BAM Next Wave Arts Festival

When the summer cools down, the culture heats up in Brooklyn! The Brooklyn Academy of Music's Next Wave fall arts festival brings cutting-edge sound, movement and drama to Kings County. On September 17, 2013, the arts fest returned to BAM for its 30th season and will run through December 22.

Big names from all genres of music and performance will be in attendance. Music buffs, listen up for maverick composer Fred Ho's Muhammad Ali–themed Sweet Science Suite or Questlove's electronic-music tribute, Electronium. Discerning dance fans, keep an eye out for a new interpretation of Stravinsky's modernist classic Rite of Spring courtesy of Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company and Anne Bogart’s SITI Company. Theater enthusiasts, don't miss Nosferatu, a creepy take on the Dracula legend via Grzegorz Jarzyna. And pop-culture fiends, attain lowbrow-highbrow nirvana withAnna Nicole, an opera based on the late doomed beauty queen. Whatever show you choose, you'll leave energized and enthused about the limitless scope of the Brooklyn arts scene.

A Few Critics' picks:

The late Playboy model and reality-TV personality Anna Nicole Smith might not seem like the ideal inspiration for a serious opera, but what resulted when English composer Mark-Anthony Turnage and librettist Richard Thomas turned their heads to the subject was a tragedy emblematic of our media-besotted time, and a 2011 smash hit for Covent Garden. Mounted here by BAM in cahoots with New York City Opera, the work's NYC premiere is directed by Richard Jones and conducted by Steven Sloane. 

Bill T. Jones and Janet Wong collaborate with director Anne Bogart and her theater troupe SITI Company for A Rite. Presented as part of BAM's Next Wave Festival, the piece celebrates the centennial of Stravinsky'sThe Rite of Spring by using its history, as well as its contemporary social relevance as inspirations.

Mounted in collaboration with Wordless Music, this moody multimedia creation juxtaposes indie-cinema director Jem Cohen's stark footage of Nova Scotia's Cape Breton with newspaper clippings and poems from the region. An all-star post-rock ensemble, fronted by Mira Billotte and including members of Fugazi, Dirty Three, Godspeed You! Black Emperor and the Quavers, provides live accompaniment.

Inspired by a 1971 EPA project that sent out 100 photographers across the country to explore how Americans relate to their homeland, radical string quartet Ethel teams with director Steve Cosson and projection artist Deborah Johnson to bring the resulting images to life in music. Composers involved include Mary Ellen Childs, Kip Jones, Ulysses Owens Jr., Jerod Impichchaachaaha' Tate, Tema Watstein and James Kimo Williams, plus Ethel members Ralph Farris and Dorothy Lawson.

The Belgian choreographer returns to BAM with her company Rosas in two works: En Atendant, which explores the transition of twilight into night, and Cesena, in which 19 dancers perform on a circle of sand along with the singers of graindelavoix, a collective directed by Björn Schmelzer. The latter refers to the bubonic plague and a medieval massacre in the northern Italian city Cesena. On Oct 19 at 4:30pm, Anna Kisselgoff moderates an artist's talk with De Keersmaeker ($20).

The choreographer presents Come, and Back Again, an evening-length premiere that looks at love and mortality, and features five musicians playing songs by the Atlanta band Smoke. The show also includes work by Brooklyn sculptor Jonah Emerson Bell in collaboration with street artist Caledonia "Swoon" Curry.

Two birds initiate the corruption of the human race in British visual artist Alexander Singh's theatrical riff on Aristophanes, featuring dance and Greco-Roman masks.

Whether you're hip to Stevie Wonder's trailblazing synth explorations with the founders of Tonto's Expanding Head Band or can't figure out what connected Afrika Bambaataa to Kraftwerk, this incredible electronic-music showcase, hosted by heavyweight mixologist Questlove, ought to spin the record straight. Joined by Jeremy Ellis, Tom "How to Dress Well" Krell, Sonnymoon and others in what's sure to be one of the fall's coolest bills, Questo plugs all the gaps between Raymond Scott and George Clinton.

For more information on the festival, all performances and show times visit: Click Here