingly tuneful, Middle Eastern-tinged female-fronted jamband SisterMonk at the Parkside

3/7, 8 PM intrepid bassist Shayna Dulberger leads a quartet with singer Fay Victor, guitarist Ava Mendoza, and drummer Juan Pablo Carletti at Roulette, $18 av tix rec

3/7, 8 PM psychedelic soul-rockers Madam West  at the small room at the Rockwood

3/7, 8 PM a composer portrait of John Zorn by an allstar cast: the Jack Quartet, pianist Steven Gosling and many more at the Miller Theatre, $25 tix avail

3/7, 8:30 PM followed by the world’s creepiest crime jazz/film noir band, Big Lazy at Bar Lunatico

3/7, 8:30 PM klezmer violinist Jake Shulman-Ment’s accurately named “MIDWOOD” w/Yoshie Fruchter, Richie Barshay, Eleonore Weill, and special guest, Francesca Ter Bergat Town & Village Social Hall, 334 E 14th St.(between 1st & 2nd Ave.), $15

3/7, 9 PM Certain General guitarslinger Phil Gammage plays his dark Americana and blues at 11th St Bar

3/7, 10 PM explosive, creepy, colorful psychedelic rembetiko metal band Greek Judas at Hank’s, $10

3/7, time tba (guessing 9ish) the L Train Brass Band (who won’t be able to get home after the show, presumably), Dingonek Street Band playing second line, Afrobeat, Ethio-jazz, and Brooklyn’s original punk Balkan horn group Hungry March Band at Pine Box Rock Shop

3/8, 6 PM mini-sets by poignantly lyrical, eclectic pianist Marta Sanchez’s provocative jazz poetry quintet with singers Sara Serpa and Charlotte Greve reinventing writing by Bukowski, Sylvia Plath and others; solo vibraphone from the magical Patricia Brennan and piano/flute duos by Lyubov Mirzoyev and Frances Brodeur at Brooklyn Conservatory of Music, $15.

3/8, 7 PM magically haunting flamenco jazz pianist Chano Dominguez at Joe’s Pub, $30

3/8, 7 PM composer-performer Gemma Peacocke’s Waves & Lines song cycle, incorporating poems by Afghan women exploring distance, anonymity, and “strange new forms of intimacy” at National Sawdust, $20 adv tix rec

3/8, 7:30/9:30 PM drummer Tomas Fujiwara’s thundering, tidally shifting two-guitar/two-drum Triple Double at the Jazz Gallery, $25

3/8, 7:30/9:30 PM ambitious, tuneful trumpeter Jonathan Finlayson and band at the Jazz Gallery, $25

3/8, 7:30 PM violinist Stanichka Dimitrova and the PhiloSonia ensemble explore the concept of sturm und drang in works by Schubert, Wolf and Brahms, woo hoo, at the Old Stone House in Park Slope, $25/$10 stud/srs

3/8, 7:30 PM Arion Chamber Music play works by Barber, Beethoven and Brahms:  Sonata No. 1 for Violin at Christ & St. Stephen’s Church, 120 W 69th St, $30/$15 stud/srs

3/8, 8 PM pianist Lucian Ban and violist Mat Maneri play their creepy Transylvanian jazz followed at 10 by hard-hitting, brass-fueled newschool latin soul/boogaloo dance band Spanglish Fly at Barbes

3/8-9, 8 PM the reliably entertaining, adventurous Chelsea Symphony play wartime works including Fascist Baby, a world premiere by Tim Kiah; Ravel’s Tombeau de Couperin, French composer Fernande Breilh-Decruck’s 1944 suite Cinq poèmes chrétiens, the Haydn Trumpet Concerto Friday night and on Saturday, the Haydn Cello Concerto instead at St. Paul’s Church, 315 W 22nd St., $20 sugg don

3/8, 8 PM the NJ Symphony Orchestra with pianist Ingrid Fliter play works by Debussy, Mendelssohn, and Britten at NJPAC in Newark, $20 tix avail

3/8, 8 PM sardonically relevant guitar-fueled female-fronted Americana punks Spanking Charlene and the similarly hilarious, smartly political faux-French retro 60s psych-pop band les Sans Culottes at Hank’s, $10

3/8. 8:30 PM unpredictable singer Cristina Morrison leads a quartet playing the album releaes show for her new one – a mix of reimagined South American classics – at the Cell Theatre, $20

3/8, 9 PM Smock – skittish Joy Division and MBV-influenced guitar band – open for mighty, labyrinthine doom/art-rockers the Hazytones at Lucky 13 Saloon, $tba 

3/8, 11 PM guitar mastermind Mike Rosado’s volcanic, pounding Dick Dale-influenced surf band 9th Wave at Berlin

3/9, 4 PM the CMS Improvisers Orchestra featuring an all-star lineup with Peter Apfebaum, Sana Nagano and many others play epic AACM-style jazz soundscapes at Brooklyn Conservatory of Music, $15

3/9, 6 PM haunting, magical Middle Eastern classical singer Shelley Thomas and her band followed at 8 by art-song luminary Karen Mantler and at 10 by Rana Santacruz – the Mexican Shane MacGowan, but without the booze if you can imagine that – at Barbes 

3/9, 7:30 PM brilliant tabla player/composer and Brooklyn Raga Massive anchor Sameer Gupta does double duty, first in a trio set with sarangi player Rohan Misra and then with sitarist Rishab Sharma at the Chhandayan Center For Indian Music, $20

3/9, 8 PM one of the year’s best twinbills: brilliant, soaring south Indian chanteuse Falu and her orchestra and hypnotic, pulsing, sousaphone-driven Guadalupian/New Orleans band Delgres a at Flushing Town Hall, $16

3/9, 8 PM singer Charmaine Lee makes her Issue Project Room debut solo and in an improvised trio performance featuring id m theft able (voice, objects) and Andrea Pensado (voice, electronics), free

3/9, 9 PM atmospheric, hypnotic guitar soundscaper Scott Helland solo followed at 10 by allusively haunting, minimalist folk noir singer Belle-Skinner at Pete’s 

3/9. 9  PM drummer, composer and bandleader Mareike Wiening leads a killer quintet with Rich Perry on sax and Glenn Zaleski on piano at the Cell Theatre, $15

3/9, 9:30 PM hilarious, savagely cynical, fearlessly political C&W parody band the Great American Country Drifters at Pine Box Rock Shop

3/9, 10 PM sizzling electric bluegrass and C&W with Demolition String Band at Skinny Dennis

3/9, 11 PM Brandi & the Alexanders play oldschool-style soul ballads at the Way Station

3/10, 1 PM low-key deep-Brooklyn sounds with Naomi Shelton & the Gospel Queens playing a gospel brunch show at Bar Lunatico. They’re also here on  3/24

3/10, 2 PM Eleonor Bindman and Susan Sobolewski of Duo Vivace play a family-friendly concert including Bernstein’s Overture from Candide and Saint-Saens’ Carnival of the Animals at the Old Stone House in Park Slope, $20 adults/$10 kids

3/10, 3 PM violist Elise Frawley leads an ensemble playing a program tba at the 92nd St.Y, free

3/10, 3 PM the Neave Trio play a program of works by women composers: Rebecca Clarke’s Piano Trio; Amy Beach’s Piano Trio in A minor, Op. 150; Cécile Chaminade’s Piano Trio No. 1, Op. 11; and Jennifer Higdon’s Piano Trio at  Madison Presbyterian Church (921 Madison Ave), $25

3/10, 4 PM the Sometime Boys’ riveting, powerful, theatrical frontwoman Sarah Mucho with pianist Elliott Roth at Freddy’s

3/10, 4 PM the Publiquartet play a program TBA at the Dreck Center at the Brooklyn Public Library, free, no under-sixes.

3/10, 7 PM spine-tingling, darkly mystical art-rock/avant-garde/chamber pop songwriter Carol Lipnik – pretty much everybody’s choice for best singer in all of NYC – with similarly haunting pianist Matt Kanelos at Pangea, $20

3/10, 10:30 PM tuneful oldschool soul/jazz trombonist Dave Gibson leads his quintet at Smalls

3/11, 7 PM tuneful postbop pianist Jim Ridl leads his group from behind the Rhodes at 55 Bar

3/11, 7:30 PM Tamás Varga, principal cellist of the Vienna Philharmonic Orchestra joins forces with Aaron Jay Kernis to pay tribute to Zoltán Kodály at Merkin Concert Hall, free, rsvp req 

3/11, 7:30/9:30 PM intense, darkly lyrical Israeli jazz pianist Shai Maestro leads his trio at the Jazz Gallery, $25. He’s back there on 3/20 with brilliant vibraphonist Joel Ross

3/11, 8 PM the NYU01 Orchestra play Mozart: Symphony No. 35 in D major, K. 35, “Haffner”Ravel: Daphnis et Chloé Suite No. 2 at the NYU Loewe Theatre, 25 W 4th St., free

3/11, 8:30 PM lavish oldschool style New Orleans funk/soul orchestra bandleader Brother Joscephus at City Winery, $20 standing room avail

3/11, 8:30 PM glimmering, noir-inspired vibraphonist Tom Beckham ’s Slice with Nate Radley on guitar at Bar Lunatico

3/11, 9 PM darkly torchy southwestern gothic/Europolitan songwriter/guitarist Miwa Gemini followed by energetic delta blues/Romany swing guitarist Felix Slim at LIC Bar

3/11, 10 PM acerbic, enigmatic parlor pop/new wave/avant garde band Dollshot at Coney Island Baby, $8

3/11, 10ish the NYC Gaita Club – a Bulla en el Barrio spinoff – play rustically pounding Afro-Colombian trance-dance music at Barbes

3/11, 10:30 PM  fiery alto saxophonist Lucas Pino’s eclectic, dynamic No No Nonet at Smalls

3/12, half past noon Gottfried Trepte plays the organ at Central Synagogue, 54th/Lex, free

3/12, drinks at 5:30, show at 6 Marilyn Nonken plays piano music of Tristan Murail at the Miller Theatre, free

3/12, 7:30 PM pianist Dominic Cheli plays works by Vine, Scriabin, Brahms, Liszt and others at Wiell Hall at Carnegie Hall, $25

3/12-16, 8:30/11 PM purist saxophonist Vincent Herring’s History of Jazz – an epic suite spanning classics from the early swing era to the present day – at Birdland, $30 at the bar

3/12, 7 PM bassist Matt Pavolka’s kinetic, tersely tuneful horns band quartet followed at 9 by clever, fiery, eclectic ten-piece Balkan/hip-hop/funk brass maniacs Slavic Soul Party at Barbes

3/12, 7:30 PM violinist and composer Megumi Saruhashi with her Middle Eastern ensemble at Sisters Brooklyn, 900 Fulton at Washington St., Ft Greene,

3/12, 7:30/9:30 PM the haunting, smokily atmospheric Michael Leonhart Orchestra at the Jazz Standard, $30

3/12-17, 8/10:30 PM soaring, politically relevant, brilliantly purposeful alto saxophonist Miguel Zenon leads his quartet at the Vanguard

3/12-13, 8/10:30 PM perennially vital latin jazz piano sage Eddie Palmieri at the Blue Note, $30 standing room avail

3/12-16, 8:30 PM indie classical chamber group Talea Ensemble play with a series of guests at the Stone at the New School, $20. Choice pick: opening night with Gato Loco guitar shredder Lily Maase

3/12, 10:30 PM charismatic, adventurous postbop/avant garde trombonist/crooner Frank Lacy‘s Tromboniverse at Smalls

3/12, 11 PM explosive, creepy, colorful psychedelic rembetiko metal band Greek Judas at Niagara upstairs, Ave. A/7th St.,

3/13 and 3/19 at 7:30 PM, also 3/15-16 at 8 PM the NY Philharmonic play the Mozart Requiem at Avery Fisher Hall, $34 tix avail

3/13, 7:30 PM the Spectrum Symphony with cello prodigy Jiaxun Caroline Yao play the Elgar Cello Sonata, a world premiere by the brilliant Balint Karosi with Hungarian clarinet soloist Gábor Varga, and the Serenade for Orchestra by Leó Weiner,at Saint Peters Church, 619 Lexington Ave at 54th St., $25/$15 stud/srs

3/13, 7:30 PM the Claring Chamber Players perform string trios and quintets by Schubert and Mozart at Christ & St. Stephen’s Church, 120 W 69th St, free

3/13, 8 PM accordion genius Shoko Nagai ’s haunting Tokala Silk Road/klezmer mashup project at Barbes

3/13, 9 PM late 80s powerpop heroes Teenage Fanclub at Bowery Ballroom, $25 gen adm

3/13, 10 PM the Last Nites play the Pulp Fiction soundtrack; also on the bill: NY horror surf legends the Coffin Daggers at the Mercury, $10 adv tix rec.

3/14, 6 PM  bass trombonist Jennifer Wharton leads her group at Silvana

3/14, 7 PM haunting Mexican jazz and pan-latin singer Magos Herrera teams up with perennially adventurous string quartet Brooklyn Rider at National Sawdust, $30 adv tix rec

3/14, 7 PM soaringly explosive jazz composer/torch singer Nicole Zuraitis at 55 Bar

3/14, 7 PM the St. Patrick’s Cathedral Choir and Mick Moloney & Friends with organ accompaniment play the arguably loudest concert of Irish music you’ll ever hear at St. Patrick’s Cathedral, free

3/14, 7:30 PM fiery Portuguese twelve-string guitar sorceress Marta Pereira da Costa at the Lincoln Center Atrium, free, early arrival advised. She’s also at Drom a half-hour earlier the next day for $15.

3/14, 7:30/9:30 PM veena virtuoso Saraswathi Ranganathan witih her brother, Ganapathi, on mridangam at the Jazz Gallery, $20

3/14, 7:30 PM rapturous Indian carnatic composer/violinist Arun Ramamurthy with his trio at Symphony Space, $20 for 30 and under

3/14, 8 PM amazing, psychedelic instrumentalists Sandcatchers – who blend cinematic, pastoral Americana and Middle Eastern themes – followed at 10 by wryly psychedelic cinematic Italophile instrumentalists/parodists Tredici Bacci at Barbes

3/14, 8 PM iconic avant garde singer/composer Joan La Barbara‘s Scenes from Dreams of Water Beyond One’s Depth; also, FLUX Quartet violinist Tom Chiu leads his Ensemble Metrix at Roulette, $20 adv tix rec

3/14, 8 PM the DaCapo Chamber Players perform works by Valerie Coleman, Yotam Haber, Eric Moe and Ralph Shapey at Merkin Concert Hall, $20

3/14, 8 PM conversational pianist Jeffrey Siegel plays Beethoven Sonatas at Scandinavia House, $25

3/14, 8 PM irrepressible, historically informed, crystalline-voiced folk noir/art-rock/loopmusic songwriter Elisa Flynn at Troost

3/14, 8;30  PM Brooklyn Conservatory of Music Klezmer Ensemble, led by colorful violinist Zoe Aqua at Town & Village Social Hall, 334 E 14th St.(between 1st & 2nd Ave.), $15

3/14, 9:30 PM the haunting, stark, ancient sounds of the Yale Slavic Chorus at the Owl

3/15, 6:30 PM cellist Bryan Hayslett presents a rare portrait concert of obscure/influential avant garde composer Lee Hyla’s chamber works: the piano trio Mother Popcorn Revisited based on a James Brown song; an iconic trio for cello, piano, and percussion titled Dream of Innocent III. Other performers include Tristan McKay and Robert Fleitz (piano), Jess Tsang (percussion), Michiko Theurer and Paul Hauer (violins), and Hannah Levinson (viola) at the Stone at the New School, $20

3/15, 7 PM indie classical ensemble Longleash and mezzo-soprano Lucy Dhegrae play Shawn Jaeger’s Places We Know – a collection for digital piano trio inspired by the soundscapes of urban and rural streams, rivers, and harbors including field recordings from Muscota Marsh (Inwood) Red Hook Channel (Brooklyn), Beargrass Creek (Louisville, KY), Coleman Run (Nerinx, KY), and Chenoweth Run (Louisville, KY), at Arete Gallery, $15

3/15, 7:30 PM the Mannes Orchestra play Dimitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 9 and Sergi Prokofiev’s Symphony No. 5 at the New School’s ground-floor auditorium, 63 5th Ave, free

3/15, 7:30 PM Venezuelan percussionists Roberto and Luisito Quintero’s oldschool Salsa Project at the Lincoln Center Atrium, free, early arrival advised

3/15, 8 PM intense Balkan chanteuse Jenny Luna‘s haunting, traditional Turkish band Dolunay followed at 10 by psychedelic salsa bandleader Zemog El Gallo Bueno at Barbes

3/15, 8 PM the unpredictably fun, funny  art-rock/psychedelic soul band the Academy Blues Project at Silvana

3/15, 8 PM reggae-rockers Zion80 and wild, hilarious klezmer punks Golem at Drom, $15 adv tix rec 

 3/15, 8 PM the Philadelphia Orchestra play Mendelssohn’s Piano Concerto No. 1 plus Schubert’s Symphony No. 9 at NJPAC in Newark, $30 tix avail

3/15, 8 PM violinist Maya Bennardo and pianist Karl Larson play music of Charles Ives at the Owl

3/15, 8 PM perennially brilliant low-register reedman Josh Sinton performs his lushly looming, enveloping Krasa contrabass clarinet project at Issue Project Room, $15/$12 stud/srs

3/15, 8 PM purposefully atmospheric guitarist Gyan Riley with drummer David Cossin and bassist Jared Engel at Happy Lucky No. 1 Gallery, $20. Riley’s here the following night, 3/16 with the amazing, even more atmospheric Arooj Aftab

3/15, 8 PM a very rare solo show by ubiquitous bassist Larry Grenadier performing music from his debut solo bass recording The Gleaners at Zürcher Gallery, 33 Bleecker St, $20

3/15, 8:30 PM haunting Bulgarian singer Biliana Voutchkova with similarly haunting jazz pedal steel virtuoso Susan Alcorn at I-Beam, $15

3/15, 8:30 PM haunting French-Tunisian saxophonist Yacine Boulares’ Ajoyo project with singer Sarah E. Charles at Bar Lunatico

3/15, 9 PM hypnotically emveloping, atmospheric guitarist/soundscaper Rafiq Bhatia, Ian Chang (electronic and acoustic drums) and Jackson Hill (bass and synthesizers) at the  Kitchen, $25

3/16, 2 PM two of the world’s most lyrical, captivating Indian carnatic violinists, Trina Basu and Anjna Swaminathan “engage together in an improvisational dialogue with an art piece of their choice during a special museum “Art & Music” tour” at the Rubin Museum of Art

3/16, 4 PM Afro-Cuban singer Melvis Santa, dancer Hadar Ahuvia and terse, enigmatic avant garde singer/percussionist Anais Mavie with Sam Yulsmanat Luisa Muhr’s monthly Women Between Arts show – NYC’s only multidisciplinary series focusing exclusively on woman performers at the Glass Box Theatre at the New School, 55 W 13th St, $20, “no one turned away for lack of funds”

3/16, 5:30 PM Alice Jones, flute | Anneke Schaul-Yoder, cello | Derin Öge, piano play works by Beethoven contemporary Louise Farrenc and Michael Fiday at Brooklyn Conservatory of Music, $15

3/16, 6 PM haunting, magical Middle Eastern classical singer Shelley Thomas followed eventually at 10 by Super Yamba playing their psychedelic Afrobeat jams at Barbes

3/16, 6 PM, Júlia Hámos (piano), Abigél Králik (violin), Dávid Nagy (bassoon) and Noémi Sallai (clarinet) play a rare all-Hungarian program of works by Kodály, Kurtág, Bartók and Leó Weiner at Hungarian House, 213 E 82nd St (1/2 Aves), free

3/16, 8 PM hypnotically percussive Afro-Honduran sounds with the Garifuna Jazz Ensemble: at Flushing Town hall, $16

3/16, 9 PM amazing, mostly-female, kinetic klezmer/cumbia/cinematic jamband Isle of Klezbos at City Winery, $20 gen adm

3/16, 9 PM hypnotically explosive live bhangra dance band Red Baraat at Bowery Ballroom, $25

3/16, 10 PM ferocious, twin guitar-fueled, Radio Birdman-esque psychedelic punks the Electric Mess  at Hank’s, $10

3/17, 2 PM the Ariel String Quartet play works by Mozart, Mendelssohn and Harbison at the New School auditorium at 66 W 12th St., $18

3/17, 3 PM lyrical latin jazz pianist Manuel Valera plays a rare solo show at the Pregones Theatre, 571 Walton Ave. in the Bronx, free, res req, 2/4/5/ to Grand Concourse 

3/17, 3 PM Benjamin Larsen, cello and Hyungjin Choi, piano​ play works by Grieg, Schumann and Robert Sirota at Concerts on the Slope, St. John’s Episcopal Church, 139 St. John’s Place downhill from 7th Ave, sugg don

3/17, 3 PM the North/South Chamber Orchestra celebrate St Patrick’s Day with the premiere of a clarinet concerto by Irish composer Frank Corcoran. Also on the program :works by David Froom, John David Little and Heather Savage. Clarinetist Sammy Lesnick and flutist Lisa Hansen are the soloists at Christ & St. Stephen’s Church, 120 W 69th St,  free

3/17, 4 PM sensational, whirlwind nuevo tango bandoneonist and composer JP Jofre at the Dreck Center at the Brooklyn Public Library, free, no under-sixes.

3/17, 7 PM veteran Irish crooner Pierce Turner – at one time he was doing a mashup of the Pogues and the Moody Blues – at Joe’s Pub, 25

3/17, 7:30/9 PM oldschool stride sounds: Jon-Erik Kellso (trumpet), Ehud Asherie (piano) at Mezzrow, $20

3/17, 8:30 PM baritone Nashville gothic/honkytonk crooner Sean Kershaw and band at the Treehouse at 2A

3/17, 9 PM high-voltage psychobilly band the Goddamn Gallows at the Kingsland, $tba

3/18, 9:30 PM jazz group the Atom String Quartet at Drom, $15 adv tix rec

3/18, 9:30 PM ex-Chicha Libre keyboard sorcerer Josh Camp’s wryly psychedelic cumbia/tropicalia/dub band Locobeach at Barbes

3/19, 7 PM Kristin Lee, violin & Jeremy Jordan, piano play 20th-century American music from ragtime to today, with a special emphasis on improvisation, with works by George Gershwin (arr. Jasha Heifetz), J.J. Johnson (arr. Jeremy Ajani Jordan), Scott Joplin (arr. Jeremy Ajani Jordan), John Novacek, Kevin Puts, and Jonathan Ragonese at 1 Rivington St. upstairs, $15/$10 stud/srs

3/19, 7:30 PM percussionist Alessandra Belloni‘s rustically witchy tarantella band plays the release show for her joint book/cd project Healing Journeys of the Black Madonna at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine, 1047 Amsterdam Ave, $25

3/19, 7:30 PM Norwegian indie classical group Ensemble Neon perform video and sound pieces by Jan Martin Smørdal, Ane Marthe Holen and Lars Skoglund, plus My Red Red Blood, “an excursion into the sound world of Marina Rosenfeld” at Scandinavia House, free

3/19, 8 PM pianist Alex Peh collaborates with percussionists Susie Ibarra, Kyaw Kyaw Naing and flautist Claire Chase to perform new Asian-tinged works at Roulette, $18 adv tix rec

3/20, 7 PM pianist Emanuele Arciuli plays works by Corigliano, Rzewski, Nino Rota, Chick Corea,Curtis Cacioppo and Missy Mazzoli’s hauntingly torrential Isabelle Eberhardt Dreams of Pianos at the Italian Academy, Columbia University, 1161 Amsterdam Ave(just south of 118th St, free

3/20, 7 PM Patrick Higgins’ two-movement piano trio Tocsin performed by pianist Vicky Chow, cellists Jay Campbell and Mariel Roberts, employing “subtle mechanical preparations for piano and a unique instrumentation to create a music where the line between piano, cello, and otherworldly source constantly traversed, undermined, and transformed’ at 1 Rivington St. upstairs, $15/$10 stud/srs

3/20, 7 PM cellist Amanda Gookin plays six new works from five female composers — Alex Temple, Shelley Washington, Kamala Sankaram, Niloufar Nourbakhsh, and National Sawdust honcho Paola Prestini  at National Sawdust, $20 adv tix rec

3/20-21, 7:30 PM hard-charging postbop tenor saxophonist Immanuel Wilkins leads his group at Smalls

3/20, 9 PM brilliant noir swing/Romany jazz/latin soul composer and guitarist Jack Martin (ex-Knoxville Girls and Dimestore Dance Band) at Troost

3/20, 9:30 PM subtly psychedelic, dynamic, eclectic Niger desert rock guitarist Bombino and band at the Poisson Rouge, $25 adv rtix rec

3/20, midnight boisterously funny oldschool 60s C&W and brooding southwestern gothic with the Jack Grace Band at the Ear Inn

3/21, 7 PM the harrowing, immigration-themed multimedia performance Ask Hafiz – the story of Sahar Muradi’s tumultuous journey from a Soviet-ruled Afghanistan to Queens. “Along the way, Sahar, following an age-old practice, asks questions to the book of poetry by Hafiz. The answers are revealed through songs composed and sung by Haleh Liza, dance choreographed and performed by Malini Srinivasan, with music by Adam Maalouf, Trina Basu, Bala Skandan and Rich Stein, at Joe’s Pub

3/21, 7:30 PM the deservedly acclaimed Brooklyn Youth Chorus sing new work by Owen Pallett, joined by Alev Lenz for a set of her songs followed by by similarly lush, enigmatic art-rock/parlor pop band Wye Oak at Merkin Concert Hall, $25

3/21, 7:30 PM early music lutenist Paul O’Dette channels “John Dowland’s Midnight” at the Kosciuszko Foundation, 15 E 65th St., $10 tix avail

3/21, 8 PM a string-driven thing at Drom:  apocalyptic string quartet Sevensuns, eclectic, funky parlor jazz violinist Mazz Swift’s MazzMuse, Joe Deninzon’s wickedly fun string metal band Stratospheerius and strings-and-percussion crew 2Birds Band, $15 adv tix rec 

3/21, 8 PM singer Dida Pelled salutes obscure and cult favorite women songwriters including Connie Converse, Elizabeth Cotten, Molly Drake, Vashti Bunyan and Norma Tanega at Barbes

 3/21, 8 PM  saxophonist María Grand’s “Music As a User’s Manual” which “Invites the audience to use it as a manual – the manual will offer several things that can be done: scream; meditate; and others” at Roulette, $18 adv tix rec

3/21, 8 PM veteran electric Chicago blues guitarist Joe Louis Walker at City Vineyard, $20

3/21, 8 PM ex-Dylan lead guitarist Larry Campbell with singer Teresa Williams with Little Feat keyboardist Bill Payne at City Winery $25 standing rom avail

3/21, 8:30 PM Dervisi feat. guitar god Steve Antonakos play “exotic Greek gangsta blues” and hash-smoking anthems at Espresso 77, 35-57 77th Street (just off of 37th Ave), Jackson Heights

3/21, 9 PM the kings of macabre British noir doom music, All Them Witches at Bowery Ballroom, $20

3/21, 9 PM wryly retro, period-perfect classic 60s style female-fronted honkytonk band the Bourbon Express at Hank’s, $10

3/22-23, 7:30/9 PM  reliably tuneful postbop piano vet George Cables s solo at Mezzrow, $25

3/22, 8 PM art-rocker Pierre de Gaillande’s Bad Reputation playing witty chamber pop English translations of Georges Brassens classics followed at 10 by the world’s creepiest crime jazz/film noir band, Big Lazy at Barbes

3/22-23, 8 PM brilliantly eclectic vibraphonist Joel Ross with Sergio Tabanico – tenor saxophone; Kanoa Mendenhall – bass; Jeremy Dutton – drums at Happy Lucky No. 1 Gallery, $20

3/22, 8:30 PM majestic, darkly cinematic surf band the TarantinosNYC. at Freddy’s

3/22, 8:30 PM otherworldly French-Algerian singer Ourida with her combo at Bar Lunatico

3/22, 9 PM Jane Lecroy’s edgy, intensely lyrical electro-punk band Ohmslice with special guests guitarist Martin Philadelphy plus Daniel Carter & Nikki D’Agostino on horns at Flowers for All Occasions, 1114 Dekalb (J to Kosciuszko) Then on 3/24 at 7 they’re at Downtown Music Gallery 

3/22, 9:30 PM explosive Boston original Balkan crew Cocek Brass Band at Radegast Hall

3/23, 2 PM the Orchestra of St Luke’s play a composer portrait of Gabriela Lena Frank at Flushing Town Halll, free w/rsvp. The program repeats on 3/24 at 2 PM at Restoration Plaza, 1368 Fulton St. in Bed-Stuy; 3/28 at 7 at the Hostos Center, 450 Grand Concourse in the Bronx, and 4/4 at 6 at the Harlem School for the Arts, 645 St Nicholas Ave

3/23, 3 PM the Washington Heights Chamber Orchestra play works by Korngold, Britten, Anna Clyne and Michael Torke at Fort Washington Collegiate Church, 729 W 181st St, free  

3/23, 6 PM haunting, magical Middle Eastern classical singer Shelley Thomas followed at 8 by poignant, eclectic, lyrical jazz bassist/composer Pedro Giraudo’s Tango Quartet and at 10 by Cumbiagra – who’ve been going in a much more psychedelic direction lately – at Barbes

3/23, 7:30 PM terse, purposeful classical Indian raga ambience: Rohan Misra on sarangi with Dibyarka Chatterjee on tabla at the Chhandayan Center For Indian Music, $20 

3/23, 8 PM multi-instrumentalist Dennis Lichtman’s popular western swing band Brain Cloud  and wild female-fronted Russian turbo-folk jammers Romashka  at Flushing Town Hall, $16

3/23. 8 PM the NJ Symphony Orchestra play Schubert’s Unfinished Symphony No. 8, the Dvorak Cello Concerto at NJPAC in Newark, $20 tix avail

3/23, 8:30 PM Antibalas spinoff Armo play Afrobeat at Bar Lunatico.

 3/23, 9 PM psychedelic Pakistani crooner Ali Sethi and His Lahore Band at National Sawdust, $25 adv tix rec

3/23, 9 PM dark intense lyrical southwestern gothic/paisley underground rockers Shanghai Love Motel at Connolly’s, 121 W 45th St., $10

3/23 snarky cabaret/funk/punk band Kid Congo & the Pink Monkey Birds– who are more new wave and less Crampsy than you would think – at Brooklyn Bazaar

3/24, 2 PM the LA Guitar Quartet play works by Handel, Liszt, Pat Metheny and others at the Town Hall, $17 tix avail

3/24, 4 PM adventurous indie classical string quartet Ethel play a program TBA at the Dreck Center at the Brooklyn Public Library, free, no under-sixes.

3/24, 5 PM the Manhattan Chamber Players perform works by Mozart, Schumann, and Bruch at the Lounge at Hudson View Gardens, 128 Pinehurst Ave @ W 183rd St, A train or #1 train (to 181st St) or the M4 bus (to 183rd St), $15/$12 stud/srs

3/24, 7 PM pyrotechnic clarinetist and Dave Tarras protege Michael Winograd leads his big band followed at 9:30ish by paradigm-shifteing Romany jazz/psychedelic rock guitar mastermind Stephane Wrembel and his band at Barbes

3/24, 8:30 PM catchy, politically fearless soulstress Alice Lee – Nina Simone meets Fiona Apple – at Pete’s

3/24, 9 PM baritone honkytonk crooner Jack Grace resurrects his legendary 90s jamband Steak at the Treehouse at 2A

3/25, 7:30 PM darkly glimmering jazz pianist/composer Guy Mintus plays a solo set followed by one with clarinetist Mark Dover at 1 Rivington St. upstairs, $15/$10 stud/srs

3/25, 7:30 PM majestic, slinky cumbia orchestra the Gregorio Uribe Big Band at St. Peter’s Church, 54th/Lex, $20

3/25, 8:30 PM intense Indian-influenced psych-folk songwriter Larkin Grimm followed by quirky, smartly lyrical avant cello-rock with the Icebergs at Pete’s

3/25, 9:30 PM feral singer Carolina Oliveros’ mighty 13-piece Afro-Colombian trance/dance choir Bulla en el Barrio at Barbes

3/26, 7 PM Brenda Castles, Liz Hanley and Johnny Cuomo play Irish guitar/fiddle/concertina music followed at 9 by wickedly torchy noir songwriter Julia Haltigan and her killer band at 11th St. Bar

3/26, 7:30 PM violinist Bella Hristova leads an ensemble playing works by Messiaen, Bach, Zwilich and Brahms at Merkin Concert Hall, $10 tix avail

3/26, 7:30 PM the Canadian Guitar Quartet reinvent works  by Beethoven, Saint-Saens, Pouilenc, Ravel and Brahns at the Baruch College auditorium, free, rsvp req 

3/26-27. 8/10:30 PM  iconic bassist Ron Carter leads an ensemble TBA at the Blue Note, $30 standing room avail

3/26-30, 8:30 PM epically lyrical alto saxophonist Peter Apfelbaum plays with a series of ensembles at the Stone at the New School, $20. Coice pick: 3/30 with his NY Heiroglyphics

3/26, 9:15 PM Peruvian brass band La Patronal at Drom, $15 adv tix rec

3/27, quarter past noon spellbinding Bulgarian vocal harmony trio Black Sea Hotel at Queens College, 65-30 Kissena Blvd., Flushing, free

3/27, 6 PM a good tunesmith twinbill: cleverly lyrical, edgily funny, soaring-voiced powerpop/acoustic rock singer Tamara Hey  followed by the much darker, more eclectic darkly eclectic, enigmatic Lorraine Leckie  at the small room at the Rockwood

3/27, 7 PM fiercely brilliant guitar twinbill: solos and duels between Ava Mendoza with Wilco’s Nels Cline at National Sawdust, $25 adv tix rec

3/27, 7 PM Eric Moe, piano, and Robert Frankenberry, actor perform David Del Tredici’s cult favorite, gleefully macabre Monsters at the Italian Academy, Columbia University, 1161 Amsterdam Ave(just south of 118th St, free

3/27, 9 PM wickedly jangly surf/twang/country instrumentalists the Bakersfield Breakers at 11th St. Bar

3/27, 9 PM slashing guitarist Steve Antonakos plays slide guitar blues with his band at Bar Chord

3/28, 7:30 PM pianist Per Tengstrand with Leland Ko (cello), Hana Mundiya (violin), Noah Pacis (viola), and Soyeong Park (violin) play Beethoven’s Piano Concerto No. 5 and Dvorak’s Piano Quintet No. 2 in A Major at Scandinavia House, $25

3/28. 7:30 PM rare solo shows by 75 Dollar Bill’s microtonal guitarist Che Chen and Debo Band’s 5 string electro-acoustic violin player Kaethe Hostetter at the Old American Can Factory, 232 3rd St., Gowanus, $15 cash only at the door, space limited, RSVP to reserve your ticket

3/28, 7:30 PM singer Min Jin and others perform classical Korean gajok art-songs backed by a chamber ensemble at Merkin Concert Hall, free, res req, limit 2 tix per person

3/28, 8 PM Fire! – Swedish psychedelic power trio with Mats Gustafsson (tenor and baritone saxophone, live electronics), Johan Berthling (bass), and Andreas Werliin  followed by playful electronic soundscaper Madalyn Merkey at the Clemente Soto Vélez Center, 107 Suffolk St, $20

3/28, 8 PM dynamic avant-garde harp luminary Zeena Parkins plays her new improvisational suite Captiva at Roulette, $18 adv tix rec

3/28, 8 PM bass goddess/soul singer Felice Rosser’s ageless reggae-rock-groove band Faith at Silvana

3/28, 8 PM International Contemporary Ensemble  joins the Jack Quartet for a composer portrait of jazz drummer Tyshawn Sorey at the Miller Theatre, $25 tix avail

3/28, 8:30 PM a raucous klezmer dance party with music by Ken Maltz, Lauren Brody, Aaron Alexander at Town & Village Social Hall, 334 E 14th St.(between 1st & 2nd Ave.), $15

3/28, 7:30 PM Iraqi maqam music icon Hamid Al-Saadi with trumpeter Amir ElSaffar’s hypnotic, incisive classical Iraqi music ensemble Safaafir at the Lincoln Center Atrium, free, early arrival advised

3/28, 10 PM drummer Arthur Vint & Associates reinvent classic Morricone spaghetti western soundtracks at Barbes

3/29, 7 PM genre-smashing avant-jazz saxophonist/singer Stephanie Chou and her band play her harrowing jazz suite Comfort Girl, about women forced into sexual slavery under the Japanese in WWII at Joe’s Pub, $15

3/29, 7 PM allstar Indian music collective the Women’s Raga Massive with an especially potent lineup:  Deepal Sanghvi Chodhari (santoor), Roopa Mahadevan (vocals), Roshni Samlal (tabla), and Rajna Swaminathan (mridangam) at the Rubin Museum of Art, $30

 3/29. 7 PM the Latin American Chamber Players perform works by Ravel, Boulanger, Francaix, Roussel and Poulenc at Scholes St. Studios, $20 

 3/29, 7 PM pianist Conor Hanick and Parallax Ensemble play works by Kati Agócs, Balázs Futó, Nicolas Namoradze; Robert Beaser and Ninfea Cruttwell-Reade; and the U.S. premiere of Petrichor, a violin-piano duet based on J.S. Bach by Jocelyn Morlock at 1 Rivington St. upstairs, $15/$10 stud/srs

3/29,  7 PM not a music event but of interest: “The Last Days of Judas Iscariot is a hilarious, poignant, thought-provoking work by Pulitzer-prize winning playwright Stephen Adly Guirgis. Boasting a large, zany cast of characters, the play asks one of the most plaguing questions in the Christian ideology: What happened to Judas Iscariot? The story is that Judas was the disciple of Jesus who betrayed his friend and teacher to the authorities. He is seen as the man responsible for Jesus’s death; afterwards, Judas fell into despair and hung himself from an olive tree; since then, he has been suffering for his deeds deep in Hell, and will continue to do so for all eternity. Is that really fair? Was Judas the duplicitous master of his own fate, a much-suffering pawn used for Jesus’s ends, or just a man who made a mistake? Set in a courtroom in Purgatory, The Last Days puts Judas’ case to a hilarious, riotous, piercing trial, the results of which are sure to make the inhabitants of Heaven, Hell, and Purgatory -mand the audience — reconsider.” At St. George’s Episcopal Church, 7 Rutherford Pl, free, RSVP required

3/29, 8 PM violin loopmusic artist Joe Kye with percussionist William Catanzaro and pianist Josh Ehrlich at Flushing Town Hall, $16

3/29, 9:30 PM NY horror surf legends the Coffin Daggers at the Gutter

3/29, 10 PM Dakha Band mix up north and South African sounds at Club Bonafide, $15

3/30, 7 PM ambient electroacoustic composer Jonathan Zorn, followed eventually around 9 by a very rare solo show by the enigmatic Paula Matthusen, and the alternately squonky and hushed Philip White & Chris Pitsiokos at Holo, $10

3/30, 7:30 PM a Cuban music dynasty: Malena Burke – daughter of legendary songstress Elena Burke,  joined by her own daughter, pianist / vocalist / composer Lena Burke at the Hostos Center theater, 450 Grand Concourse in the Bronx $20

3/30, 7:30 PM the Argus Quartet play works by Debussy, Theofanidis, Mendelssohn and Josquin des Prez at Irving Auditorium, Irving Pl/17th St., $16

3/30, 8 PM an intriguing triplebill at the Parkside: darkly lyrical psychedelic pop songwriter Jennifer Hall, Fatsy Cline (whoever she/they is/are) and a very rare performance by wickedly lyrical, Graham Parker-esque retro new wave band Lazy Lions

3/30, 8 PM Anda Union play ancient, windswept Mongolian themes at Merkin Concert Hall, $25 tix avail

3/30, 8 PM Appalachian music maven Bruce Molsky’s Mountain Drifters play the album release show for their new one at the Jalopy, $20

3/30, 8 PM murder ballad specialists and Slim Cessna’s Auto Club spinoff DBUK at El Cortez, $15

3/30, 8 PM otherworldly Moroccan mountain jams with downtown NYC types: Bachir & Mustapha Attar of the Master Musicians of Jajouka with Ned Rothenberg, Arrington De Dionysio & Ben Bennett at Roulette, $30/$26 stud/srs

3/30, 8 PM composers and instrumentalists Daniel Fishkin, Cleek Schrey, and Ron Shalom — the U.S.’s only extant daxophone consort – at Issue Project Room, $15/$12 stud/srs “The daxophone is a thin wooden strip played with a bow, created by the German improviser/inventor Hans Reichel in 1987. The instrument’s sound, somewhere between a cello and badger, ranges from furtive gurgles and delicate whistles to wild screams.”

3/30, 8:30 PM noir guitar legend Jim Campilongo leads his trio at Bar Lunatico

3/30, 10 PM Pangari & the Socialites play classic ska and rocksteady – most of it from the 60s Skatalites catalog – at Barbes 

3/30 catchy female-fronted powerpop band Big Eyes – who absolutely nail a late 70s/early 80s CBGB sensibility – play the album release show for their new one at Union Pool 

3/31, noon the annual Queens Overground Jazz Festival, acts TBA at Flushing Town Hall, free, res req

3/31, 2:30 PM the Apple Hill String Quartet play works by Shostakovich, Faure and Michael Kropf at St. Bartholomew’s Cathedral, $25/$15 stud/srs

3/31, 4 PM avant garde crooner Theo Bleckmann with Ike Sturm and Jesse Lewis at the Dreck Center at the Brooklyn Public Library, free, no under-sixes.

3/31, 4:30 PM want to learn haunting Ukrainian choral and folk singing from one of the best in the business? Charismatic singer Eva Salina conducts a master class suitable for vets and beginners at Playwrights Rehearsal Studios, Room 3D, 440 Lafayette St. (between Astor Pl. and East 4th St.), $15 adults | $10 students & seniors | children free, RSVP rec.  to reserve your seat.

3/31, 5 PM Mirror Visions Ensemble – Abigail Levis, mezzo-soprano; Scott Murphree, tenor; Mischa Bouvier, baritone; and Grant Wenaus, piano – play  music by immigrants (Kurt Weill, Paul Hindemith, Hanns Eisler, and Erich Korngold), women (Ruth Crawford Seeger, Francine Trester), and African Americans (Adolphus Hailstork, Brittney Boykin, Florence Price, and Leslie Adams), as well as by classic American composers (Charles Ives, Leonard Bernstein, Samuel Barber, and Pete Seeger) as well as world premieres from Mohammed Fairouz, Braxton Blake, and Harold Meltzer at the Sheen Center, $20

3/31, 7 PM Mississippi hill country bluesman Robert Kimbrough (son of Junior) at Barbes, $10. Followed at 9:30 by Romany jazz/psychedelic rock guitar mastermind Stephane Wrembel

3/31, 8 PM haunting Turkish art-rock guitarist/crooner Ahmet Aslan at Drom, $30 adv tix re

3/31, 7:30 PM new updates on haunting old Middle Eastern sounds: Takht al-Nagham featuring Arab Idol superstar Farrah Yousef, the Tarab Ensemble, and Nano Raies at Roulette, $25 adv tix rec

3/31, 10:30 PM noir-inspired alto saxophonist/composer Nick Hempton  leads his ensemble at Smalls

 4/1-2, 7:3/9:30 PM this era’s most intensely powerful tenor saxophonist/composer, JD Allen leads a quartet with Liberty Ellman on guitar at the Jazz Standard, $30

4/2, 7 PM RighteousGIRLS (Gina Izzo, flute & Erika Dohi, piano) play the world premiere of Legion (for 8 flutes and 8 pianos) by Alex Burtzos plus less epic works Andy Akiho, Ambrose Akinmusire, Paula Matthusen, and Mike Perdue at  1 Rivington St. upstairs, $15/$10 stud/srs

4/3, 4:30 PM the irrepressible, cinematic, comedic Broken Reed Saxophone Quartet with special guest  drummer Todd Isler, pianist Wade Ridenhour and singer/narrator Daphné Mia Essiet at St. Ann’s School in Brooklyn Heights 129 Pierrepont Street, Brooklyn Heights, (performance space is on Clinton Street across from the school.), free

4/4, 7:30 PM, repeating 4/5 at 8 PM and 4/6 at 2 and 8 PM the NY Philharmonic play works by Beethoven, Bernstein, Stucky ,Wagner and very young composers at Avery Fisher Hall, $5 tix available to NYPD, NYFD, EMT, and NYC city service professionals. 

4/6, 6 PM velvety noir jazz singer (and Tickled Pinks member) Stephanie Layton’s impressively eclectic torch/swing jazz band Eden Lane at the Onderdonk House, 1820 Flushing Ave in Ridgewood, $5 sug don

4/6 drinks and kettle corn at 6:30 PM, show at 7 PM  innovative piano duo HereNowHear play a  world premiere by Loren Loiacono and George Crumb’s epic masterwork Celestial Mechanics (Makrokosmos Book IV) plus works by Steven Stucky, Emily Cooley, Walter Zimmerman, Luciano Berio at the DiMenna Center, $20,

4/6. 7:30 PM a tribute to jazz and latin flute legend Dave Valentin, featuring a quintet led by his musical director, pianist Bill O’Connell, with flutist Andrea Brachfeld in the Valentin role, followed by the debut of O’Connell’s new project A.C.E. (Afro-Caribbean Ensemble) featuring a nonet at the Hostos Community College auditorium, 450 Grand Concourse in the Bronx, $20//$5 stud

4/6, 7:30 PM lush, sultry tropical jazz with chanteuse Belen Cusi and her combo at Groove, $5 

4/6-7, 8 PM haunting, charismatic oldtimey-style banjo player and corrosively political songwriter Curtis Eller and band play a live score to the Bipeds Dance Company’s phantasmagorical performance “54 Strange Words” at Triskelion Arts,106 Calyer St in Greenpoint, $18 adv tix rec

4/6. 8 PM brilliantly lyrical dark oldtimey songwriter/multi-instrumentalist Pete Lanctot at 68 Jay St Bar

4/7, 5 PM the Kandinsky Trio perform a lyrical early Beethoven piano trio and then will be joined by clarinetist Jose Garcia Taborda and narrator Patricia Raun for Messiaen’s Quartet for the End of Time at the Lounge at Hudson View Gardens, 128 Pinehurst Ave @ W 183rd St, A train or #1 train (to 181st St) or the M4 bus (to 183rd St), $15/$12 stud/srs

4/9, 7 PM a first-class indie classical ensemble fronted by singer Eliza Bagg with Daniel Schlosberg, Maya Bennardo, Hannah Levinson, Hannah Collins, and Mike Compitello perform the album release show for Alex Weiser’s new album All the Days Were Purple – putting a new spin on ancient Jewish musical traditions – at the Yivo Institute, 15 W 16th St., free, reception to follow

4/10, 7 PM pianist Julia Den Boer plays a world premiere by Claudia Jane Scroccaro plus works by Giacinto Scelsi. Giulia Lorusso and Luigi Nono at the Italian Academy, Columbia University, 1161 Amsterdam Ave(just south of 118th St, free

4/11, 7 PM pianist Lisa Moore plays imagistic works by Beethoven, Martin Bresnick, Leoš Janáček, Missy Mazzoli, Frederic Rzewski, and Robert Schumann at  1 Rivington St. upstairs, $15/$10 stud/srs

4/12, 6:30 PM creepy noir chamber pop/murder ballad duo Charming Disaster at the American Folk Art Museum

4/13, 3 PM the colorful Fordham University Orchestra play Slavonic Dance V, Op. 46 – Dvorak; Overture to “Candide” – Bernstein; Pictures at an Exhibition, Promenade – Mussorgsky,at Leonard Theatre, Fordham Prep (441 East Fordham Rd, Bronx,, free, B/D to Fordham Rd. 

4/16, 8 PM timeless, haunting, playful octogenarian Armenian jazz sage and multi-reedman Souren Baronian in a rare trio show at Sisters Brooklyn, 900 Fulton St. at Washington, $10

4/19, 9 PM creepy noir chamber pop/murder ballad duo Charming Disaster followed by similarly sinister psychedelic art-rock/circus rock band Cookie Tongue at Coney Island USA, 1280 Surf Ave, Coney Island, $20 includes dessert, 

4/24, 8 PM, Stefan Tcherepnin and Taketo Shimada’s dirgey duo project Afuma followed by  sepulchral, otherworldly Cairo singer/multi-instrumentalist Nadah El Shazly – who puts an eerie shoegaze spin on classical Arabic song – at Brooklyn Music School Theater, 126 St Felix St, up the block from BAM, $20 

4/30, 8 PM spectacular yet nuanced Palestinian opera singer Nour Darwish and ensemble at Sisters Brooklyn, 900 Fulton St. at Washington, $10

5/4, 10 AM – 2:30 PM a free block party with music, dance and more to celebrate 60 years of Lincoln Center on the plaza there, lineup tba

5/26, 5 PM pianist Andrea Lam performs Bach, Schumann and Stravinsky at the Lounge at Hudson View Gardens, 128 Pinehurst Ave @ W 183rd St, A train or #1 train (to 181st St) or the M4 bus (to 183rd St), $15/$12 stud/srs

6/16, 5 PM cellist Angela Lee, with pianist Evelyne Luest play works by Beethoven, Prokofiev and Janáček at the Lounge at Hudson View Gardens, 128 Pinehurst Ave @ W 183rd St, A train or #1 train (to 181st St) or the M4 bus (to 183rd St), $15/$12 stud/srs

The Julia Wolfe String Quartet Cycle at the Jewish Museum: A Major Moment in New York Music History

This past evening a sold-out crowd at the Jewish Museum witnessed what could have been a once-in-a-lifetime event: the first-ever live performance of the Julia Wolfe string quartet cycle on a single bill. On one hand, it’s kind of a shock that it took the composer’s own organization, Bang on a Can, to stage it. Sure, Wolfe’s string quartets are taxing to play, but so are Bartok’s, and hundreds of groups play the Bartok cycle. And Wolfe’s profile has never been higher: it’s hard to remember the last time the New York Philharmonic built a weekend around a work by another living composer, as they did with her epic cantata Fire in My Mouth back in January.

Assuming she writes another string quartet or two – hardly out of the question – putting five or more on a single program would be next to impossible, which would make this night even more historic. Wolfe was in the front row and revealed how she’d been moved to tears by Ethel’s performance of the most recent work on the bill, Blue Dress for String Quartet, so it made sense to give them the herculean task of playing all four this time. And the group captured lightning in a bottle.

It took immense stamina and persistence to get it all in there. All four of the works employ long, slowly mutating, sometimes utterly hypnotic passages of emphatic, insistent quarter notes (and often considerably faster volleys as well). Over the course of almost two hours onstage, violist Ralph Farris, cellist Dorothy Lawson, violinists Corin Lee and Kate Dreyfuss (the latter subbing for Kip Jones) didn’t miss a beat, no small achievement.

They began with Blue Dress, which, like so much of Wolfe’s work, draws on Americana, in this case the old folk song Little Girl with a Blue Dress On. Wolfe cautioned the crowd that this particular girl is fierce. Echoes of Philip Glass and Louis Andriessen blended into a twisted quasi-Appalachian sound world with relentless intensity and sarcasm that bordered on savagery, as the old folk tune filtered in and out of the picture. There was some wry clog-dancing and singing too. Little Girl? As if! This may have been state-of-the-art, end-of-the-decade serious concert music, but the ethos was vintage punk rock.

The other string quartets dated from the 90s. Dig Deep, Wolfe explained, was all about searching, written at a time when she felt “crazy” because she was having trouble trying to conceive. The ensemble worked the contrasts between wisps of hope and crushing reality with a knowing soberness grounded by Lawson’s pitchblende cello resonance. Lee got to give the music a breather with a Vivaldi-esque passage; Farris delivered the ending with cold matter-of-factness.

Four Marys, Wolfe said, was inspired by a Jean Ritchie murder ballad as much as by the “crude, crying sound” of the only stringed instrument she plays, the mountain dulcimer. Creeping up and around a central note, sometimes with slow, lingering glissandos, the ensemble maintained a lush intensity.

They closed with Early That Summer, the one piece that most closely foreshadowed Wolfe’s harrowing Cruel Sister string piece from 2012. She’d written this one in Amsterdam after reading Kai Bird’s The Chairman: John J. McCloy and the Making of the American Establishment, a prophetic book to encounter in the era of GATT, NAFTA and corporate sovereignty over democratically elected governments. Wispy microtones and slow upward trajectories built white-knuckle suspense, a relentlessly troubled mood amidst the calm, Lawson’s cello a stygian river of sound.

The monthly Bang on a Can concert series at the Jewish Museum continues on May 23 at 8 PM with avant garde vocal icon Meredith Monk and two members of her Vocal Ensemble, Katie Geissinger and Allison Sniffin; tix are $20/$16 stud/srs and are still available as of today but probably won’t be much longer. Ethel’s next gig is March 16 starting around 5 PM at the balcony bar at the Metropolitan Museum of Art; the performance is free with museum admission.

Mighty, Epic Individualist Fabian Almazan Plays the Jazz Gallery This Friday Night

As a composer and pianist, Fabian Almazan has no fear of epic grandeur, big statements or rich melodicism. He doesn’t limit himself to acoustic piano, or to traditional postbop tunesmithing either. As a bandleader, he hasn’t been as ubiquitous lately as he was a couple of years ago when he released his mighty Alcanza Suite, which is streaming at Bandcamp. He’s back out in front of his own trio this Friday night, March 1 at the Jazz Gallery, with sets at 7:30 and 9:30 PM. Cover is $25.

While there’s no telling which direction Almazan is going to go in next – he’s done everything from reinventing Shostakovich string quartets in a jazz context, to playing in starry space-jazz band Bryan & the Aardvarks – the Alcanza Suite is his magnum opus so far. There’s never been anything quite like it, a towering, symphonic masterpiece that draws equally on jazz and neoromanticism while tackling many sobering themes, from the trials facing immigrants to the bright of existentialism. The ensemble here rise to the many demands on their technique, a string quartet of Megan Gould and Tomoko Omura on violins, Karen Waltuch on viola and Noah Hoffeld on cello bolstered by Camila Meza on guitar and vocals, Linda May Han Oh on bass and Henry Cole on drums alongside the bandleader.

Meza sings calmly amidst the sudden gusts of the opening number, Vida Absurda y Bella (Absurd and Beautiful Life), Almazan’s piano a frenzy of climbs and spirals in tandem with Cole’s pummeling attack. Astor Piazzolla at his most adventurous seems to be a reference point.

The second movement, Marea Baja (Low Tide) is a thoughtful nocturne, Meza’s tender vocal over wary strings, Almazan picking up the pace with his circling rivulets. As Meza moves further back in the mix, she grows more forceful. From there, Almazan’s carnivalesque chromatics enter and then give way to a big, hypnotically insistent crescendo.

Verla (Seeing It, “It”) being truth, begins as a tone poem and then becomes a moody, austere string quartet piece: this particular truth seems hard to bear. Almazan follows it with a brief solo piano passage that shifts from gentle lustre to disquiet; later on, Oh and Cole also get to contribute unaccompanied solos.

Meza returns to the mic for Mas, a fervent hope for better circumstances over airy, distantly blues-tinged atmospherics that builds toward towering angst with Almazan’s chromatic cascades.

Oh pounces and bubbles within the vast, catchy riffage of Tribu T9, Meza’s vocalese adding calm contrast to Almazan’s energetic two-handed polyrhythms. 

Rising from somber belltones to emphatically spaced minimalist gravitas, Oh’s solo introduces the sixth movement, Cazador Antiguo (Ancient Hunter). Its stern, mechanical, martial drive and creepy helicopter effects juxtapose with Meza’s resolutely sailing vocals, segueing into Pater Familias. A coming-of-age narrative without words, it’s a return to the bright/shadowy dynamic between Meza and the rest of the band. Almazan cuts loose with his most gorgeously glittery solo of the entire record before a grim march returns, then gives way to a jubilant Meza coda.

Este Lugar (This Place) is the suite’s most epic segment, a lush, dynamically shifting maze of counterpoint, Meza giving voice to immigrant hopes and crushing realities: the return to the relentless march theme packs a wallop. Marea Alta (High Tide) is the suite’s towering coda, Meza’s guitar chords finally punching through the symphonic, polyrhythmic web. Whether you consider this classical music, minimalism or jazz, or all of the above, this album is pretty much unrivalled, in terms of both towering majesty and social relevance, over the last couple of years,.

Darkly Compelling, Lushly Relevant Orchestral Works in Washington Heights

This past evening a string subset of the Washington Heights Chamber Orchestra played a lush, majestic, sweeping, potently relevant program of works by 20th and 21st century composers. The performance validated conventional wisdom in real estate bubble-era New York: the fringes are where the most cutting-edge artists are supposed to be. Ask yourself how many members of the Philharmonic actually walk to work: it’s a fair bet that a good percentage of this talented ensemble did.

The group echoed Music Director Chris Whittaker’s poise on the podium, at least with as much poise as a string section can maintain playing distinctly troubled music. The central theme was Japanese, comprising works by composers with Japanese heritage, setting up a harrowing look back at the aftermath of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Fukushima wasn’t addressed, but it might as well have been, considering how plaintive and elegaic the overall ambience was.

Both the opening and concluding pieces, Kenji Bunch’s Supermaximum and Christopher Theofanidis’ A Thousand Cranes opened with percussive rustles from the bass section, a neat pairing. The former was an alternately kinetic and stark interweave of 19th century gospel-inflected pentatonic melody and more distinctly Asian motives. Permeated with the call-and-response of chain gang chants, it spoke for itself as a reminder of how little has changed in over a century.

The showstopper was an understatedly aching, enveloping take of Toru Takemitsu’s Requiem For String Orchestra. Moving gracefully from an austere pavane to stabbing close harmonies that foreshadow Julia Wolfe’s work, and then to to cellular Glass-ine phrasing, the group locked in on its relentless, overcast atmosphere.

Karen Tanaka’s Dreamscape suite often had a similarly circular but more distinctly nebulous effect, their group parsing its starry pointillisms and sparely memorable hooks with delicacy to match their lustre, harpist Tomina Parvanova and concertmaster Mark Chien tracing lively comet tails and deep-space bubbles.

Theofanidis’ piece was inspired by the Japanese tradition of making paper cranes. As the myth goes, producing a thousand of them allows for a wish to come true. That activity became a meme among those stricken with radiation poisoning and all kinds of other horrible illnesses after August of 1945.

The triptych is a hard piece to play, partly because it covers so much ground, emotionally speaking. There was unexpectedly calm jubilance in the opening overture of sorts, which disappeared as reality sank in. The group nimbly tackled the precisely dancing pizzicato section and then let the mournful washes afterward linger. The steady procession up to a decidedly unresolved ending was just as poignant.

The orchestra are staging monthly concerts  this spring: the next one is March 23 at 3 PM at at Fort Washington Collegiate Church, 729 W 181st St. just up the hill from the 1 train, with works by Korngold, Britten, Anna Clyne and Michael Torke. Admission is free; $25 gets you into the reception afterward and for the rest of the season as well.