Sunday, October 29, 7 p.m.

UMass Old Chapel

The adventurous, genre-defying string quartet Brooklyn Rider combines a wildly eclectic repertoire with a gripping performance style that is attracting legions of fans and drawing critical acclaim from classical, world and rock music critics alike. NPR credits Brooklyn Rider with “recreating the 300-year-old form of string quartet as a vital and creative 21st-century ensemble.” Through creative programming and global collaborations, including those with the Silk Road Ensemble, Brooklyn Rider illuminates music for its audiences in ways that are “stunningly imaginative,” according to Lucid Culture.

Thursday, October 26, 2017 @ 7:30 PM

Kiran Ahluwalia’s seductive singing draws on her Indian-Punjabi heritage, fusing its hypnotic grooves with passionate Saharan blues and innovative western jazz. Her compositions and arrangements embody the essence of ghazal, ancient poetry influenced by Sufi mysticism, about illicit, unattainable love. Accompanied by her band, including New York jazz guitarist Rez Abbasi and master tabla player Nitin Mitta, Ahluwalia invites us to explore the human condition and lose ourselves in love.

On Wednesday, October 25 at 7pm at Hampshire Dining Commons. Grab your meal and come join the stimulating conversations with this cool and jazzy vocal artist from South Asia and maybe she will recite a verse of her poetry or sing a bar or two of music. It promises to a fun-filled Meet and Greet with Kiran and her Band.
(General Public UMass Dining Common Dinner cost: $15.50)

Ticket Prices: $25; Students $10

Tuesday October 17, 2017 @ 7:30 PM

With precise and technical footwork, often to the accompaniment of house music, Pantsula is rooted in street culture and used to respond to cultural and political issues. Stimela the Musical, featuring an ensemble of 20 men, is a unique South African story that tells a tale of rural African men who come by train from all walks of life in search of greener pastures in the city of gold, Johannesburg.

Pre-show talk in the Concert Hall Lobby at 6:15 pm.
Pre-show Hip-Hop/Pantsula Demonstration in the Concert Hall Lobby at 6:45pm. Join JOHNNIE CRUISE MERCER, the artistic director of Johnnie Cruise Mercer/TheREDprojectNYC, a choreographer, educator, and freelance performer in the New York City area and CRAZEFAZE, the local all female hip hop crew from Western Mass directed by Rebecca Bustillos for high energy, interactive dance demos before the show!

Ticket Prices: $35, $30, $20; Students $10

Tuesday, October 3, 2017 @ 7:30 pm & Wednesday, October 4, 2017 @ 7:30 pm

Come aboard the Star of the Sea, en route from Ireland to America in 1847. Playing passengers whose lives and fates are more connected than they know, the cast of six, plus video projections, choreographed movement, and inventive sound effects, conjures up the world of Joseph O’Connor’s best-selling novel, in an extraordinary adaptation performed in Irish and English.

Ticket prices: $35, $25; Students $10

 

Monday, October 2, 2017 at 8:00 pm
UMass Old Chapel

Hailed as “a pioneer in world music” by The New York Times and “a master percussionist” by Musician magazine, Adam Rudolph was Yusef Lateef’s closest collaborator. Widely acknowledged as one of the most talented percussionists in improvised music, Hamid Drake has worked with trumpeter Don Cherry, Pharoah Sanders, Fred Anderson, Mahmoud Gania, and William Parker.