In a relatively short time Real Eyes Gallery. located in the heart of Adams in the Berkshires. is notable for programming museum level exhibtions. Marjorie Minkin: The Shape of Light sets the bar high. Gallerist Bill Reilly has been able to work with artists from an expanding and ever more remarkable community of artists. How long can MASS MoCA ignore phenomenal work being created in its own back yard?

You may have seen Twelfth Night, perhaps a dozen times. But don't miss one more sharply directed by Allyn Burrows at Shakespere & Company in Lenox. What a hoot yet again to see the absurd Malvolio, a love sotted fool, decked out in yellow stockings with crossed garters. Expect a raucous night of fun, fun, fun.

Ronald K. Brown’s classic Grace was mounted in the Sosnoff Theater at the Fisher Center of Bard. For the first time, accompanying music was live, an adaptation of the tapes usually run with the dance. Grace was followed by a world premiere of Mercy, a work commissioned by SummerScape at Bard among others.

For his centennial Jacob’s Pillow presented three dances by the avant-garde choreographer Merce Cunningham (1919-2009). The “music” featured his collaborator and life partner John Cage (1912-1992). In July, 2009 we attended the final performance at Jacob’s Pillow by the Merce Cunningham Dance Company. Several days later, on July 26, he passed away.

The Scottsboro Boys is getting a terrific production at Playhouse on Park through Aug. 4. Previously the show won acclaim, nominations and awards off-Broadway, on Broadway, in London and other places.

April Matthis, as Toni Stone (1921-1996) the first woman to play professional baseball in the Negro League, is knocking it out of the ballpark every night at New York's Laura Pels Theatre through August 11.

Bass player Ron Carter at 82, still performing around the world – will bring his trio to the Newport Jazz Festival Saturday, August 3rd at Fort Adams. He shared some thoughts about performing, music and musicianship.

A particular period of Irish history has been the focus of several recent remarkable works of art: two books, one an experimental novel, and the other journalistic nonfiction, plus a much-praised Broadway drama. All of them won multiple awards. I’ll also add a 2008 film to this list of artistic works. They all commemorate the years of the Troubles, that period of history of Northern Ireland in which more than 3500 people died or were disappeared.

At Next Door at New York Theatre Workshop The Hodgepodge Group and Lucy Powis presents, In the Penal Colony, a new and dynamic re-creation of Kafka's story by writer/director Miranda Haymon. What are the personal responsibilities of those who bear witness to the abuse of power? What is the relationship of the victim to the support of breaking institutional norms? What of the admiration for power, and the adulation of murderous solution?. At what point can we shed the reverence for brutal traditions?

Not since A Strange Loop, through July 28th at Playwrights Horizons, have we come across a many faceted gay character like Usher (the extremely talented Larry Owens). He spares no detail, however raw, intimate, personal, scatological and sordid – in the telling of his life.

The Brightness of Light by Kevin Puts had its world premiere at The Shed at Tanglewood. Rod Gilfry, baritone, and Puts' collaborator Renee Fleming, sang the baritone and soprano roles of Alfred Stieglitz and Georgia O'Keefe, who were married for twenty-two years. Often living and working in different parts of America, they corresponded. Puts scoured the correspondence to develop an arc for his orchestral song cycle. It is a brilliantly achieved work.

Davone Tines was looking for a project to touch him deeply. His college classmate Michael Schacter suggested reading Langston Hughes' poems. The Black Clown hit him in the gut. Years ago Hughes had felt just as he did. Schachter and Tines collaborated on a moving and energetic musical monologue prompted by the poem. It is a wild theatrical success in its New York premiere.

The approach of the Lucy Kirkwood play, The Children at Shakespere & Company, is conceptual. It’s rather like a BBC detective series where there is investigation of a murder that we don’t witness. There is crime but the audience is spared the horrific details. Characters are involved with cleaning up the meltdown of a nuclear power plant which entailed their flawed design.

It was standing room only last night for the packed performance of Chrissie Hynde and The Pretenders. On a perfect summer night, with just a touch of heat relief, they performed on stage in a large courtyard of MASS MoCA.

For a deliciously entertaining evening of theater it is hard to top Working: A Musical at Berkshire Theatre Group. Last night the intimate Unicorn Theatre in Stockbridge was filled to capacity by a thoroughly delighted audience.

Blck, Whyte, Gray is performed at the Mostly Mozart Festival, a clear invitation for a wide swathe of ethnic groups to join the Festival audience, and also a pleasure and a revelation for regulars. Advance notice was served at the White Light Festival last fall, when Blck, Whyte, Gray was a smash hit of the Festival.

A major billing with two headliners, Train and the Goo Goo Dolls, played to an enthusiastic audience of many generations, dominated by women at Tanglewood on Monday evening. Both bands played enthusiastic seventeen song set lists, before the encore. Cannons, fireworks and bouncing balloons helped keep the crowd active throughout the evening.

You can count on every International Contemporary Ensemble concert to deliver surprise, shock and awe. Performers are always in tip-top shape. You might hear an instrument you’ve never heard before, like the Cimbalon or the Kamanchah at a Mostly Mozart concert at Merkin Hall. ICE is superb and daring.

If I Were You possesses a compelling score with drama to match. Full of symbols of soul transporters and apples and grieving elephants as well as contrasting venues from offices to bars, it stimulates the ears and eyes and holds the attention throughout

Some thirty members of American Theatre Critics Association (ATCA) attended the Winston-Salem, NC National Black Theatre Festival. Here is the first report from our Chicago correspondent Nancy Bishop. More coverage will follow.

Set in 1927 Chicago, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom is the only play in August Wilson’s great ten-play, ten-decade “Pittsburgh Cycle,” of the black experience in America that takes place outside his home town. Although the black bottom in the title refers to the flapper dance of the period, it seems intended as a double entendre with sexual innuendo. Both connotations are relevant to one of the important verbal clashes among the band members.

Thirty years ago the late Larry Leon Hamlin founded National Black Theatre Festival in Winston-Salem, North Carolina. The biannual event, July 29 to August 3, featured 30 productions on stages in and around the city, They ranged from intensive dramas to entertaining musicals. A great part of the experience was being part of audiences that might better be described as congregations. People assemble from all over American for this unique celebration of African American history, theatre and culture.

In a conference organized by Florida critic, Jay Handelman, 30 members and guests of American Theatre Critics Association attended the biennial of the 30-year-old National Black Theatre Festival. In and around Winston-Salem, North Carolina there were 30 productions. During two insightful panel discussions we met artistic directors from Winston-Salem, Sarasota, Chicago and Houston. It provided a compelling overview of black theatre in America.

The Metropolitan Museum of Art has mounted its first sound-based installation. British artist Oliver Beer selected 32 vessels from the Museum's vast collection. They form a 32 note chromatic scale which can performed on an electronic keyboard. The exhibit was a feast for eyes and ears.

Silly is, as silly does, could easily be the subtitle following the name of the current comedy/farce romp “The Underpants,” now on stage at the Old Globe’s Sheryl and Harvey White stage. The Steve Martin comedy has been extended twice now through September 8/