SARATOGA SPRINGS —The Surround music series – which seats audiences onstage with the artist for an intimate concert experience – invites pianist Sophia Subbayya Vastek to the Zankel Music Center, at 4 p.m. on Sunday, Jan. 26.   

As a second-generation pianist and third-generation musician, Vastek brings a reverence for her collective history alongside a boundless, exploratory spirit. Her intuitive playing style—rooted in tenderness, improvisation, and classical training—has evolved into a dynamic, cinematic sound that shifts effortlessly across musical worlds. 

Her latest LP, In Our Softening (2022), was recorded on a 1902 upright piano, complete with a crack in its soundboard, delivering an ambient-inspired sound that is at once both vulnerable and captivating. 

The Surround concerts are staged at 4 p.m. one Sunday a month in January, February, and March. The series continues with performances by South Carolina singer and producer Niecy Blues on Feb. 9, and indie rock / jazz musician and songwriter Cassandra Jenkins on March 2.  For more information about events at the Zankel, which is located on the campus of Skidmore College, go to: https://www.skidmore.edu/zankel/index.php.  

LAKE GEORGE — The Lake George Arts Project’s Courthouse Gallery presents six to eight exhibitions annually by national, regional, emerging, and established contemporary visual artists who work in all media.  The mission of our gallery is to provide solo or two-person exhibition opportunities to emerging and professional artists, with preference given to work created within the last two years and to experimental or non-traditional work.  

There is no submission fee.  The deadline for proposals for 2026 is Friday, January 31, 2025, at 11:59 p.m..  The jury process will end in April 2025, and artists will be notified of their status by April 30, 2025.

Please visit the Lake George Arts Project’s website www.lakegeorgearts.org, to find the link to the guidelines, or call 518-668-2616 with any questions.

The Courthouse Gallery is located in the side entrance of the Old County Courthouse, on Lower Amherst Street in Lake George, NY. During scheduled exhibitions our in-person office and gallery hours are Wednesday through Friday 12 – 5 pm, Saturday 12 – 4 pm.  

SARATOGA SPRINGS — Drawing upon collective inspiration with their project Old Friends Beckoned, Matt Steckler, Yayoi Ikawa, Lonnie Plaxico & Tony Lewis present an evening of original jazz 8 p.m. Saturday, Jan. 11 at Caffe Lena. 

Using original scores as a canvas, the quartet strives has been described as “delightfully eclectic” by Downbeat and “inspired by greater artistic depth,” in Jazz Times.

SARATOGA SPRINGS —Top-selling female country pop artist Shania Twain announced a final series of summer 2025 tour dates across the U.S. 

Produced by Live Nation, the limited run will kick off on Saturday, July 19, in Buffalo, at Darien Lake Amphitheater, with a next-night staging in Saratoga Springs at the Saratoga Performing Arts Center on July 20.  

Tickets: livenation.com. 

SARATOGA SPRINGS — The Frances Young Tang Teaching Museum and Art Gallery will be open during Skidmore College’s winter break with special hours. 

Through Jan. 19, the Tang Teaching Museum will be open Tuesday–Sunday, noon–5 p.m., except for Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, New Year’s Eve, and New Year’s Day. 

The coming weeks offer visitors the last chance to see many current exhibitions:

• Mark Dion and Alexis Rockman: Journey to Nature’s Underworld, the epic exhibition that occupies both floors of the museum, through Jan. 5

• Elevator Music 50: Andrej Bako—Love Letter to the Deep, a sonic exploration of sperm whale interactions and miscommunications between animals and humans, through Jan. 19

• Recent Acquisitions, work by Julia Bland, Tom Burckhardt, Misha Japanwala, Ronny Quevedo, Amanda Ross-Ho, Sara VanDerBeek, through Jan. 19

• Toshiko Takaezu: Gifts from Toshiko, a stunning tribute to an artistic legend, through Jan. 26

The mezzanine exhibition Yvette Molina: A Promise to the Leaves, a popular two-year project now in its second year, will be on view through Sept. 14, 2025. Other galleries will be closed in preparation of the opening of the exhibitions Everforward, Neverback on Jan. 25 in the Winter Gallery, and a field of bloom and hum on Feb. 14 in the main galleries on both floors.

Regular museum hours resume Jan. 21. Admission to the museum is free. For more information, call the Tang Visitor Services Desk at 518-580-8080 or visit https://tang.skidmore.edu.

SARATOGA SPRINGS —Area legend David Greenberger will be appearing with The Huckleberries Sunday, Jan. 19 in an exclusive event at Universal Preservation Hall in Saratoga Springs.  

Greenberger, perhaps best known for 32 years of publishing his periodical – The Duplex Planet – which was borne out of his conversations with nursing home residents, beginning in 1979. The magazine led to a plethora of recordings and performances of monologues and music.  

Greenberger’s new release, “My Autobiography Vol. 1,” features music and monologues culled from Greenberger’s own life and observations, voiced by more than two dozen participants.   

At Universal Preservation Hall on Jan. 19, attendees will be treated to a showcase of the magic that lies in the art of conversation. With a specialty in sparking lively and spontaneous dialogue with all whom he meets, Greenberger’s latest artistic venture is a playground of conversation filled with knock-knock jokes, not-so-rhetorical questions and observations about the world akin to that of a child’s imagination and wonder.

For more information and tickets, go to: https://atuph.org/event/david-greenberger-the-huckleberries-celebrate-universal-preservation/. 

ALBANY — Saratoga Springs Youth Ballet presents the Nutcracker on Saturday, Dec. 21 at 2 and 7 p.m. and Sunday, Dec. 22 at 2 p.m. at the University at Albany Performing Arts Center.

Featuring over 120 local dancers, ages 5-18, and special guests i Sarah MacGregor and Jethro Paine courtesy of Boulder Ballet; and Andre Malo Robles as Herr Drosselmeyer. 

Tickets available at https://www.ticketleap.events/tickets/ssyballet/the-nutcracker-2030394712. General Admission: $35; seniors and students: $28; children under 3: free. All ticket proceeds directly support the Saratoga Springs Youth Ballet, a nonprofit organization providing quality professional dance training to pre-professional students throughout the Great Saratoga region. For more information, visit http://www.saratogaspringsyouthballet.org. 

The Performing Arts Center at the University at Albany is located at 1400 Washington Ave. in Albany. N.Y. 

SARATOGA SPRINGS — Avril Lavigne will stage a 19-date tour in 2025 that includes an appearance at Saratoga Performing Arts Center on May 27.  

The SPAC show – the fourth gig of the tour – will include opening support from Simple Plan, and We The Kings.  

In 2024, Lavigne returned to the stage with a massive run of her “Greatest Hits” tour dates that included appearances at the Kia Forum in Los Angeles and at major festivals like Glastonbury.

Lavigne first appeared at SPAC in 2005. From this reporter’s notebook – Avril Lavigne live at SPAC August 2005: 

“Onto the stage leapt the soon to be 21-year-old, cranking it up full volume and searing through an 18-song set that delighted 8,500 witnesses at Saratoga Performing Arts Center Sunday night, many of whom arrived adorned with men’s ties draped over rock ‘n’ roll T-shirts and with black eyeliner ala Avril prominently displayed.  

The 65 minutes of material performed – much of it culled from her albums ‘Let Go’ and ‘Under My Skin’– included a rendition of blink-182’s ‘All the Small Things,’ which out-muscled the original power trio’s  version in sheer joy. This was Power without Pretension, occasional off-key shrill and all, exhibiting acts of spontaneity on display for an art form too often missing the wonderful messiness of creativity in this modern age o contrived banalities…” 

Tickets: Livenation.org.