Remember Jones, left, and Daniel Donato will co-headline this year’s Maplewoodstock Festival.
Here is a roundup of arts events taking place around New Jersey, through July 18.
MUSIC
• Remember Jones and “Cosmic Country” performer Daniel Donato will co-headline the 2024 edition of the free, annual Maplewoodstock festival, which will take place July 13-14 at Memorial Park in Maplewood. Remember Jones will headline the first night and Donato, the second, with other acts including Nation Beat (featuring guest vocalist Christylez Bacon), July 13; DJ Prince Hakim, July 13; and The Tia Holt Experience, July 14.
Founded in 2004, Maplewoodstock offers vendors, a beer garden and a “Kid Zone,” in addition to the bands.
Click HERE for a new feature on Nation Beat.
DARYL HALL
• Daryl Hall and Elvis Costello & the Imposters (with Charlie Sexton) are touring together this summer, with venues including The PNC Bank Arts Center in Holmdel, July 18 at 7 p.m.
It’s only tangentially relevant to this tour but … Hall sang backing vocals on Costello’s 1984 single, “The Only Flame in Town” (from his Goodbye Cruel World album) and appeared in the song’s video. In the liner notes of a 2004 reissue of Goodbye Cruel World, Costello wrote of the video, “Naturally, my romantic rival (in the video) was Daryl, but my only real humiliation was in having a Columbia promotion woman hector the makeup girl: ‘Make him look handsome,’ while a very hungover Daryl sat in the next chair looking like a movie star. His hair was perfect.”
• The Pretenders, featuring Chrissie Hynde, will perform at The Count Basie Center for the Arts in Red Bank, July 13 at 8 p.m. This show will be part of a summer gala that will include a pre-concert dinner reception and a post-dinner dance party featuring The Sensational Soul Cruisers. The gala will be presented by the blockchain technology company Ripple and raise money for student scholarships and programs in support of the Basie Center’s nonprofit mission. For information about sponsorship tickets, visit thebasie.org/summer-gala-2024.
Hynde will be joined on the tour by guitarist James Walbourne, bassist Dave Page and drummer Kris Sonne. The Pretenders’ last album, Relentless, came out in September.
• The Sunset Jazz Series at the Camden Waterfront will present “A Celebration of Toots & the Maytals,” featuring singer Leba Hibbert, July 15 at 8 p.m. Frederick “Toots” Hibbert, frontman of the legendary reggae band The Maytals — known for hits such as “Pressure Drop,” “Monkey Man,” “Do the Reggay” and “54-46 (That’s My Number)” — died in 2020; Leba Hibbert is his daughter.
There will be no admission charge.
The cover of Tony Trischka’s “Earl Jam” album.
• Banjo master Tony Trischka will perform at Flounder Brewing Co. in Hillsborough, July 17 at 6 p.m. Trischka’s most recent album, Earl Jam: A Tribute to Earl Scruggs, celebrates the 100th anniversary of the late Scruggs’ birth, and features guests such as Vince Gill, Stuart Duncan, Del McCoury, Darol Anger, Molly Tuttle and Billy Strings.
• The Moody Blues are no longer active, but one group member, singer-songwriter-guitarist Justin Hayward is double billed with Christoper Cross at The Mayo Performing Arts Center in Morristown, July 16 at 7:30 p.m. (with Mike Dawes opening), and another member, singer-songwriter-bassist John Lodge, will play the band’s landmark 1967 album Days of Future Passed in its entirety, as well as other songs, at The State Theatre in New Brunswick, July 13 at 8 p.m.; and The Ocean City Music Pier, July 15 at 7 p.m.
• Mike Kaplan’s group Nth Degree will kick off the free Jazz in the Park series at Riverside Gardens Park in Red Bank, July 11 at 7 p.m., with subsequent shows featuring The Wallace Roney Jr. Quartet, July 18; Vince Ector & Organatomy, July 25; The Don Braden Quartet, Aug. 1; The Grace Fox Big Band, Aug. 8; and The Hendrik Meurkens Quartet, Aug. 15.
THEATER
• Cape May Stage will present the New Jersey premiere of “Ms. Holmes & Ms. Watson — Apt. 2B” from July 17 to Aug. 25. Written by Kate Hamill and set in the post-pandemic London of 2021, this is a modern, female, comedic reimagining of Arthur Conan Doyle’s classic detective team Sherlock Holmes and John Watson (here, Sherlock Holmes and Joan Watson).
• Bernards Township’s Plays in the Park program will present Trilogy Repertory‘s production of the classic musical “Fiddler on the Roof,” July 11-13 and 18-20 at 8 p.m. at Pleasant Valley Park in Basking Ridge. Lawn chairs and flashlights are recommended.
There will be no admission charge, but donations will be accepted.
Swamp Dogg in “Swamp Dogg Gets His Pool Painted.”
FILM
• As part of The Newark Black Film Festival, The Newark Museum of Art will show “Swamp Dogg Gets His Pool Painted” — a documentary about the eccentric musician, who was most popular during the 1970s — July 13 at 5 p.m., with Swamp Dogg participating in a post-screening question-and-answer session.
You can watch a trailer for the film HERE.
• The Historic Organ Restoration Committee of Boardwalk Hall in Atlantic City will show the 1926 silent adventure film “The Black Pirate,” starring Douglas Fairbanks, July 17 at 5 p.m. at Boardwalk Hall, with live organ music by Brett Miller. The screening will be preceded, from 2 to 4:30 p.m., by an antique car show.
• The life and music of the experimental musician and composer Pauline Oliveros, who died in 2016, is explored in the documentary “Deep Listening: The Story of Pauline Oliveros” (watch trailer below), which WFMU will screen July 14 at 7 p.m. at Monty Hall in Jersey City. The film includes performance footage, previously unreleased music, and appearances by Laurie Anderson, Thurston Moore, Terry Riley and others.
The screening will be followed by a question-and-answer session featuring the film’s director Daniel Weintraub and WFMU “Radio Ravioli” DJ Olivia Bradley.
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Click HERE for a list of free shows taking place throughout New Jersey.
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REVIEWS
“As You Like It,” presented by Shakespeare Theatre of New Jersey, outdoors at Saint Elizabeth University, Florham Park. (Through July 14)
“Crossing the Hudson” at MORA Museum of International Art, Jersey City. (Through July 30)
“George Segal: Themes and Variations“ at Zimmerli Art Museum, New Brunswick. (Through July 31)
“Set in Motion: Kinetic Worlds from the Studio of Richard Whitten” at Morris Museum, Morris Township. (Through Sept. 1)
“Morven Revealed: Untold Stories From New Jersey’s Most Historic Home” at Morven Museum & Garden, Princeton. (Through March 2)
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