Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center

The Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center in Great Barrington announces a schedule of events and performances from now through August. Highlights include the sold out Live in HD broadcasts from the Met. Tony winner, Patti LuPone, jazz masters McCoy Tyner and Bucky Pizzarelli are among the highlights. As well as appearances by the Paul Taylor and Alvin Ailey dance companies.

As reliable as Black Friday and White Christmas, holiday offerings in the Berkshires once again take center stage. From "A Christmas Carol" at the Berkshire Theatre Festival to "The Nutcracker" at the Colonial Theatre, with a Christmas Oratorio and British Panto tucked away here and there, the holidays are upon us.

There will be a combination of rarities, surprises as well as familiar favorites during the special Holiday concert "The World's Favorite Carols." Cantilena Chamber Choir and Trinity Church Youth & Adults Choirs will perform at Trinity Church in Lenox, on Sunday, December 6, at 3 p.m. Deck the halls.

It was a classic example of "A Star Is Born." Because of a flu for soprano Maria Guleghina at the last minute Lise Lindstrom, who is known for her Turandot, made her Met debut to thunderous applause. It was an evening of enchanting fantasy in the magnificent Franco Zeffirelli production. It comes to a theater near you live in HD on November 7.

Pilobolus performed to a sold-out crowd Sunday in Great Barrington. But despite its best efforts, something seemed to missing from this show by this world-renowned dance company.

Pittsfield becomes the first city in the Berkshires to openly welcome LGBT visitors. On Columbus Day weekend, October 10-12, it kicks off an "Out in the Berkshires" weekend full of music, theatre and dance performances for the gay community and its friends. It's great to see the region openly welcome this segment of our population.

Pilobolus Dance Theatre sprang from a Dartmouth College dance class in 1971 with a clear desire to make something new. The group is known for its startling mix of humor and invention. We spoke with one of its artistic directors about what's new these days.

The Met's Live in HD opera presentations begins its fourth season of telecasts to the big screen on Saturday, October 10 with a new production of Puccini's Tosca. Tickets are difficult to find, and at Great Barrington's Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, tickets for the first few telecasts were quickly gobbled up by Berkshire residents. Tickets remain at other venues, and we have the latest scoop on the entire season.

An eagerly awaited new production for Puccini's Tosca opened the Met for the 2009-2010 season, and will be broadcast Live in HD on October 10.

The first stop on their national tour was the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, and Big Bad Voodoo Daddy blew the roof off the venerable old hall at its opening concert. This legendary powerhouse proves that nothing comes close to the sound of a live big band.

Bebe Neuwirth takes to the Mahaiwe stage Saturday for an evening of songs and remembrances, but will she have time to check out the Berkshire antique shops she loves so dearly?

In recent years the Berkshires has emerged as a major theatre community. With four professional companies and eight stages it's becoming a force in American theatre. And behind the scenes there is another show going on as well. Read all about it.

A new season of events kicks off July 5 with the reigning "Pied Piper of Music," Dan Zane and Friends and continues with opera, dance, theatre and "something for every taste."

It takes a community to make something like the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center succeed, and in Great Barrington this local theatre is a success in every sense of the word. Executive Director Beryl Jolly tells us why.

Last night the near-sellout audience in the Colonial howled with laughter and gasped with delight as scene after scene of merry mayhem unfolded. As the company of The Producers took their first bows in the Berkshires, the audience stood and literally cheered this modest but clever company from Cohoes, New York. It was a moment, and a show, to remember.

There is a long standing relationship between the American Repertory Theatre and arguably the greatest American playwright of his generation, David Mamet. While ART has seen world premieres of several of his plays it is currently staging a mini festival with "Romance" (2005) on its main stage, the Loeb Drama Center, and two successive Mamet productions for its smaller Zero Arrow Theatre.

The live in HD series of broadcasts from the Metropolitan Opera were an enormous success this past year for the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center in Great Barrington. There will be a preview of the season which starts in the fall with a broadacast of a vintage performance of Renee Fleming starring in Eugene Onegin on July 11. The Mahaiwe is planning a stunning schedule of dance, music, film and theatre for the coming season.

New plays by David Mamet, Eric Bogosian, Larry Gelbart and Joan Ackermann will be read by Karen Allen and others at the BTL Gala at the Mahaiwe on May 29. Proceeds will help fund the free series of readings.

On Saturday, March 21, there will be a live HD broadcast in American movie theatres of a new Metropolitan Opera production of Vincenzo Bellini's 1831 Bel Canto masterpiece "La Sonnambula." The opera stars the soprano Natalie Dessay in the demanding role of Amina and the tenor Elvino, Juan Diego Florez, who rejects her for alleged infidelity the night before their wedding.

Happily, midwinter in the Berkshires is anything but quiet. In fact, that's when many of our resident cultural institutions do their best work. A survey of what's coming up between now and Spring.

The beginning of winter is marked by theatre, music and dance throughout the world, but perhaps nowhere is it more heartfelt than here in the Berkshires. This Thanksgiving let us give thanks to our arts community and then get out and enjoy their offerings. Your guide awaits.

The Berkshire Hills are very much alive this fall. Choose from the ridiculous or the sublime, from the Ballet Trockaderos with men in tutus and on pointe to the arrival of Irina Brook at Shakespeare & Company to wrest a play from Oscar Wilde's book, The Canterville Ghost. For a complete change of pace, the Cirque du Soleil is coming to Amherst and Boston.

Berkshire residents are reveling in an amazing array of area arts offerings. Our monthly Preview serves to help guide your choices with helpful facts, insider details and handy links. The only mistake would be to procrastinate. Nothing gold can stay.

Berkshire residents and visitors are about to enjoy the earliest and most promising arts season in years. We pick the best of the early music, theater, dance and gallery offerings, from Memorial Day to the end of June 2008.

Theater, music and dance performances are sprouting up everywhere. Here's a head's up on the most promising. After a hard winter, it's nice to see the Berkshires bloom with life again.