Pre Covid-19 we searched the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you didn’t have to.
We made it as easy as 1-2-3.

Covid-19 has required some changes for the time being.
Stay Safe.
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For the month of August we are going to try a different format – on some days we will go visual and offer a selection of the very best NYCity Instagram photos or YouTube videos. Some days you will find “the Nifty Nine”, all the NYC news you need to start your day, or the Top Online Travel Forums with NYC info. On other days we will offer “Top 10 Corona Culture,” updated info and video especially suited to these difficult times.

We hope you will come back often to see what’s cooking here.
Today it’s Top 10 Corona Culture (a2). NEW STUFF!

1. What’s next after Phase 4? What you need to know about NYC’s reopening (TONY). There’s no Phase 5, but there’s still a lot of reopening to do.

2. Everything You Need To Know About NYC’s Reopening  (curbed).
The five boroughs entered the fourth and final phase of reopening on Monday, July 20.

3. The 9 best streets for outdoor dining in NYC this summer  (TONY).
These streets are closed off to traffic on weekends through August for al fresco dining.

4. Brooklyn Bridge, Star of the City: Here’s a Tour  (NYT).
Our critic explores the bridge and the neighborhoods on either side with the architects Marion Weiss and Michael Manfredi.

5. The Best Online Workout Classes, According to Strategist Writers and Editors  (NY Magazine).

6. The New York Botanical Garden is officially open  (TONY).
You’ll be able to once again bask in the garden’s bountiful natural wonders.

7. 15 TV Shows That Make You Want to Visit New York City  (nycgo.com).

8. Where to Stream Great Dance Performances  (NY Magazine).

9. 10 virtual tours: Travel the world without leaving home  (Newsday).
Take a tour of many of the world’s greatest sights—from home! Travel across the globe through these virtual, online experiences.

10. All the performances, events, and classes in NYC you can stream online (6sqft).

The American Merchant Mariner’s Memorial
“Twice a day one of these tragic bronze mariners drowns with the tide to remember all those the sea has taken.

Hidden away in the water off Battery Park is one of the most moving memorials you are ever likely to see. The American Merchant Mariner’s memorial, sculpted by Marisol Escobar in 1991, takes the form of three merchant seamen stranded on a sinking ship, terrified, calling for help and trying to reach the desperate hand of one of their shipmates floundering in the water below.

The United States Merchant Mariner suffered more casualties than any other American service during World War II, 1 of every 26 mariners would not return home.

The sculpture bears the following inscription: “This memorial serves as a marker for America’s merchant mariners resting in the unmarked ocean depths.” The monument is based on a true event, the sinking of SS Muskogee by German U-boat 123 on March 22nd, 1942. The Muskogee was sailing from Venezuela to Halifax carrying a cargo of petroleum. Without an escort and unarmed, the Muskogee was hit by a torpedo in her engine room and began to sink within a quarter of an hour, 335 miles north-northeast. Ten survivors clung to life rafts in the burning sea as the U-boat surfaced. The submarine captain Reinhard Hardegen took their photograph, and it’s from this, that Escobar based her sculpture.

What makes the memorial so moving is that the helpless sailor in the water is covered by the Upper New York Bay with each high tide. His fingertips permanently out of reach to his companions, he drowns twice a day. The plaque next to the memorial makes the striking statue all the more poignant, where we learn that for the crew of the SS Muskogee; “left to the perils of the sea, the survivors later perished.”  (atlasobscura)

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Now how about some other useful information during these trying times.

WFUV Live Online (July 30 – August 05)

7/31-8/5 – WXPN Free at Noon Virtual Musikfest on NPR Live Sessions: Strand of Oaks, Low Cut Connie, Pretenders, Citizen Cope, Pixies, Nada Surf, Waxahatchee, Best Coast, David Gray, Richard Thompson, Joseph Arthur, Nathaniel Rateliff, The Lone Bellow, The Wood Brothers, I’m With Her, The Cactus Blossoms, First Aid Kit… 7/30-8/2 – Lollapalooza with Paul McCartney, Run The Jewels, LCD Soundsystem, Jane’s Addiction, Arcade Fire, H.E.R., Portugal. The Man, Gary Clark Jr., The Cure, Alabama Shakes… 7/30-8/2 – The Falcon Ridge 2020 Share & Shelter In Place Fest with Susan Werner, Donna the Buffalo, Mary Gauthier… 7/30 – Lucius w/Courtney Barnett, The War & Treaty 7/30 – Mayer Hawthorne 7/30 – Dar Williams songs and fan Q&A 7/31 – Mavis 80 with Jason Isbell, Brandi Carlile, Trombone Shorty, Grace Potter, Phoebe Bridgers, Lucius, M. Ward, Joe Henry, Ben Harper… 7/31 – City Winery Farewell to Varick St. with Joan Osborne, Joseph Arthur, Jill Sobule, Teddy Thompson, Rhett Miller, James Maddock… 8/1 – Deer Tick & Friends live from Fort Adams with Leon Bridges, Robert Ellis, Sharon Van Etten, The Tallest Man on Earth and Courtney Marie Andrews, Newport Folk 8/1 – Rock My Soul: Jerry Garcia Birthday with artists playing his songs 8/1 – LP with a full band

Online concert calendar and links at wfuv.org/livestreams

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Interesting. Unusual. Uniquely NYC. Highlights of this week’s top virtual events include Bound Unbound, Video Chat Variations, Ice Factory Festival 2020 and more. Get the NYC-ARTS Top Five in your inbox every Friday and follow @NYC_ARTS on Instagram or @NYCARTS on Twitter to stay abreast of events as they happen.

Bound Unbound: Four by Mehrdad Oskouei

Museum of the Moving Image

Queens / Wed, Aug 05, 2020 – Sun, Aug 30, 2020

Beginning August 5, 2020, Museum of the Moving Image is pleased to present “Bound Unbound: Four by Mehrdad Oskouei,” films by the esteemed Iranian documentarian who has spent twelve years exploring the lives of women and children in detention centers near Tehran. The series is anchored by “Sunless Shadows,” Oskouei’s latest film, for which he was awarded Best Director at the International Documentary Film Festival Amsterdam in 2019. Punctuated by deeply confessional monologues, the film …

MJH Virtual Summer Programming

Museum of Jewish Heritage – A Living Memorial to the Holocaust

Manhattan / Tue, Jul 28, 2020 – Thu, Aug 20, 2020

The Museum of Jewish Heritage — A Living Memorial to the Holocaust continues to provide virtual programming while the Museum remains closed.  Upcoming events include book talks, a film screening, and a multimedia event featuring songs of Holocaust refugees that were recorded in 1948. Trauma Studies, Creativity, And The Second Generation Tuesday, August 4 | 2 PM Suggested Donation $10 https://mjhnyc.org/events/trauma-studies-creativity-and-the-second-generation/ Children of Holocaust survivors (often referred to as “2Gs”, for second generation) are no strangers to intergenerational trauma. Children …

Ice Factory Festival 2020

New Ohio Theatre

Manhattan / Fri, Jul 24, 2020 – Sat, Aug 15, 2020

New Ohio Theatre is excited to announce that the 27th annual Obie Award-winning “Ice Factory Festival” will be live-streamed online for the first time, and will feature four new works over four weeks. NOT recognizes the precarious, disorienting, and historic nature of this summer of COVID-19 social distancing, widespread economic dislocation, and BLM racial justice protests. As always, they look to their theatre artists to help us find our bearings. They reached out to New …

Video Chat Variations

Alarm Will Sound

Manhattan  / Sat, Aug 01, 2020 – Sat, Sep 12, 2020

Alarm Will Sound—”one of the most vital and original ensembles on the American music scene” (The New York Times)—continues to revitalize music-making during the COVID-19 pandemic with “VIDEO CHAT VARIATIONS,” a new series of remote performances that respond to the quirks of video chat platforms. The series will launch in August 2020 with two visionary, multi-faceted artists, both MacArthur “Genius” Award winners: Meredith Monk (8/1), and Tyshawn Sorey (9/12).  This new project comes on the heels …

Digital Discovery Festival: Renewal

National Sawdust

Brooklyn / Tue, Aug 04, 2020 – Fri, Aug 07, 2020

In times of trouble, we seek out songs we know which bring us comfort. Great artists harness that impulse of nostalgia and desire for the familiar, then use that energy to subvert expectations with new possibilities. For Week 13, National Sawdust’s “Digital Discovery Festival” embraces Renewalas a creative force to reshape music in ways we never considered and bring light to our darkest hours.The magnetic impresario Michael Mwenso, alongside his band The Shakes, specializes in …

In the age of Covid-19 this info from City Guide is one of the best sources of info on What’s Happening, even if some are only available in your home, and not in your favorite venue.

Places to Go in NYC: Virtual Tours of Observation Decks

City Guide News Desk