Bay Area arts: 7 cool things to do and see this weekend
There is a lot to see and do in the Bay Area over Labor Day Weekend, including a gaggle of fun festivals and a show by a Bay Area music legend.
Here is a partial rundown.
Holiday fests: Scottish games, Kings Mountain, Art & Wind
The three-day Labor Day weekend marks the unofficial end of summer with some of the Bay Area’s biggest and longest tenured outdoor events, plus a vegan food fest now in its third year. Here’s a look.
157th Scottish Highland Gathering and Games: The Bay Area’s largest celebration of Scottish culture features “heavy athletics” contests such as the caber and stone tosses, a Kilted Mile race, heritage exhibits, traditional foods, whisky tastings and music including pipe bands, harpists, fiddlers and Celtic rock.
Details: 8 a.m.-6 p.m. Saturday-Sunday; Alameda County Fairgrounds, 4501 Pleasanton Ave., Pleasanton; $35 single day; $60 two-day passes; youth, senior discounts available; military members and kids 11 and under free; www.thescottishgames.com.
Kings Mountain Art Fair: More than 100 juried artists from the U.S. and Canada will gather to create a fine-art gallery in the redwoods at this 60th annual event, which also features live entertainment, food and drink booths.
Details: 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Saturday, Sunday and Monday; 13889 Skyline Blvd., Woodside; free admission; kingsmountainartfair.org
Millbrae Art & Wine Festival: The annual event features 300 arts and crafts booths, live music, food and wine vendors, a car show and a Kids Zone.
Details: 10 a.m.-5 p.m. Saturday and Sunday; along Broadway between Victoria and Meadow Glen; free admission; millbrae.com/art-wine-festival.
Bizerkeley Food Festival: The third annual vegan food festival will feature more than two dozen food vendors plus entertainment, games and a children’s activity zone.
Details: 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Sunday; 2727 Milvia St., Berkeley; $10, kids 15 and under free; thebizerkeleyvegan.com/foodfest.
— Linda Zavoral, Staff
New work from Megan Lowe
Megan Lowe Dances, the Bay Area troupe led by the namesake dancer, choreographer, musician, aerialist and musician, who’s of Chinese and Irish descent, kicks off its 10th anniversary season with a new work that aims to offer some exhilarating dance moves while making a point about minority representation in the arts world.
“Gathering Pieces of Peace,” opening Friday in San Francisco, goes inside the lives, thoughts and experiences of mixed-race Asian American people and artists. Incorporating text, music and song, and evocative choreography, “Pieces of Peace” creates mini-stories of “fractured selves and longings to belong,” says Lowe, and explores the power of of community. The cast of dancers includes Lowe and fellow AAPI artists Clarissa Rivera Dyas, Malia Hatico-Byrne, and Melissa Lewis Wong.
“Mixed-race individuals make up less than 5% of the S.F. population and are severely underrepresented in the arts,” explains Lowe. The new work is part of her goal to show how “drastically different racial and cultural backgrounds can come closer together — dreaming up possibilities for our futures and the futures of our diverse communities.”
Details: Performances 7:30 p.m. Friday and Saturday and Sept. 8 and 9; 3153 17th St., San Francisco; free with suggested donation; odc.dance, www.meganlowedances.com.
— Randy McMullen Staff
A biting new comedy
A Liz Duffy Adams play is always a marvelously intricate feast of dazzling wordplay, and the Bay Area has been blessed with more than its share of them: her Glickman Award-winning postapocalyptic “Dog Act” with Shotgun Players; “Or,” her magnificent comedy about Aphra Behn at the Magic; and collaborations with Crowded Fire Theater such as “The Listener,” “The Train Play” and “One Big Lie.”
Now Adams returns with “Born with Teeth,” her acclaimed new comedy about Christopher Marlowe and William Shakespeare replete with danger and seduction. Aurora artistic director Josh Costello helms its Bay Area premiere.
Details: Sept. 1-Oct. 1; Aurora Theatre, Berkeley; $20-$65; www.auroratheatre.org
— Sam Hurwitt, Correspondent
Celebrating Linda Tillery
Linda Tillery is a Bay Area musical treasure. The singer, songwriter, musician, arranger, bandleader and producer has lent her immense talent to a variety of blues, jazz and American roots music ventures, bringing an equal measure of authenticity and passion to each performance and recording.
She got her start as a member of the psychedelic rock band The Loading Zone. Her second album, a self-titled release, came out in 1977 on Olivia Records, a women-run label that emerged at a time when women occupied few positions of leadership in the recording business. She was heralded as a pioneer in a genre that became known as Women’s Music. She has collaborated with such luminaries as Barbara Higbie and Holly Near and sung with A-listers ranging from Carlos Santana to Huey Lewis and the News to Boz Scaggs to Bobby McFerrin and the Turtle Island String Quartet. And she won a Grammy in 1997 for, of all things, a children’s album.
This legendary member of the Bay Area music scene turns 75 on Saturday, and doncha know she will be greeting the milestone on stage, in a celebratory concert at Berkeley’s famed Freight & Salvage music hall. She will be performing with The Freedom Band in a program titled Songs of Protest and Resistance (with all tunes penned by Black songwriters) and will also perform a set with the Chocolate Psychedelic Band. It’s sure to be a rousing show full of love for a Bay Area original.
Details: 8 p.m. Sept. 2; Freight & Salvage, Berkeley; general seating tickets are sold out but standing room only tickets are still available ($38); show will also be available for live-streaming ($20); thefreight.org.
— Bay City News Foudation