NYC Events,”Only the Best” (03/11) + Museum Special Exhibitions: Manhattan’s WestSide

Posted on 03/11/2019 by GregD

Today’s Elite 8 NYC Events > MONDAY/ MARCH 11, 2019

“We search the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you don’t have to.” We make it as easy as 1-2-3.

For future NYC Events, check the tab above:  “March NYC Events”
It’s the most comprehensive list of top events this month that you will find anywhere.
Carefully curated from “Only the Best” NYC event info on the the web, it’s a simply superb resource that will help you plan your NYC visit all over town, all through the month.
To make your own after dinner plans TONIGHT, see the tab above;  “LiveMusic.”

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Have time for only one NYC Event today? Do this:

Marcia Ball
City Winery Loft / 8PM, $30-$35
“Rollicking, playful, good-time blues and intimate, reflective balladry…her songs ring with emotional depth” –Rolling Stone

“A welcome ray of sunshine…Ball is a killer pianist, a great singer and songwriter. Potent blues, sweet zydeco, soulful, fast and furious Texas boogie…heartfelt, powerful and righteous” –Billboard

“Fifty years have passed in a flash,” says Texas-born, Louisiana-raised pianist, songwriter and vocalist Marcia Ball of her long and storied career. Ball, the 2018 Texas State Musician Of The Year, has won worldwide fame and countless fans for her ability to ignite a full-scale roadhouse rhythm and blues party every time she takes the stage.”

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7 OTHER TOP NYC EVENTS TODAY (see below for full listing)
>> The Brubeck Institute Jazz Quartet with special guest Lewis Nash
>> Jim Caruso’s Cast Party 
>> The Vanguard Jazz Orchestra
>> Taste of Grand Central Market
>> Statue of Liberty? Myths About the Lady in the Harbor
>> Philosophy of Friendship: the Good, the Bad, and the Toxic
>> Historical Fiction Unbound: Lisa Gornick with Christina Baker Kline

Continuing Events
>> Suzanne Vega.
>> Hubbard Street
>> NOCHE FLAMENCA
===================================================

Music, Dance, Performing Arts

The Brubeck Institute Jazz Quartet with special guest Lewis Nash
Dizzy’s Club, Jazz at Lincoln Center / 7:30PM, +9:30PM, $30-$35
“Nine-time winners of the prestigious DownBeat Student Music award for Best Collegiate Jazz Group—including the most recent award in 2018—the Brubeck Institute Jazz Quintet has performed all over the world, from top jazz clubs and festivals to an appearance at the United Nations as part of the Dave Brubeck forum, Jazz: A Language for Peace. Recent graduates of the group have played at Jazz at Lincoln Center multiple times and are now highly active jazz professionals.”

Jim Caruso’s Cast Party (Cabaret)
Birdland, 315 West 44th St. (btw 8/9 ave) / 9:30PM, $30
the witty host attracts broadway stars on their night off, along with up and comers.
“Part cabaret, part piano bar and part social set, Cast Party offers a chance to hear rising and established talents step up to the microphone (backed by the slap and tickle of Steve Doyle on bass and Billy Stritch at the ivories, plus the bang of Daniel Glass on drums). The waggish Caruso presides as host.” (TONY)

The Vanguard Jazz Orchestra
Village Vanguard, 178 7th Ave. South (btw W11th/Perry St.) / 8:30Pm +10:30PM, $35
World class big band with 16 members on that small stage, a monday night institution.
“Almost exactly half a century ago, the trumpeter-composer-arranger Thad Jones and the drummer Mel Lewis began their Monday-night big band residency at the Village Vanguard, establishing what became a hallowed tradition.” (NYT)

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Smart Stuff / Other NYC EventS

Taste of Grand Central Market
Grand Central Terminal, Vanderbilt Hall / 2PM, FREE
“New Yorkers will gladly cough up change for great food, but when there’s a chance to snag excellent grub for the price of nada, we pounce! Make sure to stake out a spot for Grand Central’s “Taste of Grand Central Market.” The foodie heaven (located between Graybar Building and the 4/5/6 subway lines) serves a ton of gratis bites from merchants such as Ceriello Fine Foods, Eli Zabar’s Bread & Pastry, Eli Zabar’s Farm to Table, Oren’s Daily Roast, Pescatore Seafood Co., Sushi by Pescatore, Murray’s Cheese and more.The complimentary tastings last for an hour (2pm to 3pm) on March 11 and March 13. So, if you’re in dire need of a snack during your commute, this is the spot to hit! And before you go, make sure to check our list of 10 fascinating secrets about Grand Central.” (TONY)

Statue of Liberty? Myths About the Lady in the Harbor
Graduate Center, CUNY, 365 Fifth Ave./ 6:30PM, FREE
“Francesca Lidia Viano speaks about her new book, Sentinel: The Unlikely Origins of the Statue of Liberty. Few structures have become as iconic, for the city and nation, as the Statue of Liberty. Yet its own history remains obscure. In this new work, “the fullest account yet of the people and ideas that brought the lady of the harbor to life,” Viano, a Fellow at Harvard’s Weatherhead Center for International Affairs, discusses the contradictory mix of ideologies and values behind it.”

Skye & Massimo’s Philosophy Cafe |
Philosophy of Friendship: the Good, the Bad, and the Toxic
New York Society for Ethical Culture, 2 W. 64th St./ 6PM, $5
“Friendship is a crucial element of the good life. As Seneca said, “Nothing…refreshes and aids a sick man so much as the affection of his friends. Nothing so steals away the expectation and the fear of death.” Nevertheless, being a great friend is challenging because it takes practice, courage, and time. Friendships can also be messy, rife with conflicts and tensions. And all too easily, friendships can turn sour through neglect, misunderstandings, jealousy, or too much or too little honesty. In this cafe, we will discuss the philosophy of friendship, including the nature of friendship, what being a good friend means, what an ideal friendship looks like, and the role of frenemies.”

Historical Fiction Unbound: Lisa Gornick with Christina Baker Kline
New York Public Library—Mid-Manhattan Library, 476 Fifth Ave. (42nd St. Entrance) / 6:30PM, FREE
“Two authors discuss the pleasures and perils of writing fiction set in other eras.
Gornick (Louisa Meets Bear, Tinderbox, and A Private Sorcery) and Kline (Orphan Train) will discuss the pleasures and perils of writing about other eras, and their approaches to combining historical and fictional events and characters.”

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Continuing Events

Suzanne Vega (through March 16, NO MON.)
at Café Carlyle
“This New York-based singer-songwriter has been composing and performing folk-inspired acoustic tunes since she was a Barnard student in the early 1980s. The venerable cabaret Café Carlyle might be considerably more upscale than Tom’s Restaurant — the Upper West Side student haunt that inspired Vega’s enduring and influential single “Tom’s Diner” — but both offer a glimpse of a bygone New York. A product of the bohemian Greenwich Village folk scene, which has all but disappeared, Vega herself presents an evening of time travel to a completely different period in the city’s history.” (NYT-NATALIE WEINER)

Hubbard Street (thru Mar.17, NO MON.)
Joyce Theatre, 175 Eighth Ave., at 19th St./
“Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, one of the country’s most prominent contemporary-dance ensembles, returns to New York after a four-year absence. Each half of the two-week run is devoted to a single choreographer: the Tel Aviv-based Ohad Naharin first, followed by the Canada-born Crystal Pite. “Decadance/Chicago” is an updated version of Naharin’s popular 2000 work, a series of surrealistic vignettes that concludes with a section in which audience members slow-dance with the cast onstage. The Pite evening, in contrast, is made up of three works—“A Picture of You Falling,” “The Other You,” and “Grace Engine”—executed in Pite’s highly articulated, sinuous movement style.” (Marina Harss, NewYorker)

NOCHE FLAMENCA (thru Mar.31, NO MON.)
at the Connelly Theater
“This splendid flamenco company, led by Martín Santangelo, its artistic director, and the dancer Soledad Barrio, presents “Entre Tú y Yo” (“Between You and Me”), an evening of solos, duets and ensemble works that includes “Refugiados” (“Refugees”), which has been recently added to the company’s repertoire. The piece transforms poems written by children in refugee camps into song and dance. The program also features the latest iteration of “La Ronde,” which is inspired by Max Ophüls’s 1950 film and spotlights the talents of a guitarist, a vocalist and a solo dancer.” (NYT-Gia Kourlas)
(March 12-14, 7:30 p.m.; through March 31).
If you like flamenco even a little, you must see Soledad’s performance.

==========================================================================
♦ Before making final plans, we suggest you call the venue to confirm ticket availability, plus dates and times, as schedules are subject to change.
♦ NYCity, with a population of  8.6 million, had a record 65 million visitors last year and was TripAdvisor’s Traveler’s Choice Top U.S. Destination for 2018 – awesome! BUT quality shows draw crowds. Try to reserve seats for these top NYC events in advance, even if just earlier on the day of performance.

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Bonus: Nifty 9 – Best Cabarets / Piano Bars NYCity
These are my favorite places for an after dinner night on the town – music and drinks.
Hit the Hot Link and check out what’s happening tonight:

Feinstein’s/54 Below – 254 W 54th St.

The Green Room 42 – 570 Tenth Ave.

Don’t Tell Mama – 343 W 46th St.

The Rum House, in the Hotel Edison – 228 W. 47th St.

Laurie Beechman Theatre – 407 W 42nd St.

Marie’s Crisis – 59 Grove St.

The Duplex – 61 Christopher St.

Sid Gold’s Request Room – 165 W 26th St.

Cafe Carlyle, in the Carlyle Hotel – 35 E. 76th St.
This is the only one not located on Manhattan’s WestSide, and it ain’t cheap, but it has some of the finest singers.

For a comprehensive list of the best places to hear All Types of Live Music in Manhattan see the tab above “LiveMusic.”

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NYCity Vacation Travel Guide Video (Expedia):

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WHAT’S ON VIEW
My Fave Special Exhibitions – MUSEUMS / Manhattan’s WestSide
(See the New York Times Arts Section for listings of all museums,
and also to see their expanded reviews of exhibitions)

Whitney Museum of American Art

‘ANDY WARHOL — FROM A TO B AND BACK AGAIN’  (through March 31) “Although this is the artist’s first full American retrospective in 31 years, he’s been so much with us — in museums, galleries, auctions — as to make him, like wallpaper, like the atmosphere, only half-noticed. The Whitney show restores him to a full, commanding view, but does so in a carefully shaped and edited way, with an emphasis on very early and late work. Despite the show’s monumentalizing size, supplemented by an off-site display of the enormous multipanel painting called “Shadows,” it’s a human-scale Warhol we see. Largely absent is the artist-entrepreneur who is taken as a prophet of our market-addled present. What we have instead is Warhol for whom art, whatever else it was, was an expression of personal hopes and fears.”  (Cotter)

Museum of Art and Design

‘STERLING RUBY: CERAMICS’  (through March 17).
“Adept at most art mediums, this artist is at his best in ceramics, especially in the outsize, awkwardly hand-built, resplendently glazed baskets, ashtrays and plates and the objects that verge on sculpture in this show. These works actively incorporate accident and aspects of the ready-made, have precedents in the large-scale ceramics of Peter Voulkos and Viola Frey, but may be closest in spirit to the Neo-Expressionism of Julian Schnabel — rehabilitated, of course.” (Smith – NYT)

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For other selected Museum and Gallery Special Exhibitions see Posts in right Sidebar dated 03/09 and 03/07.
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Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

NYC Events,”Only the Best” (03/10) + Today’s Featured Pub (Midtown West)

Posted on 03/10/2019 by GregD

Today’s Elite 8 NYC Events > SUNDAY/ MARCH 10, 2019

“We search the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you don’t have to.” We make it as easy as 1-2-3.

For future NYC Events, check the tab above:  “March NYC Events”
It’s the most comprehensive list of top events this month that you will find anywhere.
Carefully curated from “Only the Best” NYC event info on the the web, it’s a simply superb resource that will help you plan your NYC visit all over town, all through the month.
To make your own after dinner plans TONIGHT, see the tab above;  “LiveMusic.”

==========================================================

Have time for only one NYC Event today? Do this:

SILAS FARLEY
at the Metropolitan Museum of Art / 11 a.m.,1:30 + 3:30 p.m.
“MetLiveArts Performances hosts “Songs From the Spirit,” a site-specific ballet created by Farley, a choreographer and director. During this production, audience members will follow dancers into three galleries as Farley explores ideas revolving around history, spirituality, freedom and the inherent need to create art. The dancers — including Farley, a member of New York City Ballet — are accompanied by traditional spirituals and new songs created by inmates at San Quentin State Prison, courtesy of the Radiotopia podcast “Ear Hustle.” (NYT-Gia Kourlas)
Of course, you can pair this with a visit to one of America’s premier museums.

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7 OTHER TOP NYC EVENTS TODAY (see below for full listing)
>> Flamenco Festival
>> Ambrose Akinmusire
>> BALLET FLAMENCO SARA BARAS
>> Renee Rosnes Quartet
>> Big Apple Comic Con
>> The Armory Show
>> New York International Antiquarian Book Fair

Continuing Events
>> Suzanne Vega.
>> Hubbard Street
>> NOCHE FLAMENCA
===================================================

Music, Dance, Performing Arts

Flamenco Festival (Mar.7-10)
Joe’s Pub / $30
Israel Fernández: Universo Pastora; Sun, Mar 10 at 7PM
Diego Guerrero: Vengo Caminando; Sun, Mar 10 at 9:30PM
“Primarily based in New York, throughout its 22 years of history, Flamenco Festival has taken over (almost) the entire world! Flamenco Festival has a presence in 101 cities, presenting 129 companies and 1,225 shows to 1,600,000 attendees.”

Ambrose Akinmusire (last chance)
Village Vanguard, 178 Seventh Ave. S., at 11th St./ 8:30PM, +10:30PM, $35
“Go-for-broke musicians like Ambrose Akinmusire often lead dual musical lives. The gifted trumpeter and composer went big on his compelling 2018 release, “Origami Harvest”—a commissioned work that made fruitfully dissonant use of an impassioned rapper and a string quartet­. Here, though, he reverts to a small group, helming a coiled quintet that features the skillful pianist Sullivan Fortner and the return of the tenor saxophonist Walter Smith III.” (Steve Futterman, NewYorker)

BALLET FLAMENCO SARA BARAS (March 7-10)
at New York City Center / 8 p.m.; $35+
“La Farruca is a style of flamenco characterized by fast, intense footwork, quick spins and dramatic poses. Historically it has been performed by men, but women are increasingly claiming it for themselves. Baras, a flamenco dancer from Spain celebrated for her power and precision, has long been associated with the style. That dismantling of gender roles informs her show “Shadows,” which was created in honor of the 20th anniversary of her company and which will be performed to a score by the guitarist Keko Baldomero.” (NYT- Brian Schaefer)

Renee Rosnes Quartet (Mar.7-10)
Dizzy’s Club, Jazz at Lincoln Center / 7:30PM, +9:30PM, $35-$45
“One of the premier pianists and composers of her generation, Renee Rosnes has toured and recorded with legendary musicians James Moody, Joe Henderson, Wayne Shorter, JJ Johnson, Bobby Hutcherson, the SFJAZZ Collective, and her husband, pianist Bill Charlap. A New York City staple for years, every member of Rosnes’ group has an extremely impressive résumé and brings their absolute best to this group. If her recent sold-out appearances at Dizzy’s Club are any indication, audiences should expect to hear some of Rosnes’ award-winning original compositions and perhaps a few choice selections by such artists as Bill Evans, Thelonious Monk, and Billy Strayhorn. Extraordinarily gifted as a pianist, composer, and bandleader, Rosnes leads one of the most consistently excellent groups in town.”

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Smart Stuff / Other NYC EventS

Big Apple Comic Con
Penn Plaza Pavilion / 10AM, $30
“Die-hard fans of comics and anime that need a less overwhelming alternative to the behemoth NYCC can head to this delightful old-school convention, running for over 20 years. Browse through bins and bundles of comics and meet icons like William Shatner, Mike Colter, Kathleen Turner, Frank Cho and Brent Spiner. If you’re down for some cosplay fun without experiencing severe agoraphobia, this may be the con for you. “ (TONY)

New York International Antiquarian Book Fair
Park Avenue Armory /
“Calling all bibliophiles! Find something told to love at the Antiquarian Book Fair, happening through Sunday at the Park Avenue Armory. Learn to drink like our forefathers from the 1895 edition of The Mixicologist or How to Mix all Kinds of Fancy Drinks, which includes early on a recipe for a “morning cocktail” with absinthe, brandy, and whiskey. (Fun fact, 1895 was also the the first time the word brunch came into use.) Then take a gander at treasures like an inscribed first U.S. edition of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (going for $195,000), a first edition of Graham Greene’s Brighton Rock with its original dust jacket ($115,000), and an architectural archive featuring Alexandre-Gustave Eiffel’s sketches for the Statue of Liberty. On Sunday from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m., you can also bring your own rare works, Antique Roadshow–style, for experts to appraise for free.” (grubstreet)

The Armory Show (Mar.7-10)
Piers 90, 92, 94 / 12-8PM, $52
“The Armory Show is a top international art fair devoted to the most important artworks of the 20th and 21st centuries. The show combines a selection of the world’s leading galleries—more than 200 of them from 30 countries around the world—with an unsurpassed program of art events and exhibitions at the fair venue and throughout New York City.” (nycgo.com)

“For three days or so at the beginning of each March, Armory Week—the closest thing the New York art world has to Fashion Week—brings a stampede of collectors, curators, artists and dealers (including, of course, those from Chelsea, Uptown and Lower East Side galleries) to the city. Thousands of them from all over the world rush in for a confluence of art fairs featuring modern and contemporary art of all stripes. For the general public, Armory Week—which takes its name from The Armory Show—offers the perfect opportunity to discover the latest trends in art. There’s tons to see, and taking it all in can be exhausting, but there’s a fair for everyone’s taste. To help you find one that suits yours, we offer this handy guide of the best things to do during Armory Week.” (TONY)

Celebrate 25 years of the Armory Show.
“Break out the comfy kicks, art lovers (and according our critic Jerry Saltz, pack snacks and breath mints), it’s Armory Show week. The behemoth itself is now on Piers 90, 92 ,and 94 (with a shuttle running in between), but all the major players are still there, including this year’s “Focus” section, curated by Lauren Haynes of the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. When you’re done with all that head to the satellite fairs: cutting-edge works at the Independent on Varick Street; exhibits with the theme “fact and fiction” at Spring/Break, this year at the U.N. Plaza; 60 international exhibitors at Scope, at the Metropolitan Pavilion; and the self-explanatory Art on Paper at Pier 36. Buy tickets ahead of time to avoid lines.” (grubstreet)

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Continuing Events

Suzanne Vega (through March 16)
at Café Carlyle
“This New York-based singer-songwriter has been composing and performing folk-inspired acoustic tunes since she was a Barnard student in the early 1980s. The venerable cabaret Café Carlyle might be considerably more upscale than Tom’s Restaurant — the Upper West Side student haunt that inspired Vega’s enduring and influential single “Tom’s Diner” — but both offer a glimpse of a bygone New York. A product of the bohemian Greenwich Village folk scene, which has all but disappeared, Vega herself presents an evening of time travel to a completely different period in the city’s history.” (NYT-NATALIE WEINER)

Hubbard Street (thru Mar.17)
Joyce Theatre, 175 Eighth Ave., at 19th St./
“Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, one of the country’s most prominent contemporary-dance ensembles, returns to New York after a four-year absence. Each half of the two-week run is devoted to a single choreographer: the Tel Aviv-based Ohad Naharin first, followed by the Canada-born Crystal Pite. “Decadance/Chicago” is an updated version of Naharin’s popular 2000 work, a series of surrealistic vignettes that concludes with a section in which audience members slow-dance with the cast onstage. The Pite evening, in contrast, is made up of three works—“A Picture of You Falling,” “The Other You,” and “Grace Engine”—executed in Pite’s highly articulated, sinuous movement style.” (Marina Harss, NewYorker)

NOCHE FLAMENCA  (thru Mar.31)
at the Connelly Theater
“This splendid flamenco company, led by Martín Santangelo, its artistic director, and the dancer Soledad Barrio, presents “Entre Tú y Yo” (“Between You and Me”), an evening of solos, duets and ensemble works that includes “Refugiados” (“Refugees”), which has been recently added to the company’s repertoire. The piece transforms poems written by children in refugee camps into song and dance. The program also features the latest iteration of “La Ronde,” which is inspired by Max Ophüls’s 1950 film and spotlights the talents of a guitarist, a vocalist and a solo dancer.” (NYT-Gia Kourlas)
(March 10, 3 p.m.; March 12-14, 7:30 p.m.; through March 31).
If you like flamenco even a little you must see Soledad’s performance.

============================================================================
♦ Before making final plans, we suggest you call the venue to confirm ticket availability, plus dates and times, as schedules are subject to change.
♦ NYCity, with a population of  8.6 million, had a record 65 million visitors last year and was TripAdvisor’s Traveler’s Choice Top U.S. Destination for 2018 – awesome! BUT quality shows draw crowds. Try to reserve seats for these top NYC events in advance, even if just earlier on the day of performance.

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Bonus NYC events– Jazz Clubs:
Many consider NYCity the Jazz capital of the world. My favorite Jazz Clubs, all on Manhattan’s WestSide, feature top talent every night of the week.
Hit the Hot Link and check out who is playing tonight:

Greenwich Village:
(4 are underground, classic jazz joints. all 6 are within walking distance of each other):
Village Vanguard – UG, 178 7th Ave. So., villagevanguard.com, 212-255-4037 (1st 8:30)
Blue Note – 131 W3rd St. nr 6th ave. bluenotejazz.com, 212-475-8592 (1st set 8pm)
55 Bar – basement @55 Christopher St. nr 7th ave.S. 55bar.com, 212-929-9883 (1st 7pm)
Mezzrow – basement @ 163 W10th St. nr 7th Ave. mezzrow.com,646-476-4346 (1st 8)
Smalls – basement @ 183 W10th St. smallslive.com, 646-476-4346 (1st set 7:30pm)
The Stone at The New School – 55 w13 St. (btw 6/5 ave) – thestonenyc.com (8:30PM)

Outside Greenwich Village:
Dizzy’s Club – Broadway @ 60th St. — jazz.org/dizzys / 212-258-9595 (1st set 7:30pm)
Birdland – 315 W44th St.(btw 8/9ave) — birdlandjazz.com / 212-581-3080 (1st 8:30pm)
Smoke Jazz Club – 2751 Broadway nr.106th St. — smokejazz.com/ 212-864-6662 (7pm)
Jazz Standard – 116 E27 St. (btw Park/Lex) – jazzstandard.com – (1st set 7:30)

For a comprehensive list of the best places to hear All Types of Live Music in Manhattan see the tab above “LiveMusic.”

Special Mention:
Caffe Vivaldi – 32 Jones St. nr Bleecker St. — caffevivaldi.com / 212-691-7538 (1st 7pm)
a classic, old jazz club in the Village, Caffe V often surprised with a wonderfully eclectic lineup. It was my favorite spot for an evening of listening enjoyment and discovery.
Alas, Caffe V is no more, another victim of a rapacious NYC landlord. Owner Ishrat fought the good fight and Caffe V will be sorely missed.
Cornelia Street Cafe – UG, 29 Cornelia St. corneliastreetcafe.com, 212-989-9319
And more recently we have lost Cornelia Street Cafe. After 41 years, it too became another victim of an unreasonable rent increase.

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NYCity Vacation Travel Guide Video (Expedia):

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A PremierPub / Midtown West

Russian Vodka Room / 265 W 52nd St (btw 7th/8th ave)

Sure, you could travel to Minsk or even Brighton Beach, for an authentic Russian experience, but why bother. On those days when you feel you must wash down your dish of kasha with a few glasses of icy, cold vodka, the Russian Vodka Room will definitely satisfy your urge.

From the outside this place looks a bit drab, and with no windows, a bit mysterious. Midtown tourists walk right by on their way to see “Jersey Boys,” just down the block.
(Alas, no more. After 10 years, “Jersey Boys” finally closed, now it’s “Mean Girls.”)

lThose in the know enter a secret hideaway, a dimly lit front room with soft jazz playing – a perfect spot for an illicit late-night rendezvous, or maybe a meet-up with your Russian spy handler, but that’s later in the evening. Early in the evening the large U-shaped bar fills with the after work happy hour crowd, a group made very happy by the much reduced prices.

Their website says: “Welcome Comrades”. Of course, this welcome focuses on dozens of different vodkas, including their own special infusions, which marinate in giant, clear glass jugs visible around the room. The large vodka martinis ensure that you won’t confuse this place with your mother’s Russian Tea Room.

But man does not live by vodka alone. Eat some food, especially the tapa like appetizers. Be decadent and try the cheese blintzes with chocolate, or try a main dish like beef stroganoff with kasha.

Your best bet is to go on a night when the piano man is playing. This guy, who looks like he has eaten a lot of those cheese blintzes, plays five nights a week from 7 to 12 (no Mondays and Thursdays). When the piano man is playing American pop tunes, and you are at the crowded, dimly lit bar testing the horseradish infused vodka, that’s when the RVR shines.

It’s the kind of place where the noise gets louder and the crowd gets happier as the happy hour goes on. I’m generally a beer guy, but I like to come here with a group of friends. We find a table in the back room near the piano man; we eat, and we drink vodka ‘till it hurts (and it will hurt).
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Website: http://www.russianvodkaroom.com/
Phone #: 212-307-5835
Hours: 4pm-2am; Fri-Sun closes 4am (that could be trouble)
Happy Hour: 4-7pm every day
$4 shots infused vodka (2oz), $5 cosmos; $4 czech draft beer
Music: FR-SU; TU-WE / 7pm-12am
Subway: #1 to 50th St.
Walk 2 blk N. on B’way to 52nd St.; 1 blk W. to RVR
Confusingly, the Russian Samovar is right across the street, on the S. side of 52nd St.
The RVR, your destination, is on the N. side of 52nd St.
Update: music now includes a younger, trimmer piano man. “Tiny” we miss you.
Update#2: Rumor that “Tiny” is back playing only on Friday nights – need to check it out.

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“Pub” is used in it’s broadest sense – bars, bar/restaurants, jazz clubs, wine bars, tapas bars, craft beer bars, dive bars, cocktail lounges, and of course, pubs – just about anyplace you can get a drink without a cover charge (except for certain jazz clubs).
If you have a fave premier pub or good eating place on Manhattan’s WestSide let us all know about it – leave a comment.
Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , | Leave a comment

NYC Events,”Only the Best” (03/09) + GallerySpecialExhibits: Chelsea

Posted on 03/09/2019 by GregD

Today’s Elite 8 NYC Events > SATURDAY/ MARCH 09, 2019

“We search the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you don’t have to.” We make it as easy as 1-2-3.

For future NYC Events, check the tab above:  “March NYC Events”
It’s the most comprehensive list of top events this month that you will find anywhere.
Carefully curated from “Only the Best” NYC event info on the the web, it’s a simply superb resource that will help you plan your NYC visit all over town, all through the month.
To make your own after dinner plans TONIGHT, see the tab above;  “LiveMusic.”

==========================================================

Have time for only one NYC Event today? Do this:

The Armory Show (Mar.7-10)
Piers 90, 92, 94 / 12-8PM, $52
“The Armory Show is a top international art fair devoted to the most important artworks of the 20th and 21st centuries. The show combines a selection of the world’s leading galleries—more than 200 of them from 30 countries around the world—with an unsurpassed program of art events and exhibitions at the fair venue and throughout New York City.” (nycgo.com)

“For three days or so at the beginning of each March, Armory Week—the closest thing the New York art world has to Fashion Week—brings a stampede of collectors, curators, artists and dealers (including, of course, those from Chelsea, Uptown and Lower East Side galleries) to the city. Thousands of them from all over the world rush in for a confluence of art fairs featuring modern and contemporary art of all stripes. For the general public, Armory Week—which takes its name from The Armory Show—offers the perfect opportunity to discover the latest trends in art. There’s tons to see, and taking it all in can be exhausting, but there’s a fair for everyone’s taste. To help you find one that suits yours, we offer this handy guide of the best things to do during Armory Week.” (TONY)

Celebrate 25 years of the Armory Show.
“Break out the comfy kicks, art lovers (and according our critic Jerry Saltz, pack snacks and breath mints), it’s Armory Show week. The behemoth itself is now on Piers 90, 92 ,and 94 (with a shuttle running in between), but all the major players are still there, including this year’s “Focus” section, curated by Lauren Haynes of the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. When you’re done with all that head to the satellite fairs: cutting-edge works at the Independent on Varick Street; exhibits with the theme “fact and fiction” at Spring/Break, this year at the U.N. Plaza; 60 international exhibitors at Scope, at the Metropolitan Pavilion; and the self-explanatory Art on Paper at Pier 36. Buy tickets ahead of time to avoid lines.” (grubstreet)

=========================================================

7 OTHER TOP NYC EVENTS TODAY (see below for full listing)
>> BALLET FLAMENCO SARA BARAS
>> Renee Rosnes Quartet
>> Nellie McKay
>> NYC Winter Wine Festival
>> Pastryland Bake Sale
>> Sebastian Junger + Dr. Hector A. Garcia: Sex, Power, and Partisanship
>> New York International Antiquarian Book Fair

Continuing Events
>> Suzanne Vega.
>> The Orchid Show
>> Hubbard Street
===================================================

Music, Dance, Performing Arts

BALLET FLAMENCO SARA BARAS (March 7-10)
at New York City Center / 8 p.m.; $35+
“La Farruca is a style of flamenco characterized by fast, intense footwork, quick spins and dramatic poses. Historically it has been performed by men, but women are increasingly claiming it for themselves. Baras, a flamenco dancer from Spain celebrated for her power and precision, has long been associated with the style. That dismantling of gender roles informs her show “Shadows,” which was created in honor of the 20th anniversary of her company and which will be performed to a score by the guitarist Keko Baldomero.” (NYT- Brian Schaefer)

Renee Rosnes Quartet (Mar.7-10)
Dizzy’s Club, Jazz at Lincoln Center / 7:30PM, +9:30PM, $35-$45
“One of the premier pianists and composers of her generation, Renee Rosnes has toured and recorded with legendary musicians James Moody, Joe Henderson, Wayne Shorter, JJ Johnson, Bobby Hutcherson, the SFJAZZ Collective, and her husband, pianist Bill Charlap. A New York City staple for years, every member of Rosnes’ group has an extremely impressive résumé and brings their absolute best to this group. If her recent sold-out appearances at Dizzy’s Club are any indication, audiences should expect to hear some of Rosnes’ award-winning original compositions and perhaps a few choice selections by such artists as Bill Evans, Thelonious Monk, and Billy Strayhorn. Extraordinarily gifted as a pianist, composer, and bandleader, Rosnes leads one of the most consistently excellent groups in town.”

Nellie McKay (LAST CHANCE)
Birdland / 7PM, $30-$40
“Fearless singer-songwriter and deceptively feather-light song stylist McKay is always guaranteed to flabber your gast with her witty, unwieldy and beguiling performances. In this Birdland run, she toasts the release of her seventh album, Sister Orchid, which includes versions of standards including “My Romance,” “The Nearness of You” and “Georgia on My Mind.” (TONY)

=========================================================

Smart Stuff / Other NYC EventS

NYC Winter Wine Festival
Sip and sample at a midtown wine festival
“Returning for a 10th year, the NYC Winter Wine Festival takes place not in a vineyard or cellar but within the spacious confines of the PlayStation Theater in Times Square. Guests can eat hors d’oeuvres while sampling vintages from around the Empire State plus live music by jazz musician Alex Bugnon.” (Newsday)
WHEN | WHERE 3 to 6 p.m. and 8 to 11 p.m. Saturday, March 9; 1515 Broadway, Manhattan
INFO $69 to $89; 877-571-6690, newyorkwineevents.com

Pastryland Bake Sale
The Ultimate Bake Sale
The Studio at 28 Crosby / 1:45, 2:30, 3:15PM
“Taste exclusive creations from New York City’s top pastry talent at Pastryland, a charity bake sale benefiting Hot Bread Kitchen! An afternoon for the ultimate sweet tooth, Pastryland celebrates the talents and imaginations of pastry chefs through delicious, one-of-a-kind desserts you won’t find anywhere else. Featuring unique treats from the chefs of Union Square Café, Per Se, Café Boulud, Marc Forgione, Bâtard, Patisserie Chanson and many more, experience the world of sweets like you’ve never tasted before.

All tickets receive tokens. Each token can be exchanged for a beverage or prepared food item. Additional tokens can be purchased on-site (Debit/Credit only — NO CASH) as:
ONE token $5
TWO tokens $9
FIVE tokens $20”

Sebastian Junger + Dr. Hector A. Garcia: Sex, Power, and Partisanship
Rubin Museum of Art, 150 W. 17th St./ 3PM, $28
“We are a tribal species. Will it prove fatal? Clinical psychologist Dr. Hector A. Garcia (Sex, Power, and Partisanship: How Evolutionary Science Makes Sense of Our Political Divide) speaks about our legacy of violent male competition and its impact on issues like climate change and equality. He’ll be joined by Sebastian Junger, author of Tribe: On Homecoming and Belonging.” (ThoughtGallery)

New York International Antiquarian Book Fair
Park Avenue Armory /
“Calling all bibliophiles! Find something told to love at the Antiquarian Book Fair, happening through Sunday at the Park Avenue Armory. Learn to drink like our forefathers from the 1895 edition of The Mixicologist or How to Mix all Kinds of Fancy Drinks, which includes early on a recipe for a “morning cocktail” with absinthe, brandy, and whiskey. (Fun fact, 1895 was also the the first time the word brunch came into use.) Then take a gander at treasures like an inscribed first U.S. edition of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (going for $195,000), a first edition of Graham Greene’s Brighton Rock with its original dust jacket ($115,000), and an architectural archive featuring Alexandre-Gustave Eiffel’s sketches for the Statue of Liberty. On Sunday from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m., you can also bring your own rare works, Antique Roadshow–style, for experts to appraise for free.” (grubstreet)

=======================================================

Continuing Events

Suzanne Vega (through March 16)
at Café Carlyle
This New York-based singer-songwriter has been composing and performing folk-inspired acoustic tunes since she was a Barnard student in the early 1980s. The venerable cabaret Café Carlyle might be considerably more upscale than Tom’s Restaurant — the Upper West Side student haunt that inspired Vega’s enduring and influential single “Tom’s Diner” — but both offer a glimpse of a bygone New York. A product of the bohemian Greenwich Village folk scene, which has all but disappeared, Vega herself presents an evening of time travel to a completely different period in the city’s history.” (NYT-NATALIE WEINER)

Hubbard Street (thru Mar.17)
Joyce Theatre, 175 Eighth Ave., at 19th St./
Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, one of the country’s most prominent contemporary-dance ensembles, returns to New York after a four-year absence. Each half of the two-week run is devoted to a single choreographer: the Tel Aviv-based Ohad Naharin first, followed by the Canada-born Crystal Pite. “Decadance/Chicago” is an updated version of Naharin’s popular 2000 work, a series of surrealistic vignettes that concludes with a section in which audience members slow-dance with the cast onstage. The Pite evening, in contrast, is made up of three works—“A Picture of You Falling,” “The Other You,” and “Grace Engine”—executed in Pite’s highly articulated, sinuous movement style.” (Marina Harss, NewYorker)

The Orchid Show (Until Apr 28 2019)
New York Botanical Garden | Bronx, NY
“Now in its 17th year, this mesmerizing show displays thousands of orchids in geometric, illuminated sculptural presentations. This year’s exhibit pays tribute to Singapore, showcasing the country’s achievements in orchid cultivation, research and conservation (look out for nods to Singapore’s dazzling Supertrees). Catch special Orchid Evenings for dancing, music and cocktails among the flowers.”

============================================================================
♦ Before making final plans, we suggest you call the venue to confirm ticket availability, plus dates and times, as schedules are subject to change.
♦ NYCity, with a population of  8.6 million, had a record 65 million visitors last year and was TripAdvisor’s Traveler’s Choice Top U.S. Destination for 2018 – awesome! BUT quality shows draw crowds. Try to reserve seats for these top NYC events in advance, even if just earlier on the day of performance.

=====================================================

Bonus NYC Music Venues:
So much fine live music every night in this town. These are my favorite non jazz music venues on Manhattan’s WestSide. Check out who’s playing tonight:

City Winery – 155 Varick St., citywinery.com, 212-608-0555
Joe’s Pub @ Public Theater – 425 Lafayette St., joespub.com, 212-967-7555
Beacon Theatre – 2124 Broadway @ 74th St., beacontheatre.com, 212-465-6500
Town Hall – 123 W43rd St., thetownhall.org, 212-997-6661
Le Poisson Rouge – 158 Bleecker St., lepoissonrouge.com, 212-505-3474
and one more, not quite WestSide
Bowery Ballroom – 6 Delancey St. boweryballroom.com

For a comprehensive list of the best places to hear All Types of Live Music in Manhattan see the tab above “LiveMusic.”

Special Mention:
Caffe Vivaldi – 32 Jones St. nr Bleecker St. caffevivaldi.com, 212-691-7538
a classic, old jazz club in the Village, Caffe V often surprises with a wonderfully eclectic lineup. It’s my favorite spot for an evening of listening discovery and enjoyment.

Alas, Caffe V is no more, another victim of a rapacious NYC landlord. Owner Ishrat fought the good fight and Caffe V will be sorely missed.
===========================================================

NYCity Vacation Travel Guide Video (Expedia):

================================================================================

Chelsea Art Gallery District*

Chelsea is the heart of the NYCity contemporary art scene. Home to more than 300 art galleries, the Rubin Museum, the Joyce Theater and The Kitchen performance spaces, there is no place like it anywhere in the world. Come here to browse free exhibitions by world-renowned artists and those unknowns waiting to be discovered in an art district that is concentrated between West 18th and West 27th Streets, and 10th and 11th Avenues. Afterwards stop in the Chelsea Market, stroll on the High Line, or rest up at one of the many cafes and bars and discuss the fine art.

Here is one exhibition the New Yorker likes:

“The Techniques of the Observer”  (LAST CHANCE)

This trend-spotting group show, which is more than the sum of its uneven parts, registers a seismic shift from abstraction to representation among ambitious painters. It pertains to a mode, if not merely a mood, of handling images—be they realist, imagined, or appropriated—with some ratio of self-conscious deliberateness (not Expressionist) and shoot-the-works feeling (irony-free). The notion extends a magnetic field from a nocturnal cityscape by the chronically underrated poetic realist Lois Dodd, ninety-one years old, to a dreamily blurred floral still-life by the mid-career German Michael Krebber and a lividly harsh self-portrait by a tyro Italian, Giangiacomo Rossetti. Elizabeth Peyton shines with an agitated portrait, and so does Gillian Carnegie, with one that is uncannily calm. All the show’s artists impress as experimentally sincere.” (

===========================================================================

For a listing of 25 essential galleries in the Chelsea Art Gallery District, organized by street, which enables you to create your own Chelsea Art Gallery crawl, see the Chelsea Gallery Guide (nycgo.com) Or check out TONY magazine’s list of the “Best Chelsea Galleries” and click through to see what’s on view.

*Now plan your own gallery crawl, but better to plan your visits for Tuesday through Saturday; most galleries are closed Sunday and Monday.

TIP: After your gallery tour, stop in Ovest at 513W27th St. for Aperitivo Italiano (Happy Hour on steroids). Discuss all the great art you have viewed over a drink and a very tasty selection of FREE appetizers (M-F, 5-8pm). OR try this NYT recommendation: “When you’re done, adjourn to the newly renovated Bottino , the Chelsea art world’s unofficial canteen on 10th Avenue (btw 24/25 St.) “

=======================================================
For other selected Museum and Gallery Special Exhibitions see recent posts in right sidebar dated 03/07 and 03/05.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

NYC Events,”Only the Best” (03/08) + Today’s Featured Pub (Times Square / Theater District)

Posted on 03/08/2019 by GregD

Today’s Elite 8 NYC Events > FRIDAY/ MARCH 08, 2019

“We search the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you don’t have to.” We make it as easy as 1-2-3.

For future NYC Events, check the tab above:  “March NYC Events”
It’s the most comprehensive list of top events this month that you will find anywhere.
Carefully curated from “Only the Best” NYC event info on the the web, it’s a simply superb resource that will help you plan your NYC visit all over town, all through the month.
To make your own after dinner plans TONIGHT, see the tab above;  “LiveMusic.”

==========================================================

Have time for only one NYC Event today? Do this:

LITTLE FEAT
at the Beacon Theater / 8 p.m.; $
At the half-century mark, a number of the musicians behind Little Feat’s best-known songs are still with the group, including the co-founder and pianist Bill Payne, the guitarist Paul Barrere, the percussionist Sam Clayton and the bassist Kenny Gradney. For this celebration of their 50 years onstage, expect a career-spanning retrospective that shows the range of this tricky-to-pin-down band, whose work spans country, funk, R&B and more. Regardless of what they’re playing, though, Little Feat have long been celebrated for their live act.” (NYT-NATALIE WEINER)

=========================================================

7 OTHER TOP NYC EVENTS TODAY (see below for full listing)
>> Madeleine Peyroux
>> BALLET FLAMENCO SARA BARAS
>> Renee Rosnes Quartet
>> Flamenco Festival
>> Nellie McKay
>> New York International Antiquarian Book Fair
>> The Armory Show

Continuing Events
>> more continuing events coming soon.

===================================================

Music, Dance, Performing Arts

Madeleine Peyroux
Sony Hall / 7PM, $40+
“Madeleine Peyroux is an American jazz singer and songwriter who began her career as a teenager on the streets of Paris. She sang vintage jazz and blues songs before finding mainstream success in 2004 when her album Careless Love sold half a million copies.”

BALLET FLAMENCO SARA BARAS (March 7-10)
at New York City Center / 8 p.m.; $35+
“La Farruca is a style of flamenco characterized by fast, intense footwork, quick spins and dramatic poses. Historically it has been performed by men, but women are increasingly claiming it for themselves. Baras, a flamenco dancer from Spain celebrated for her power and precision, has long been associated with the style. That dismantling of gender roles informs her show “Shadows,” which was created in honor of the 20th anniversary of her company and which will be performed to a score by the guitarist Keko Baldomero.” (NYT- Brian Schaefer)

Renee Rosnes Quartet (Mar.7-10)
Dizzy’s Club, Jazz at Lincoln Center / 7:30PM, +9:30PM, $35-$45
“One of the premier pianists and composers of her generation, Renee Rosnes has toured and recorded with legendary musicians James Moody, Joe Henderson, Wayne Shorter, JJ Johnson, Bobby Hutcherson, the SFJAZZ Collective, and her husband, pianist Bill Charlap. A New York City staple for years, every member of Rosnes’ group has an extremely impressive résumé and brings their absolute best to this group. If her recent sold-out appearances at Dizzy’s Club are any indication, audiences should expect to hear some of Rosnes’ award-winning original compositions and perhaps a few choice selections by such artists as Bill Evans, Thelonious Monk, and Billy Strayhorn. Extraordinarily gifted as a pianist, composer, and bandleader, Rosnes leads one of the most consistently excellent groups in town.”

Flamenco Festival (Mar.7-10)
Joe’s Pub / $30
Ismael Fernández: Trato / 7PM
Miguel Angel Cortes: Sonantas en Tres Movimientos / 9:30PM
Primarily based in New York, throughout its 22 years of history, Flamenco Festival has taken over (almost) the entire world! Flamenco Festival has a presence in 101 cities, presenting 129 companies and 1,225 shows to 1,600,000 attendees.

Nellie McKay (Mar.5-9)
Birdland / 7PM, $30-$40
“Fearless singer-songwriter and deceptively feather-light song stylist McKay is always guaranteed to flabber your gast with her witty, unwieldy and beguiling performances. In this Birdland run, she toasts the release of her seventh album, Sister Orchid, which includes versions of standards including “My Romance,” “The Nearness of You” and “Georgia on My Mind.” (TONY)

=========================================================

Smart Stuff / Other NYC EventS

New York International Antiquarian Book Fair
Park Avenue Armory /
“Calling all bibliophiles! Find something told to love at the Antiquarian Book Fair, happening through Sunday at the Park Avenue Armory. Learn to drink like our forefathers from the 1895 edition of The Mixicologist or How to Mix all Kinds of Fancy Drinks, which includes early on a recipe for a “morning cocktail” with absinthe, brandy, and whiskey. (Fun fact, 1895 was also the the first time the word brunch came into use.) Then take a gander at treasures like an inscribed first U.S. edition of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain (going for $195,000), a first edition of Graham Greene’s Brighton Rock with its original dust jacket ($115,000), and an architectural archive featuring Alexandre-Gustave Eiffel’s sketches for the Statue of Liberty. On Sunday from 1 p.m. to 3 p.m., you can also bring your own rare works, Antique Roadshow–style, for experts to appraise for free.” (grubstreet)

The Armory Show (Mar.7-10)
Piers 90, 92, 94 / 12-8PM, $52
“The Armory Show is a top international art fair devoted to the most important artworks of the 20th and 21st centuries. The show combines a selection of the world’s leading galleries—more than 200 of them from 30 countries around the world—with an unsurpassed program of art events and exhibitions at the fair venue and throughout New York City.” (nycgo.com)

“For three days or so at the beginning of each March, Armory Week—the closest thing the New York art world has to Fashion Week—brings a stampede of collectors, curators, artists and dealers (including, of course, those from Chelsea, Uptown and Lower East Side galleries) to the city. Thousands of them from all over the world rush in for a confluence of art fairs featuring modern and contemporary art of all stripes. For the general public, Armory Week—which takes its name from The Armory Show—offers the perfect opportunity to discover the latest trends in art. There’s tons to see, and taking it all in can be exhausting, but there’s a fair for everyone’s taste. To help you find one that suits yours, we offer this handy guide of the best things to do during Armory Week.” (TONY)

Celebrate 25 years of the Armory Show.
“Break out the comfy kicks, art lovers (and according our critic Jerry Saltz, pack snacks and breath mints), it’s Armory Show week. The behemoth itself is now on Piers 90, 92 ,and 94 (with a shuttle running in between), but all the major players are still there, including this year’s “Focus” section, curated by Lauren Haynes of the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. When you’re done with all that head to the satellite fairs: cutting-edge works at the Independent on Varick Street; exhibits with the theme “fact and fiction” at Spring/Break, this year at the U.N. Plaza; 60 international exhibitors at Scope, at the Metropolitan Pavilion; and the self-explanatory Art on Paper at Pier 36. Buy tickets ahead of time to avoid lines.” (grubstreet)

=======================================================

Continuing Events

SUZANNE VEGA (through March 16)
at Café Carlyle
This New York-based singer-songwriter has been composing and performing folk-inspired acoustic tunes since she was a Barnard student in the early 1980s. The venerable cabaret Café Carlyle might be considerably more upscale than Tom’s Restaurant — the Upper West Side student haunt that inspired Vega’s enduring and influential single “Tom’s Diner” — but both offer a glimpse of a bygone New York. A product of the bohemian Greenwich Village folk scene, which has all but disappeared, Vega herself presents an evening of time travel to a completely different period in the city’s history.” (NYT-NATALIE WEINER)

Hubbard Street (thru Mar.17)
Joyce Theatre, 175 Eighth Ave., at 19th St./
Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, one of the country’s most prominent contemporary-dance ensembles, returns to New York after a four-year absence. Each half of the two-week run is devoted to a single choreographer: the Tel Aviv-based Ohad Naharin first, followed by the Canada-born Crystal Pite. “Decadance/Chicago” is an updated version of Naharin’s popular 2000 work, a series of surrealistic vignettes that concludes with a section in which audience members slow-dance with the cast onstage. The Pite evening, in contrast, is made up of three works—“A Picture of You Falling,” “The Other You,” and “Grace Engine”—executed in Pite’s highly articulated, sinuous movement style.” (Marina Harss, NewYorker)

The Orchid Show (Until Apr 28 2019)
New York Botanical Garden | Bronx, NY
“Now in its 17th year, this mesmerizing show displays thousands of orchids in geometric, illuminated sculptural presentations. This year’s exhibit pays tribute to Singapore, showcasing the country’s achievements in orchid cultivation, research and conservation (look out for nods to Singapore’s dazzling Supertrees). Catch special Orchid Evenings for dancing, music and cocktails among the flowers.”

==========================================================================
♦ Before making final plans, we suggest you call the venue to confirm ticket availability, plus dates and times, as schedules are subject to change.
♦ NYCity, with a population of  8.6 million, had a record 65 million visitors last year and was TripAdvisor’s Traveler’s Choice Top U.S. Destination for 2018 – awesome! BUT quality shows draw crowds. Try to reserve seats for these top NYC events in advance, even if just earlier on the day of performance.

=====================================================
Bonus: Nifty 9 – Best Cabarets / Piano Bars NYCity
These are my favorite places for an after dinner night on the town – music and drinks.
Hit the Hot Link and check out what’s happening tonight:

Feinstein’s/54 Below – 254 W 54th St.

The Green Room 42 – 570 Tenth Ave.

Don’t Tell Mama – 343 W 46th St.

The Rum House, in the Hotel Edison – 228 W. 47th St.

Laurie Beechman Theatre – 407 W 42nd St.

Marie’s Crisis – 59 Grove St.

The Duplex – 61 Christopher St.

Sid Gold’s Request Room – 165 W 26th St.

Cafe Carlyle, in the Carlyle Hotel – 35 E. 76th St.
This is the only one not located on Manhattan’s WestSide, and it ain’t cheap, but it has some of the finest singers.

For a comprehensive list of the best places to hear All Types of Live Music in Manhattan see the tab above “LiveMusic.”

========================================================================
NYCity Vacation Travel Guide Video (Expedia):

========================================================================

A PremierPub

Jimmy’s Corner / 140 W 44th St (btw B’way & 7th ave)

IMG_2083Jimmy’s Corner is right in the heart of Times Square, but you won’t find it on the corner, it’s mid-block. Enter this long narrow bar and you are struck by the walls covered with mostly black-and-white boxing photographs, and memorabilia. Soon enough you learn that “Corner” refers to proprietor Jimmy Glenn’s long career as a corner man for some of boxing greats – Liston, Tyson, even “the greatest,” Ali.

Jimmy’s is a sort of time machine, taking you back to a time and place that no longer exists. All around you Times Square has cleaned up, grown up, assumed a new identity. Jimmy’s probably hasn’t changed a bit since it first opened in 1971. Certainly the bar itself looks original and the prices haven’t changed much either. When I brought a friend, who owns her own bar, she was surprised when she got the small tab for a round of drinks. Figured there must be a mistake, that maybe they forgot to charge for all the drinks.

Times Square today is filled with neon glitz and wandering tourists from Dubuque, but not Jimmy’s. You’ll likely find some old timer’s at the bar nursing their drinks, some younger locals at tables in the back, and maybe a few adventuresome tourists clutching their trusty guidebooks. There’s no food served here because this is just a bar, and sometimes that’s all you need.

On nights when no local team is playing, it’s a fine place to sip some drafts and listen to a great old time jukebox, with a great selection of  40s& 50s R&B and soul. On sports nights this very narrow bar can get a bit claustrophobic, filled with excited fans watching their team on the TVs. Either way, Jimmy’s is the place to be if you are looking for an old time bar in the new Times Square.
————————————————————————————————————————
Website: are you kidding !
(although there is a facebook page with lots of photos –
facebook.com/jimmyscornernyc)
Phone #: 212-221-9510
Hours: 11am – 4 am, except Sunday they open 12 noon
Happy Hour: not necessary, low prices all day, every day
Subway: #1,2,3 to TimesSquare 42nd st
walk 2 blks N on 7th ave to 44th st; ½ blk E to Jimmy’s

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“Pub” is used in it’s broadest sense – bars, bar/restaurants, jazz clubs, wine bars, tapas bars, craft beer bars, dive bars, cocktail lounges, and of course, pubs – just about anyplace you can get a drink without a cover charge (except for certain jazz clubs).
If you have a fave premier pub or good eating place on Manhattan’s WestSide let us all know about it – leave a comment.
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Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , , | Leave a comment

NYC Events,”Only the Best” (03/07) + Museum Special Exhibitions: Manhattan’s 5th Avenue

Posted on 03/07/2019 by GregD

Today’s Elite 8 NYC Events > THURSDAY/ MARCH 07, 2019

“We search the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you don’t have to.” We make it as easy as 1-2-3.

For future NYC Events, check the tab above:  “March NYC Events”
It’s the most comprehensive list of top events this month that you will find anywhere.
Carefully curated from “Only the Best” NYC event info on the the web, it’s a simply superb resource that will help you plan your NYC visit all over town, all through the month.
To make your own after dinner plans TONIGHT, see the tab above;  “LiveMusic.”

==========================================================

Have time for only one NYC Event today? Do this:

Best Brews of New York
Brookfield Place, Winter Garden / 4-9PM, $
“Best Brews is back at Brookfield Place! Sample offerings from the best breweries from Upstate New York, Long Island and New York City as the Winter Garden transforms into a Winter Biergarten with a different set of beers on tap each week (through March 14). Best of all, YOU decide which beer should win Best Brew of New York!”
Anytime there’s an excuse to spend time in the Winter Garden take it.

Tonight: New York City

  • Coney Island Brewery (Brooklyn, New York)
  • Harlem Brewing Company (Harlem, New York)
  • Mikkeller NYC (Queens, New York)
  • Sixpoint Brewery (Brooklyn, New York)
  • Bronx Brewery (Bronx, New York)
  • Featured Restaurant: Parm

=========================================================

7 OTHER TOP NYC EVENTS TODAY (see below for full listing)
>> BALLET FLAMENCO SARA BARAS
>> Renee Rosnes Quartet
>> Aida
>> Flamenco Festival
>> Nellie McKay
>> Ambrose Akinmusire
>> The Armory Show

Continuing Events
>> more continuing events coming soon.

===================================================

Music, Dance, Performing Arts

BALLET FLAMENCO SARA BARAS (March 7-10)
at New York City Center / 8 p.m.; $35+
“La Farruca is a style of flamenco characterized by fast, intense footwork, quick spins and dramatic poses. Historically it has been performed by men, but women are increasingly claiming it for themselves. Baras, a flamenco dancer from Spain celebrated for her power and precision, has long been associated with the style. That dismantling of gender roles informs her show “Shadows,” which was created in honor of the 20th anniversary of her company and which will be performed to a score by the guitarist Keko Baldomero.” (NYT- Brian Schaefer)

Renee Rosnes Quartet
Dizzy’s Club, Jazz at Lincoln Center / 7:30PM, +9:30PM, $35-$45
“One of the premier pianists and composers of her generation, Renee Rosnes has toured and recorded with legendary musicians James Moody, Joe Henderson, Wayne Shorter, JJ Johnson, Bobby Hutcherson, the SFJAZZ Collective, and her husband, pianist Bill Charlap. A New York City staple for years, every member of Rosnes’ group has an extremely impressive résumé and brings their absolute best to this group. If her recent sold-out appearances at Dizzy’s Club are any indication, audiences should expect to hear some of Rosnes’ award-winning original compositions and perhaps a few choice selections by such artists as Bill Evans, Thelonious Monk, and Billy Strayhorn. Extraordinarily gifted as a pianist, composer, and bandleader, Rosnes leads one of the most consistently excellent groups in town.”

Aida (last chance)
Metropolitan Opera House / 7:30PM, $20+
“In what should be a highlight of the new season, soprano Anna Netrebko sings her first Met Aida, going toe-to-toe with mezzo-soprano Anita Rachvelishvili as Amneris. Later in the season, a second star-studded cast takes over, with Sondra Radvanovsky and Dolora Zajick as the leading ladies.Tenors Aleksandrs Antonenko and Yonghoon Lee alternate as Radamès, and Nicola Luisotti and Plácido Domingo take the podium for the Met’s monumental production.”

Flamenco Festival (Mar.7-10)
Joe’s Pub / $30
Ismael Fernández: Trato / 7PM
Miguel Angel Cortes: Sonantas en Tres Movimientos / 9:30PM
Primarily based in New York, throughout its 22 years of history, Flamenco Festival has taken over (almost) the entire world! Flamenco Festival has a presence in 101 cities, presenting 129 companies and 1,225 shows to 1,600,000 attendees.

Nellie McKay (Mar.5-9)
Birdland / 7PM, $30-$40
“Fearless singer-songwriter and deceptively feather-light song stylist McKay is always guaranteed to flabber your gast with her witty, unwieldy and beguiling performances. In this Birdland run, she toasts the release of her seventh album, Sister Orchid, which includes versions of standards including “My Romance,” “The Nearness of You” and “Georgia on My Mind.” (TONY)

Ambrose Akinmusire (March 5-10)
Village Vanguard, 178 Seventh Ave. S., at 11th St./ 8:30PM, +10:30PM, $35
“Go-for-broke musicians like Ambrose Akinmusire often lead dual musical lives. The gifted trumpeter and composer went big on his compelling 2018 release, “Origami Harvest”—a commissioned work that made fruitfully dissonant use of an impassioned rapper and a string quartet­. Here, though, he reverts to a small group, helming a coiled quintet that features the skillful pianist Sullivan Fortner and the return of the tenor saxophonist Walter Smith III.” (Steve Futterman, NewYorker)

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Smart Stuff / Other NYC EventS

The Armory Show (Mar.7-10)
Piers 90, 92, 94 / 12-8PM, $52
“The Armory Show is a top international art fair devoted to the most important artworks of the 20th and 21st centuries. The show combines a selection of the world’s leading galleries—more than 200 of them from 30 countries around the world—with an unsurpassed program of art events and exhibitions at the fair venue and throughout New York City.” (nycgo.com)

“For three days or so at the beginning of each March, Armory Week—the closest thing the New York art world has to Fashion Week—brings a stampede of collectors, curators, artists and dealers (including, of course, those from Chelsea, Uptown and Lower East Side galleries) to the city. Thousands of them from all over the world rush in for a confluence of art fairs featuring modern and contemporary art of all stripes. For the general public, Armory Week—which takes its name from The Armory Show—offers the perfect opportunity to discover the latest trends in art. There’s tons to see, and taking it all in can be exhausting, but there’s a fair for everyone’s taste. To help you find one that suits yours, we offer this handy guide of the best things to do during Armory Week.” (TONY)

Celebrate 25 years of the Armory Show.
“Break out the comfy kicks, art lovers (and according our critic Jerry Saltz, pack snacks and breath mints), it’s Armory Show week. The behemoth itself is now on Piers 90, 92 ,and 94 (with a shuttle running in between), but all the major players are still there, including this year’s “Focus” section, curated by Lauren Haynes of the Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art. When you’re done with all that head to the satellite fairs: cutting-edge works at the Independent on Varick Street; exhibits with the theme “fact and fiction” at Spring/Break, this year at the U.N. Plaza; 60 international exhibitors at Scope, at the Metropolitan Pavilion; and the self-explanatory Art on Paper at Pier 36. Buy tickets ahead of time to avoid lines.” (grubstreet)

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Continuing Events

SUZANNE VEGA (through March 16)
at Café Carlyle
This New York-based singer-songwriter has been composing and performing folk-inspired acoustic tunes since she was a Barnard student in the early 1980s. The venerable cabaret Café Carlyle might be considerably more upscale than Tom’s Restaurant — the Upper West Side student haunt that inspired Vega’s enduring and influential single “Tom’s Diner” — but both offer a glimpse of a bygone New York. A product of the bohemian Greenwich Village folk scene, which has all but disappeared, Vega herself presents an evening of time travel to a completely different period in the city’s history.” (NYT-NATALIE WEINER)

Hubbard Street (thru Mar.17)
Joyce Theatre, 175 Eighth Ave., at 19th St./
Hubbard Street Dance Chicago, one of the country’s most prominent contemporary-dance ensembles, returns to New York after a four-year absence. Each half of the two-week run is devoted to a single choreographer: the Tel Aviv-based Ohad Naharin first, followed by the Canada-born Crystal Pite. “Decadance/Chicago” is an updated version of Naharin’s popular 2000 work, a series of surrealistic vignettes that concludes with a section in which audience members slow-dance with the cast onstage. The Pite evening, in contrast, is made up of three works—“A Picture of You Falling,” “The Other You,” and “Grace Engine”—executed in Pite’s highly articulated, sinuous movement style.” (Marina Harss, NewYorker)

The Orchid Show (Until Apr 28 2019)
New York Botanical Garden | Bronx, NY
“Now in its 17th year, this mesmerizing show displays thousands of orchids in geometric, illuminated sculptural presentations. This year’s exhibit pays tribute to Singapore, showcasing the country’s achievements in orchid cultivation, research and conservation (look out for nods to Singapore’s dazzling Supertrees). Catch special Orchid Evenings for dancing, music and cocktails among the flowers.”

 

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♦ Before making final plans, we suggest you call the venue to confirm ticket availability, plus dates and times, as schedules are subject to change.
♦ NYCity, with a population of  8.6 million, had a record 65 million visitors last year and was TripAdvisor’s Traveler’s Choice Top U.S. Destination for 2018 – awesome! BUT quality shows draw crowds. Try to reserve seats for these top NYC events in advance, even if just earlier on the day of performance.

===========================================================
Bonus NYC events– Jazz Clubs:
Many consider NYCity the Jazz capital of the world. My favorite Jazz Clubs, all on Manhattan’s WestSide, feature top talent every night of the week.
Hit the Hot Link and check out who is playing tonight:

Greenwich Village:
(4 are underground, classic jazz joints. all 6 are within walking distance of each other):
Village Vanguard – UG, 178 7th Ave. So., villagevanguard.com, 212-255-4037 (1st 8:30)
Blue Note – 131 W3rd St. nr 6th ave. bluenotejazz.com, 212-475-8592 (1st set 8pm)
55 Bar – basement @55 Christopher St. nr 7th ave.S. 55bar.com, 212-929-9883 (1st 7pm)
Mezzrow – basement @ 163 W10th St. nr 7th Ave. mezzrow.com,646-476-4346 (1st 8)
Smalls – basement @ 183 W10th St. smallslive.com, 646-476-4346 (1st set 7:30pm)
The Stone at The New School – 55 w13 St. (btw 6/5 ave) – thestonenyc.com (8:30PM)

Outside Greenwich Village:
Dizzy’s Club – Broadway @ 60th St. — jazz.org/dizzys / 212-258-9595 (1st set 7:30pm)
Birdland – 315 W44th St.(btw 8/9ave) — birdlandjazz.com / 212-581-3080 (1st 8:30pm)
Smoke Jazz Club – 2751 Broadway nr.106th St. — smokejazz.com/ 212-864-6662 (7pm)
Jazz Standard – 116 E27 St. (btw Park/Lex) – jazzstandard.com – (1st set 7:30)

For a comprehensive list of the best places to hear All Types of Live Music in Manhattan see the tab above “LiveMusic.”

Special Mention:
Caffe Vivaldi – 32 Jones St. nr Bleecker St. — caffevivaldi.com / 212-691-7538 (1st 7pm)
a classic, old jazz club in the Village, Caffe V often surprised with a wonderfully eclectic lineup. It was my favorite spot for an evening of listening enjoyment and discovery.
Alas, Caffe V is no more, another victim of a rapacious NYC landlord. Owner Ishrat fought the good fight and Caffe V will be sorely missed.
Cornelia Street Cafe – UG, 29 Cornelia St. corneliastreetcafe.com, 212-989-9319
And more recently we have lost Cornelia Street Cafe. After 41 years, it too became another victim of an unreasonable rent increase.

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NYCity Vacation Travel Guide Video (Expedia):

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WHAT’S ON VIEW
These are My Fave Special Exhibitions @ MUSEUMS / Manhattan’s Fifth Avenue
(See the New York Times Arts Section for listings of all museum exhibitions,
and also see the expanded reviews of these exhibitions)

Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum

Hilma af Klint : Paintings for the Future (thru 04/23/19)

“Convinced that the world was not ready for her artistry in 1906, particularly as an underrepresented female in her field, af Klint of Sweden kept her work private. Her paintings anticipated by years “breakthroughs” by Kandinsky, Mondrian and others and were unseen before 1986. The Guggenheim rediscovers her.”

“Recognized as one of the art world’s earliest abstract painters, Hilma af Klint was a steadfast believer that her work was inspired by the spiritual. The new Guggenheim exhibition, “Hilma af Klint: Paintings for the Future,” showcases the work of this groundbreaking Swedish artist (1862-1944), whose work was rarely seen until the 1980s.” (Newsday)

See our art critic’s top pick of the year.
“Luckily, the number-one pick in Jerry Saltz’s best art shows of 2018 is still running. Hilma af Klint’s Paintings for the Future at the Guggenheim Museum examines the work of the unacknowledged Swedish visionary and makes a case for her being the first modernist abstract painter. Saltz is especially enamored with the first gallery, so make sure you spend some time there.” (NYMagazine)

GD: Definitely worth a visit. af Klint was like the original Kandinsky and it’s interesting to see both of their works in the same museum, even if not side-by-side.

New-York Historical Society

‘BETYE SAAR: KEEPIN’ IT CLEAN’  (through May 27).

“Saar has been making important and influential work for nearly 60 years. Yet no big New York museum has given her a full retrospective, or even a significant one-person show, since a 1975 solo at the Whitney Museum of American Art. As this exhibition demonstrates, the institutional oversight is baffling, as her primary themes — racial justice and feminism (her 1972 breakthrough piece, “The Liberation of Aunt Jemima,” merges the two by transforming the racist stereotype of the smiling black mammy into an armed freedom fighter) — are exactly attuned to the present.” (Cotter-NYT)
212-873-3400, nyhistory.org

Jewish Museum

‘SCENES FROM THE COLLECTION’  “After a surgical renovation to its grand pile on Fifth Avenue, the Jewish Museum has reopened its third-floor galleries with a rethought and refreshed display of its permanent collection, which intermingles modern and contemporary art, by Jews and gentiles alike — Mark Rothko, Lee Krasner, Nan Goldin, Cindy Sherman, and the excellent young Nigerian draftswoman Ruby Onyinyechi Amanze — with 4,000 years of Judaica. The works are shown in a nimble, non-chronological suite of galleries, and some of its century-spanning juxtapositions are bracing; others feel reductive, even dilletantish. But always, the Jewish Museum conceives of art and religion as interlocking elements of a story of civilization, commendably open to new influences and new interpretations.” (Farago) 212-423-3200, thejewishmuseum.org

Museum of the City of New York

NY AT ITS CORE (ongoing)
“Ten years in the making, New York at Its Core tells the compelling story of New York’s rise from a striving Dutch village to today’s “Capital of the World.” The exhibition captures the human energy that drove New York to become a city like no other and a subject of fascination the world over. Entertaining, inspiring, important, and at times bemusing, New York City “big personalities,” including Alexander Hamilton, Walt Whitman, Boss Tweed, Emma Goldman, JP Morgan, Fiorello La Guardia, Jane Jacobs, Jay-Z, and dozens more, parade through the exhibition. Visitors will also learn the stories of lesser-known New York personalities, like Lenape chieftain Penhawitz and Italian immigrant Susie Rocco. Even animals like the horse, the pig, the beaver, and the oyster, which played pivotal roles in the economy and daily life of New York, get their moment in the historical spotlight. Occupying the entire first floor in three interactive galleries (Port City, 1609-1898, World City, 1898-2012, and Future City Lab) New York at Its Core is shaped by four themes: money, density, diversity, and creativity. Together, they provide a lens for examining the character of the city, and underlie the modern global metropolis we know today. mcny.org” (NYCity Guide)

and you should be sure to check out these special exhibitions at that little museum on Fifth Ave., The Metropolitan Museum of Art
(open 7 days /week, AND always Pay What You Wish for NewYorkers)

“In Praise of Painting” (thru Oct.4, 2020)

“How great are the Met’s holdings in the Dutch golden age? Very. This long-term installation rings the lower level of the Lehman Wing with scores of lesser-known gems from the mid-seventeenth century, many of them rarely on view before, amid masterworks by Rembrandt, Vermeer, Hals, and Ruisdael. The period, vivified here, began in 1648, when the end of the Eighty Years’ War with Spain brought a boom in wealth and morale, expressed by genre paintings that exalt the national ideal of gezelligheid—social warmth, comfort, belonging. A key figure was Gerard ter Borch, who had travelled widely and worked at the court of Philip IV, in company with Velázquez. Ter Borch’s lustrous, ineffably witty domestic scenes inspired a generation of masters, notably Vermeer, whose genius rather eclipsed his elder’s. The pictures often star ter Borch’s younger sister Gesina, preening in satins or enigmatically musing. Herself a painter, she is cutely funny-looking—pointy nose, weak chin—and desperately lovable. There’s much to be said for a world with such a family in it.”

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Museum Mile is a section of Fifth Avenue which contains one of the densest displays of culture in the world. Eight museums can be found along this section of Fifth Avenue:
• 105th Street – El Museo del Barrio (closed Sun-Mon)*
• 103rd Street – Museum of the City of New York (open 7 days /week)
•  92nd Street – The Jewish Museum (closed Wed) (Sat FREE) (Thu 5-8 PWYW)
•  91st Street  –  Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum (open 7 days /week)
•  89th Street –  National Academy Museum (closed Mon-Tue)
•  88th Street –  Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum (closed Thu) (Sat 6-8 PWYW)
•  86th Street –  Neue Galerie New York (closed Tue-Wed) (Fri 6-8 FREE)
Last, but certainly not least, America’s premier museum
•  82nd Street – The Metropolitan Museum of Art (open 7 days /week)*
*always Pay What You Wish (PWYW) for NewYorkers

Although technically not part of the Museum Mile, the Frick Collection (closed Mon) (Wed 2-6pm PWYW; First Friday each month (exc Jan+Sep) 6-9pm FREE) on the corner of 70th St. and Fifth Avenue and the The Morgan Library & Museum (closed Mon) (Fri 7-9 FREE) on Madison Ave and 37th St are also located near Fifth Ave.
Now plan your own museum crawl (info on hours & admission updated June 2, 2015).
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For other selected Museum and Gallery Special Exhibitions see Recent Posts in right Sidebar dated 03/05 and 03/03.
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NYC Events,”Only the Best” (03/06) + Today’s Featured Pub (Greenwich Village)

Posted on 03/06/2019 by GregD

Today’s Elite 8 NYC Events > WEDNESDAY/ MARCH 06, 2019

“We search the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you don’t have to.” We make it as easy as 1-2-3.

For future NYC Events, check the tab above:  “March NYC Events”
It’s the most comprehensive list of top events this month that you will find anywhere.
Carefully curated from “Only the Best” NYC event info on the the web, it’s a simply superb resource that will help you plan your NYC visit all over town, all through the month.
To make your own after dinner plans TONIGHT, see the tab above;  “LiveMusic.”

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Have time for only one NYC Event today? Do this:

Rigoletto (next Mar.9, 8PM)
Metropolitan Opera House / 7:30PM, $20+
“Verdi’s tragic jester returns in Michael Mayer’s neon-bedecked, Las Vegas–themed production. Baritones Roberto Frontali and George Gagnidze share the title role, and soprano Nadine Sierra reprises her portrayal of Gilda, the role that helped launch her now-blossoming Met career. Tenors Vittorio Grigolo and Bryan Hymel share the role of the lascivious Duke, and Nicola Luisotti conducts.”

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7 OTHER TOP NYC EVENTS TODAY (see below for full listing)
>> 2019 Ecstatic Music Festival
>> Ches Smith
>> Nellie McKay
>> Ambrose Akinmusire
>> Justin Vivian Bond: Under the Influence
>> SciCafe: The Raw Truth About Cooking
>> Workers and Wages in America Today —

Continuing Events
>> more continuing events coming soon.

===================================================

Music, Dance, Performing Arts

2019 Ecstatic Music Festival
Tonight: Bang on a Can People’s Commissioning Fund Concert
@ Kaufman Center, Merkin Hall / 7:30PM, $25
“The Ecstatic Music Festival pairs modern classical with pop, rock, jazz artists for unique collaborations, audacious, one-night-only presentations of surprising musical collaborations.
Next up is the annual Bang on a Can People’s Commissioning Fund Concert which will feature premieres of works by composers Nicole Lizée, Josué Collado Fregoso, Henry Threadgill and Trevor Weston.”
“No series has better instincts in fomenting post-genre alchemy than the Ecstatic Music Festival.” (Steve Smith, The New Yorker)

Ches Smith
The Stone at the New School, 55 W. 13th St./ 8:30PM, $20
Having reached maturity in the new millennium, the drummer Ches Smith is from a generation of fervently eclectic players still ready and willing to get their hands dirty with any genre they encounter. An invaluable figure in numerous new-jazz and rock ensembles, Smith hosts a residency that finds room for, among others, a crew of risk-taking guitarists that includes Mary Halvorson, Nels Cline, Liberty Ellman, and Marc Ribot.” (Steve Futterman, NewYorker)

Nellie McKay (Mar.5-9)
Birdland / 7PM, $30-$40
“Fearless singer-songwriter and deceptively feather-light song stylist McKay is always guaranteed to flabber your gast with her witty, unwieldy and beguiling performances. In this Birdland run, she toasts the release of her seventh album, Sister Orchid, which includes versions of standards including “My Romance,” “The Nearness of You” and “Georgia on My Mind.” (TONY)

Ambrose Akinmusire (March 5-10)
Village Vanguard, 178 Seventh Ave. S., at 11th St./ 8:30PM, +10:30PM, $35
“Go-for-broke musicians like Ambrose Akinmusire often lead dual musical lives. The gifted trumpeter and composer went big on his compelling 2018 release, “Origami Harvest”—a commissioned work that made fruitfully dissonant use of an impassioned rapper and a string quartet­. Here, though, he reverts to a small group, helming a coiled quintet that features the skillful pianist Sullivan Fortner and the return of the tenor saxophonist Walter Smith III.” (Steve Futterman, NewYorker)

Justin Vivian Bond: Under the Influence (Mar.5-6)
Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater / 9PM, (7pm, Wed); $35
“The inimitable siren of the downtown cabaret stage toasts Judy Collins with an evening of song. On the setlist: songs by artists whom Collins has covered throughout her career. Show up for favorites from Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Stephen Sondheim and others, sung by one of New York’s most luminous performers. “ (TONY)

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Smart Stuff / Other NYC EventS

AMNH Presents | SciCafe: The Raw Truth About Cooking
American Museum of Natural History, Central Park West at 79th St./ 7PM, FREE, with RSVP
“Evolutionary biologist Rachel Carmody talks about the long-standing human practice of processing foods. She’ll explain how it increases the calories we can extract, its evolutionary advantages, and the challenges it presents for our present and future.” (ThoughtGallery)

Workers and Wages in America Today —
Featuring Nobel-Winning New York Times Columnist Paul Krugman
CUNY Graduate Center, 365 Fifth Ave.,Room C200 / 6:30PM, FREE, RSVP required

“In this time of low unemployment, why is it so hard for American workers to make a living? Why haven’t the economy’s gains of the recent past meant higher wages for everyone?

A panel of experts examines the power, or weakness, of the American worker—looking at factors such as features of U.S. markets, technology, globalization, gendered wage patterns, and the decline of unions. Featuring Paul Krugman, Nobel Prize–winning economist, New York Times columnist, and distinguished professor; Heidi Shierholz, senior economist and director of policy at The Economic Policy Institute; Arindrajit Dube, professor of economics at UMass Amherst; and others.”

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Continuing Events

more continuing events coming soon.

==========================================================================
♦ Before making final plans, we suggest you call the venue to confirm ticket availability, plus dates and times, as schedules are subject to change.
♦ NYCity, with a population of  8.6 million, had a record 65 million visitors last year and was TripAdvisor’s Traveler’s Choice Top U.S. Destination for 2018 – awesome! BUT quality shows draw crowds. Try to reserve seats for these top NYC events in advance, even if just earlier on the day of performance.

=====================================================

Bonus NYC Events – Music Venues:
So much fine live music every night in this town. These are my favorite non jazz music venues on Manhattan’s WestSide. Hit the Hot Link and check out who’s playing tonight:

City Winery – 155 Varick St., citywinery.com, 212-608-0555
Joe’s Pub @ Public Theater – 425 Lafayette St., joespub.com, 212-967-7555
Beacon Theatre – 2124 Broadway @ 74th St., beacontheatre.com, 212-465-6500
Town Hall – 123 W43rd St. (btw 6/7), thetownhall.org, 212-997-6661
Le Poisson Rouge – 158 Bleecker St., lepoissonrouge.com, 212-505-3474
Sony Hall – 235 W 46th St. (btw 7/8), sonyhall.com, 212-997-5123
and one more, not exactly WestSide:
Bowery Ballroom – 6 Delancey St. boweryballroom.com

For a comprehensive list of the best places to hear All Types of Live Music in Manhattan see the tab above “LiveMusic.”

Special Mention:
Caffe Vivaldi – 32 Jones St. nr Bleecker St. caffevivaldi.com, 212-691-7538
a classic, old jazz club in the Village, Caffe V often surprises with a wonderfully eclectic lineup. It’s my favorite spot for an evening of listening discovery and enjoyment.
Alas, Caffe V is no more, another victim of a rapacious NYC landlord. Owner Ishrat fought the good fight and Caffe V will be sorely missed.

See Below.
———————————————————————————————————-

NYCity Vacation Travel Guide Video (Expedia):
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A PremierPub and 3 Good Eating Places – Greenwich Village

Caffe Vivaldi / 32 Jones Street (btw. Bleecker St./W4th St.)

Café Vivaldi is a classic, intimate club located in Greenwich Village on Jones Street, the street featured on the cover of Bob Dylan’s second album, “Freewheelin’. ”

maxresdefaultEach night Ishrat, the long time proprietor and impresario, carefully curates and schedules an eclectic series of musicians. You can often see him at his table in the corner, hard at work reviewing music videos and listening to cd demos on his laptop, scouting out future bookings. Musicians come from all over to play and sing in a club in Greenwich Village. Some are local New Yorkers, others are just passing through, in town for a few days.

There is a small bar, seating maybe 10. It’s close to the stage and I find it’s a perfect spot to sip a glass of red wine while listening to the music. The room itself has the performance area at one end and a cozy fireplace at the other. The performance area here is small, dominated by a large black Yamaha Grand piano. Tables are bunched together and most people at the tables are eating lite meals or sampling the wonderful desserts.

There is also a good selection of fairly priced wines,  but you are here because of the music. You can never be quite sure what you’re going to find, and that’s half the charm of this place. It’s not a home run every night, but many nights it’s pretty special.

I remember the night I saw the most talented bossa nova group, just in from San Paulo. As I listened, I wondered if there was any better music playing anywhere else in New York City that night. And at Caffé Vivaldi there is never a cover charge. Their recently redesigned web site does give you a better idea of the type of music playing each night.

At one time Greenwich Village was filled with clubs just like this, but times change. Real estate interests have impacted the village, and not for the better. Even Caffé Vivaldi had a rough time recently, when a new landlord raised the rent exorbitantly. Fortunately, Ishrat has built a loyal following over the years, and a fund raiser and slightly more reasonable rent has kept Café Vivaldi in business.

When Woody Allen and Al Pacino wanted to make movies featuring the timeless quality of Greenwich Village they came to Vivaldi. It’s important that we keep this special place alive, for if we lose Cafe Vivaldi, NYCity will have lost a piece of it’s soul.

CAFFE VIVALDI HAS CLOSED, VERY SAD.
I HAVE LEFT THIS REVIEW ON MY SITE AS A KIND OF MEMORIAL.
As reported in the “Gothamist”:
“Caffe Vivaldi, one of the last bohemian bastions of the West Village, is set to close this weekend. During its 35 years on Jones Street, the casual cafe won the hearts of locals and celebs alike, including Oscar Isaac, Bette Midler, and Al Pacino.

Despite that friendly communal atmosphere, the owners ultimately struggled to survive under their notorious vulture landlord Steve Croman, who they say waged a harassment campaign against the restaurant, and eventually tripled their rent.”

Website: http://caffevivaldi.com/
Phone #: (212) 691-7538
Hours: Music generally 7:30PM – 11PM, but varies
Lunch/Dinner 11AM-on
Subway: #1 to Christopher St.
Walk 1 blk S. on 7th ave S. to Bleecker St., 1 blk left on Bleecker to Jones St., 50 yards left on Jones St. to Caffe V.
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“Pub” is used in it’s broadest sense – bars, bar/restaurants, jazz clubs, wine bars, tapas bars, craft beer bars, dive bars, cocktail lounges, and of course, pubs – just about anyplace you can get a drink without a cover charge.

If you have a fave premier pub or good eating place on Manhattan’s WestSide let us all know about it – leave a comment.
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3 Good Eating places

It’s not difficult to find a place to eat in Manhattan.
Finding a good, inexpensive place to eat is a bit harder.
Here are a few of my faves in this neighborhood:

Fish – 280 Bleecker St. (just a bit S. of 7th ave South)
This was an easy pick – the best raw bar special in town. $9 gets you 6 of the freshest oysters or clams + a glass of wine or beer. Don’t know how they can do it, but I tell everyone I know about this place. And it’s located right in the heart of some of the best no cover music in town.

Bleecker Street Pizza – 69 7th ave S. (corner of Bleecker St.)
The place is tiny and not much to look at, but this is one good slice. They like to brag that they have been voted “Best pizza in NY” 3 years in a row by the Food Network. I believe them. I would have voted for them.

Num Pang – 21 E 12th St. (btw. University Place/5th ave.)
This is a Cambodian banh mi sandwich shop that kept me well fed while I was in class nearby recently. It’s cramped, even for NYCity, but usually there is room up the spiral staircase to sit down and eat. In good weather carry your sandwich a few blocks to Union Square park. You may have to wait a few minutes, because everything is freshly made, but it’s worth it. Can you believe – an unheard of 26 food rating by Zagat.

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“3 Good Eating places” focuses on a quick bite, what I call “Fine Fast Food – NYCity Style”
No reservations needed.
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NYCity is the most diverse and interesting place to find a meal anywhere in the world. With more than 24,000 eating establishments you might welcome some advice.

◊ For all my picks of 54 Good Eating places, and essays on my favorite 18 PremierPubs in 9 Neighborhoods on Manhattan’s WestSide, order a copy of my e-book:
“Eating and Drinking on NYCity’s WestSide” ($4.99, available SUMMER 2019).
◊ Order before AUG. 31, 2019 and receive a bonus – 27 of my favorite casual dining places with free Wi-Fi.

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NYC Events,”Only the Best” (03/05) + Museum Special Exhibitions: Manhattan’s WestSide

Posted on 03/05/2019 by GregD

Today’s Elite 8 NYC Events > TUESDAY/ MARCH 05, 2019

“We search the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you don’t have to.” We make it as easy as 1-2-3.

For future NYC Events, check the tab above:  “March NYC Events”
It’s the most comprehensive list of top events this month that you will find anywhere.
Carefully curated from “Only the Best” NYC event info on the the web, it’s a simply superb resource that will help you plan your NYC visit all over town, all through the month.
To make your own after dinner plans TONIGHT, see the tab above;  “LiveMusic.”

==========================================================

Have time for only one NYC Event today? Do this:

JULIAN LAGE TRIO
at Le Poisson Rouge / 8:30 p.m.; $25
“Lage, a 31-year-old guitar virtuoso, just released a winning new album, “Love Hurts.” It might be the closest thing he’s released to a straight-ahead jazz record. But with the bassist Jorge Roeder and the drummer Dave King — two left-field improvisers a generation ahead of him — at his side, a freewheeling, rock-tinged vibe finds its way in through the seams. Ever the adaptive player, Lage leans into the influences of Pat Martino and John Scofield here, playing his distorted electric guitar in snaky, spiraling lines. The trio’s repertoire ranges from Ornette Coleman to Roy Orbison to some of Lage’s own tunes.” (NYT-GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO)

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7 OTHER TOP NYC EVENTS TODAY (see below for full listing)
>> A Gotham Kings Mardi Gras Celebration
>> Nellie McKay
>>  A Bowie Celebration: The David Bowie Alumni Tour
>> Marshall Crenshaw and The Bottle Rockets
>> Ambrose Akinmusire
>> Justin Vivian Bond: Under the Influence
>> Lecture with Michael Parloff

Continuing Events 
>> more continuing events coming soon.

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Music, Dance, Performing Arts

A Gotham Kings Mardi Gras Celebration
Dizzy’s Club, Jazz at Lincoln Center / 7:30PM, +9:30PM, $30-$35
“The Gotham Kings Mardi Gras Celebration returns to Dizzy’s for another night of festivities. Led by trumpeter Alphonso Horne, this fun-loving group of musicians and dancers will treat audiences to the infectious traditions of Creole jazz. The concert showcases the virtuosity of a young Louis Armstrong and the innovative genius of King Oliver, weaving the sounds of New Orleans into a rich musical fabric that uplifts and warms the soul. With special Mardi Gras drinks on the menu, the club will be in good spirits for the occasion.”

Nellie McKay (Mar.5-9)
Birdland / 7PM, $30-$40
“Fearless singer-songwriter and deceptively feather-light song stylist McKay is always guaranteed to flabber your gast with her witty, unwieldy and beguiling performances. In this Birdland run, she toasts the release of her seventh album, Sister Orchid, which includes versions of standards including “My Romance,” “The Nearness of You” and “Georgia on My Mind.” (TONY)

 A Bowie Celebration: The David Bowie Alumni Tour
@ Irving Plaza / 7PM, $55
“Musicians who have played and collaborated with David Bowie over the years pay tribute tonight, including ’70s-era band members Mike Garson and Earl Slick, ’80s-era bassist Carmine Rojas, and ’00s-era guitarist Gerry Leonard. (Some of them have played similar tribute shows in the past couple years.) The shows will also feature guest vocalists Corey Glover (of Living Colour) and Bernard Fowler (of Tackhead, backing vocalist for The Rolling Stones since the ’80s, etc), and drummer Lee John.” (BrooklynVegan)

Marshall Crenshaw and The Bottle Rockets
@ City Winery / 8PM, $28-$35
“Singer-songwriter Marshall Crenshaw scored a couple early-’80s power pop hits with “Whenever You’re on My Mind” and “Someday Someway,” and plays tonight with alt-country vets The Bottle Rockets.” (BrooklynVegan)

Ambrose Akinmusire (March 5-10)
Village Vanguard, 178 Seventh Ave. S., at 11th St./ 8:30PM, +10:30PM, $35
“Go-for-broke musicians like Ambrose Akinmusire often lead dual musical lives. The gifted trumpeter and composer went big on his compelling 2018 release, “Origami Harvest”—a commissioned work that made fruitfully dissonant use of an impassioned rapper and a string quartet­. Here, though, he reverts to a small group, helming a coiled quintet that features the skillful pianist Sullivan Fortner and the return of the tenor saxophonist Walter Smith III.” (Steve Futterman, NewYorker)

Justin Vivian Bond: Under the Influence (Mar.5-6)
Joe’s Pub at the Public Theater / 9PM, (7pm, Wed); $35
“The inimitable siren of the downtown cabaret stage toasts Judy Collins with an evening of song. On the setlist: songs by artists whom Collins has covered throughout her career. Show up for favorites from Joni Mitchell, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Stephen Sondheim and others, sung by one of New York’s most luminous performers. “ (TONY)

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Smart Stuff / Other NYC EventS

Lecture with Michael Parloff
Winter Festival: Russian Panorama
Russian Music From Glinka to Shostakovich
Rose Studio, Lincoln Center / 6:30PM, $10
“Returning lecturer Michael Parloff inaugurates the Winter Festival’s Russian journey with an overview of the country’s rich musical tapestry, from the time of Mikhail Glinka to that of Dmitri Shostakovich.”

=======================================================

Continuing Events

more continuing events coming soon.

==========================================================================
♦ Before making final plans, we suggest you call the venue to confirm ticket availability, plus dates and times, as schedules are subject to change.
♦ NYCity, with a population of  8.6 million, had a record 65 million visitors last year and was TripAdvisor’s Traveler’s Choice Top U.S. Destination for 2018 – awesome! BUT quality shows draw crowds. Try to reserve seats for these top NYC events in advance, even if just earlier on the day of performance.

=====================================================
Bonus: Nifty 9 – Best Cabarets / Piano Bars NYCity
These are my favorite places for an after dinner night on the town – music and drinks.
Hit the Hot Link and check out what’s happening tonight:

Feinstein’s/54 Below – 254 W 54th St.

The Green Room 42 – 570 Tenth Ave.

Don’t Tell Mama – 343 W 46th St.

The Rum House, in the Hotel Edison – 228 W. 47th St.

Laurie Beechman Theatre – 407 W 42nd St.

Marie’s Crisis – 59 Grove St.

The Duplex – 61 Christopher St.

Sid Gold’s Request Room – 165 W 26th St.

Cafe Carlyle, in the Carlyle Hotel – 35 E. 76th St.
This is the only one not located on Manhattan’s WestSide, and it ain’t cheap, but it has some of the finest singers.

For a comprehensive list of the best places to hear All Types of Live Music in Manhattan see the tab above “LiveMusic.”

=========================================================

NYCity Vacation Travel Guide Video (Expedia):

===============================================================================

WHAT’S ON VIEW
My Fave Special Exhibitions – MUSEUMS / Manhattan’s WestSide
(See the New York Times Arts Section for listings of all museums,
and also to see their expanded reviews of exhibitions)

Whitney Museum of American Art

‘ANDY WARHOL — FROM A TO B AND BACK AGAIN’  (through March 31) “Although this is the artist’s first full American retrospective in 31 years, he’s been so much with us — in museums, galleries, auctions — as to make him, like wallpaper, like the atmosphere, only half-noticed. The Whitney show restores him to a full, commanding view, but does so in a carefully shaped and edited way, with an emphasis on very early and late work. Despite the show’s monumentalizing size, supplemented by an off-site display of the enormous multipanel painting called “Shadows,” it’s a human-scale Warhol we see. Largely absent is the artist-entrepreneur who is taken as a prophet of our market-addled present. What we have instead is Warhol for whom art, whatever else it was, was an expression of personal hopes and fears.”  (Cotter)

Museum of Art and Design

‘STERLING RUBY: CERAMICS’  (through March 17).
“Adept at most art mediums, this artist is at his best in ceramics, especially in the outsize, awkwardly hand-built, resplendently glazed baskets, ashtrays and plates and the objects that verge on sculpture in this show. These works actively incorporate accident and aspects of the ready-made, have precedents in the large-scale ceramics of Peter Voulkos and Viola Frey, but may be closest in spirit to the Neo-Expressionism of Julian Schnabel — rehabilitated, of course.” (Smith – NYT)

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For other selected Museum and Gallery Special Exhibitions see Posts in right Sidebar dated 03/03 and 03/01.
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NYC Events, “Only the Best” (03/04) + Today’s Featured Pub (Tribeca)

Posted on 03/04/2019 by GregD

Today’s Elite 8 NYC Events > MONDAY/ MARCH 04, 2019

“We search the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you don’t have to.” We make it as easy as 1-2-3.

For future NYC Events, check the tab above:  “March NYC Events”
It’s the most comprehensive list of top events this month that you will find anywhere.
Carefully curated from “Only the Best” NYC event info on the the web, it’s a simply superb resource that will help you plan your NYC visit all over town, all through the month.
To make your own after dinner plans TONIGHT, see the tab above;  “LiveMusic.”

==========================================================

Have time for only one NYC Event today? Do this:

Aida (next Mar.7, 7:30PM)
Metropolitan Opera House / 7:30PM, $20+
“In what should be a highlight of the new season, soprano Anna Netrebko sings her first Met Aida, going toe-to-toe with mezzo-soprano Anita Rachvelishvili as Amneris. Later in the season, a second star-studded cast takes over, with Sondra Radvanovsky and Dolora Zajick as the leading ladies.Tenors Aleksandrs Antonenko and Yonghoon Lee alternate as Radamès, and Nicola Luisotti and Plácido Domingo take the podium for the Met’s monumental production.”

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7 OTHER TOP NYC EVENTS TODAY (see below for full listing)
>> Monday Nights with WBGO: Gwilym Simcock
>> Broadway Sings Adele
>> CHIAROSCURO QUARTET AND KRISTIAN BEZUIDENHOUT
>> WEEK AT THE CREEK WITH JORDAN TEMPLE
>> Jim Caruso’s Cast Party 
>> Songs of Bukovina: A Conversation with Alexei Ratmansky
>> Waking up to the Facebook Catastrophe: Team Human with Roger McNamee

Continuing Events 
>> more continuing events coming soon.

===================================================

Music, Dance, Performing Arts

Monday Nights with WBGO: Gwilym Simcock
Dizzy’s Club, Jazz at Lincoln Center / 7:30PM, $35
“Gwilym Simcock is a brilliant young pianist and composer from Wales. He’s spent the last several years touring extensively in Pat Metheny’s quartet alongside Linda Oh and Antonio Sanchez, but he is also renowned for his stunning solo concerts, which he has performed at prestigious venues such as the Montreal Jazz Festival. Tonight’s show is the only New York stop on Simcock’s solo tour of the United States, United Kingdom, and Europe in promotion of his upcoming release, Near and Now. Join us at Dizzy’s Club for an evening of impeccable jazz-meets-classical piano music.”

Broadway Sings Adele
Sony Hall / 8PM, $20+
“The acclaimed Broadway Sings concert series will continue honoring singer-songwriter Adele with a bombshell cast of Broadway stars including Matt Doyle (The Book of Mormon), Bonnie Milligan (Head Over Heels), Wesley Taylor (SpongeBob SquarePants), and Jessica Vosk (Wicked). The one-night-only concert will feature completely new arrangements of the hits of the English singer, accompanied by a 14-piece orchestra playing original orchestrations of her music.”

CHIAROSCURO QUARTET AND KRISTIAN BEZUIDENHOUT
at Zankel Hall / 7:30 p.m.; $42+
“Period instruments all around in this concert, as a leading fortepianist joins a strong quartet led by the noted soloist Alina Ibragimova. On the bill are Schubert’s “Death and the Maiden” quartet, Mozart’s Piano Sonata in C minor, K. 457, and an arrangement of Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 12 in A.” (NYT-David Allen)

WEEK AT THE CREEK WITH JORDAN TEMPLE (March 1-8)
at the Creek and the Cave / 7 p.m.; $5
“This comedian not only performed stand-up on “Conan,” but also created and produced the cult-hit stage production “Hidden Fences.” Temple is also a new story editor for the award-winning Amazon series “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” and is working on a new hour of stand-up. His “Maisel” co-workers Noah Gardenswartz and Alison Leiby will open for his run at the Creek. Ticket proceeds will go to the American Bird Conservancy in the memory of the comedian Kevin Barnett.” (NYT-Sean L. McCarthy)

Jim Caruso’s Cast Party (Cabaret)
Birdland, 315 West 44th St. (btw 8/9 ave) / 9:30PM, $30
the witty host attracts broadway stars on their night off, along with up and comers.
“Part cabaret, part piano bar and part social set, Cast Party offers a chance to hear rising and established talents step up to the microphone (backed by the slap and tickle of Steve Doyle on bass and Billy Stritch at the ivories, plus the bang of Daniel Glass on drums). The waggish Caruso presides as host.” (TONY)

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Smart Stuff / Other NYC EventS

Songs of Bukovina: A Conversation with Alexei Ratmansky
Atrium at Lincoln Center / 7PM, FREE
“In celebration of his 10th anniversary as Artist in Residence at American Ballet Theatre, Alexei Ratmansky joins scholars and artists in a special conversation that situates his recent work, Songs of Bukovina, within its cultural and political contexts.”

Presented in collaboration with American Ballet Theatre, The Center for Ballet and the Arts at NYU, and NYU’s Remarque Institute

Waking up to the Facebook Catastrophe: Team Human with Roger McNamee
The Greene Space, 44 Charlton St./ 7PM, $25
“Digital theorist Douglas Rushkoff hosts a Team Human night with Roger McNamee, original Facebook investor and Mark Zuckerberg’s mentor. McNamee will talk about his new book, Zucked: Waking up to the Facebook Catastrophe, and the case for breaking up Facebook before it breaks up our democracy.” (ThoughtGallery)

=======================================================

Continuing Events

more continuing events coming soon.

==========================================================================
♦ Before making final plans, we suggest you call the venue to confirm ticket availability, plus dates and times, as schedules are subject to change.
♦ NYCity, with a population of  8.6 million, had a record 65 million visitors last year and was TripAdvisor’s Traveler’s Choice Top U.S. Destination for 2018 – awesome! BUT quality shows draw crowds. Try to reserve seats for these top NYC events in advance, even if just earlier on the day of performance.

===========================================================
Bonus NYC events– Jazz Clubs:
Many consider NYCity the Jazz capital of the world. My favorite Jazz Clubs, all on Manhattan’s WestSide, feature top talent every night of the week.
Hit the Hot Link and check out who is playing tonight:

Greenwich Village:
(4 are underground, classic jazz joints. all 6 are within walking distance of each other):
Village Vanguard – UG, 178 7th Ave. So., villagevanguard.com, 212-255-4037 (1st 8:30)
Blue Note – 131 W3rd St. nr 6th ave. bluenotejazz.com, 212-475-8592 (1st set 8pm)
55 Bar – basement @55 Christopher St. nr 7th ave.S. 55bar.com, 212-929-9883 (1st 7pm)
Mezzrow – basement @ 163 W10th St. nr 7th Ave. mezzrow.com,646-476-4346 (1st 8)
Smalls – basement @ 183 W10th St. smallslive.com, 646-476-4346 (1st set 7:30pm)
The Stone at The New School – 55 w13 St. (btw 6/5 ave) – thestonenyc.com (8:30PM)

Outside Greenwich Village:
Dizzy’s Club – Broadway @ 60th St. — jazz.org/dizzys / 212-258-9595 (1st set 7:30pm)
Birdland – 315 W44th St.(btw 8/9ave) — birdlandjazz.com / 212-581-3080 (1st 8:30pm)
Smoke Jazz Club – 2751 Broadway nr.106th St. — smokejazz.com/ 212-864-6662 (7pm)
Jazz Standard – 116 E27 St. (btw Park/Lex) – jazzstandard.com – (1st set 7:30)

For a comprehensive list of the best places to hear All Types of Live Music in Manhattan see the tab above “LiveMusic.”

Special Mention:
Caffe Vivaldi – 32 Jones St. nr Bleecker St. — caffevivaldi.com / 212-691-7538 (1st 7pm)
a classic, old jazz club in the Village, Caffe V often surprised with a wonderfully eclectic lineup. It was my favorite spot for an evening of listening enjoyment and discovery.
Alas, Caffe V is no more, another victim of a rapacious NYC landlord. Owner Ishrat fought the good fight and Caffe V will be sorely missed.
Cornelia Street Cafe – UG, 29 Cornelia St. corneliastreetcafe.com, 212-989-9319
And more recently we have lost Cornelia Street Cafe. After 41 years, it too became another victim of an unreasonable rent increase.

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NYCity Vacation Travel Guide Video (Expedia):

================================================================================

A PremierPub / Tribeca

B-Flat / 277 Church St. (btw Franklin/White St)

b_flat4There are some places that are tough to find, then add a layer of mystery when you do find them. B-Flat has a nondescript, almost unmarked door at street level – today’s speakeasy vibe. Open this door and you face a dimly lit stairway down to their basement location. It almost takes a leap of faith to follow the stairs down to their interior door.
But open that door and a pleasant surprise awaits you.

It’s a basement jazz spot all right, but not like any traditional jazz joint you may have been to before. This place looks as fresh as today, probably because it’s only been open for 6 years. Even though it hasn’t had a chance to age gracefully, the cherry wood accents and low lighting make this small space very inviting.

There is always jazz, often progressive jazz, playing over their very discrete, stylish bose speakers, setting just the right tone as you find a seat at the bar, or one of the small tables. There is wine and beer available, but this place has some expert mixologists making some very creative cocktails, which I’m told change seasonally, a nice touch.

Come at happy hour and tasty cocktails like the el Diablo or the lychee martini are $8 – not bad. I am a sucker for any drink made with lychee and how can you not try a tequila drink named el Diablo. There is also nice selection of small bites available at happy hour and a food menu that is as innovative as the cocktail menu, so this does not have to be a happy hour only stop.

It wasn’t surprising to find a tasty prosciutto and arugula salad with yuzu dressing, but I did not expect to find such a good version of fried chicken breast on the apps menu. Here it’s called “Tatsuta.” Best bet is to sample happy hour, then dinner on a Monday or Wednesday night, when you can finish with no cover live jazz that starts around 8.

This place is tough to find (look for a small slate sandwich board on the sidewalk out front advertising happy hour) and on some nights when there is no live music it may be a little too quiet for some. But I think it’s worth searching out if you want a place with good music, food, and especially drinks, away from the maddening crowd.

Website: http://http://www.bflat.info/index.html
Phone #: 212-219-2970
Hours: Mo-Wed 5pm-2am; Th-Sat 5pm-3am; no Sun
Happy Hour: 5-7pm every day; $8 cocktails + special prices on apps
Music: Mon/Wed 8pm
Subway: #1 to Franklin; walk E 1 blk to Church; N 1 blk to bFlat

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“Pub” is used in it’s broadest sense – bars, bar/restaurants, jazz clubs, wine bars, tapas bars, craft beer bars, dive bars, cocktail lounges, and of course, pubs – just about anyplace you can get a drink without a cover charge (except for certain jazz clubs).

If you have a fave premier pub or good eating place on Manhattan’s WestSide let us all know about it – leave a comment.
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NYC Events,”Only the Best” (03/03) + GallerySpecialExhibits: Chelsea

Posted on 03/03/2019 by GregD

Today’s Elite 8 NYC Events > SUNDAY/ MARCH 03, 2019

“We search the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you don’t have to.” We make it as easy as 1-2-3.

For future NYC Events, check the tab above:  “March NYC Events”
It’s the most comprehensive list of top events this month that you will find anywhere.
Carefully curated from “Only the Best” NYC event info on the the web, it’s a simply superb resource that will help you plan your NYC visit all over town, all through the month.
To make your own after dinner plans TONIGHT, see the tab above;  “LiveMusic.”

==========================================================

Have time for only one NYC Event today? Do this:

NEW YORK CITY BALLET (LAST CHANCE).
at the NYS Theater, Lincoln Center / 8PM, $35+
“The final weekend of City Ballet’s winter season offers a tidy recap of the previous weeks. On Friday and Saturday afternoon, the company presents a Balanchine double bill with “Prodigal Son” and “Liebeslieder Walzer”; on Saturday evening it serves up a triple bill of new and revised work by William Forsythe, Kyle Abraham and Justin Peck; and on Sunday it concludes the season with a trifecta of works by Jerome Robbins, featuring “Interplay,” “In the Night” and “N.Y. Export: Opus Jazz.” (NYT-Brian Schaefer)

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7 OTHER TOP NYC EVENTS TODAY (see below for full listing)
>> Laugh along with Patton Oswalt
>> Lou Reed’s Birthday Celebration with James Chance , Hal Willner, Kevin Heard
>> ALFREDO RODRIGUEZ AND PEDRITO MARTINEZ
>> Complexions, Contemporary Ballet
>> Sharp: Michelle Dean with Meg Wolitzer
>> On Air Fest
>> Food Book Fair

Continuing Events 
>> NYC Beer Week
>> Bank of America Winter Village at Bryant Park

===================================================

Music, Dance, Performing Arts

Laugh along with Patton Oswalt
Beacon Theatre / 7:30PM, $45-$75
“Known for his nerd-friendly-yet-biting style of smart comedy, Patton Oswalt is also a familiar face on TV (“The King of Queens,” “Agents of SHIELD”) and to kiddies as the voice of Remy in the Pixar flick “Ratatouille.” Currently touring the nation, he’ll be dropping by the Big Apple for a solitary stop at the Beacon Theatre.” (Newsday)

Lou Reed’s Birthday Celebration with James Chance , Hal Willner, Kevin Heard
The Bowery Electric / 7PM, $20
“Celebrate late music legend Lou Reed at Bowery Electric’s annual soirée. You’ll hear Reed and The Velvet Underground tracks and live tunes by Tammy Faye Starlight, Dougie Needles, and Mina Caputo.” (thrillist)

Complexions, Contemporary Ballet (LAST CHANCE)
Joyce Theatre, 175 Eighth Ave., at 19th St./ 8PM, $45+
“For most of its twenty-five years of existence, Complexions Contemporary Ballet has endured critical disapproval of its flashy aesthetic and its relentless, all-exclamation-points preening. And, for most of that time, such complaints have had little to no effect on its loyal, adoring audience. Its silver-anniversary programs at the Joyce include a greatest-hits compilation, as well as the premières of the supposedly neoclassical “Bach 25” and the topical “Woke.” (Brian Seibert, NewYorker)

ALFREDO RODRIGUEZ AND PEDRITO MARTINEZ (LAST CHANCE)
at Jazz Standard / 7:30 and 9:30 p.m.; $30
“Rodriguez, a pianist, and Martinez, a percussionist and vocalist, are masters of Afro-Cuban rhythm who both hail from Havana, though they learned their craft in different settings: Rodriguez at clubs and solares — the housing units where much of Cuba’s African musical inheritance is passed down — and Martinez at various conservatories in the city. On “Duologue,” their new, Quincy Jones-produced album, the pair find plenty of generative energy in the space between their styles. They appear at the Standard in an unadorned duo.” (NYT-GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO)

=========================================================

Smart Stuff / Other NYC EventS

Sharp: Michelle Dean with Meg Wolitzer
92nd Street Y / 11AM,$42
A discussion of the brilliant writers—Dorothy Parker, Rebecca West, Hannah Arendt, Susan Sontag and Joan Didion, to name a few—featured in Michelle Dean’s Sharp, a mix of biography, literary criticism and cultural history examining how they asserted themselves through their writing in the male-dominant and often hostile intellectual beau monde of twentieth-century New York.” (grubstreet)

Elsewhere, but these two look worth the detour:

On Air Fest (Mar.1-3)
Wythe Hotel, Bklyn / 9AM-6PM, $79
“Why just listen to the radio when you can discuss how to to harness the technology for the better? Through Sunday, the On Air Fest contributors including Roxane Gay, Radiolab’s Jad Abumrad, Amber Tamblyn, Still Processing’s Jenna Wortham, and more converge at the Wythe Hotel for discussions, performances, live podcast tapings, and more, all exploring the future of audio.” (grubstreet)

“On Air Fest may be about bringing podcasters to Brooklyn in front of an audience — but don’t call it a podcast festival. Instead of just sitting in a room watching people talk to each other, On Air Fest 2019 features immersive soundscapes, live concerts, poetry, stories told with projections and art installations.” (Metro)

Food Book Fair (March 2-3)
Smorgasburg: 625 Atlantic Ave., Brooklyn / 11AM-5PM, FREE
“An expo where food writing is the main dish, the annual Food Book Fair highlights cookbooks, food-inspired art and other media that emphasize all things edible. Browse booths from more than 20 different independent publishers.”

=======================================================

Continuing Events

NYC Beer Week (LAST DAY)
The best week for craft beer lovers
“The NYC Brewers Guild’s annual celebration of all things hops, malt and a little madness, NYC Beer Week, returns with over 60 breweries taking part in more than 150 events, from walk-around tastings to tap takeovers, brewer talks and pairing dinners. With beers brewed special for the festival, it’s a chance to taste things you won’t find anywhere else in the company of people who love one thing above all else”. (Metro)

The grand finale of NYC Beer Week
“NYC Beer Week ends with a brunch dedicated to the brewers who rise to the challenge of creating a special beer made entirely with New York state-grown ingredients. Taste your way through them at Randolph Beer Dumbo, and help crown your favorite breweries with the Ruppert’s Cup. March 3, noon-2 p.m., 82 Prospect St., Brooklyn, pay as you go, nycbrewed.com.”

Bank of America Winter Village at Bryant Park
Midtown Manhattan’s winter wonderland.
Bryant Park (btw 5th/6th Ave. @42nd St.) / shops to 8PM, rink to 10PM
Enjoy The Lodge by Urbanspace, and The Rink, the centerpiece of Winter Village and New York City’s only free admission ice skating rink.
The Rink
This 17,000 square foot rink features free admission ice skating, high quality rental skates, and free skating shows, special events, and activities.
​October 27, 2018 – March 3, 2019 (LAST DAY)
Daily, 8am-10pm (Rink hours are weather permitting and Rink may be closed for events – check here)

============================================================================
♦ Before making final plans, we suggest you call the venue to confirm ticket availability, plus dates and times, as schedules are subject to change.
♦ NYCity, with a population of  8.6 million, had a record 65 million visitors last year and was TripAdvisor’s Traveler’s Choice Top U.S. Destination for 2018 – awesome! BUT quality shows draw crowds. Try to reserve seats for these top NYC events in advance, even if just earlier on the day of performance.

=====================================================

Bonus NYC Music Venues:
So much fine live music every night in this town. These are my favorite non jazz music venues on Manhattan’s WestSide. Check out who’s playing tonight:

City Winery – 155 Varick St., citywinery.com, 212-608-0555
Joe’s Pub @ Public Theater – 425 Lafayette St., joespub.com, 212-967-7555
Beacon Theatre – 2124 Broadway @ 74th St., beacontheatre.com, 212-465-6500
Town Hall – 123 W43rd St., thetownhall.org, 212-997-6661
Le Poisson Rouge – 158 Bleecker St., lepoissonrouge.com, 212-505-3474
and one more, not quite WestSide
Bowery Ballroom – 6 Delancey St. boweryballroom.com

For a comprehensive list of the best places to hear All Types of Live Music in Manhattan see the tab above “LiveMusic.”

Special Mention:
Caffe Vivaldi – 32 Jones St. nr Bleecker St. caffevivaldi.com, 212-691-7538
a classic, old jazz club in the Village, Caffe V often surprises with a wonderfully eclectic lineup. It’s my favorite spot for an evening of listening discovery and enjoyment.

Alas, Caffe V is no more, another victim of a rapacious NYC landlord. Owner Ishrat fought the good fight and Caffe V will be sorely missed.
===========================================================

NYCity Vacation Travel Guide Video (Expedia):

================================================================================

Chelsea Art Gallery District*

Chelsea is the heart of the NYCity contemporary art scene. Home to more than 300 art galleries, the Rubin Museum, the Joyce Theater and The Kitchen performance spaces, there is no place like it anywhere in the world. Come here to browse free exhibitions by world-renowned artists and those unknowns waiting to be discovered in an art district that is concentrated between West 18th and West 27th Streets, and 10th and 11th Avenues. Afterwards stop in the Chelsea Market, stroll on the High Line, or rest up at one of the many cafes and bars and discuss the fine art.

Here is one exhibition the New Yorker likes:

“The Techniques of the Observer”  (through March 9)

This trend-spotting group show, which is more than the sum of its uneven parts, registers a seismic shift from abstraction to representation among ambitious painters. It pertains to a mode, if not merely a mood, of handling images—be they realist, imagined, or appropriated—with some ratio of self-conscious deliberateness (not Expressionist) and shoot-the-works feeling (irony-free). The notion extends a magnetic field from a nocturnal cityscape by the chronically underrated poetic realist Lois Dodd, ninety-one years old, to a dreamily blurred floral still-life by the mid-career German Michael Krebber and a lividly harsh self-portrait by a tyro Italian, Giangiacomo Rossetti. Elizabeth Peyton shines with an agitated portrait, and so does Gillian Carnegie, with one that is uncannily calm. All the show’s artists impress as experimentally sincere.” (

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For a listing of 25 essential galleries in the Chelsea Art Gallery District, organized by street, which enables you to create your own Chelsea Art Gallery crawl, see the Chelsea Gallery Guide (nycgo.com) Or check out TONY magazine’s list of the “Best Chelsea Galleries” and click through to see what’s on view.

*Now plan your own gallery crawl, but better to plan your visits for Tuesday through Saturday; most galleries are closed Sunday and Monday.

TIP: After your gallery tour, stop in Ovest at 513W27th St. for Aperitivo Italiano (Happy Hour on steroids). Discuss all the great art you have viewed over a drink and a very tasty selection of FREE appetizers (M-F, 5-8pm). OR try this NYT recommendation: “When you’re done, adjourn to the newly renovated Bottino , the Chelsea art world’s unofficial canteen on 10th Avenue (btw 24/25 St.) “

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For other selected Museum and Gallery Special Exhibitions see recent posts in right sidebar dated 03/01 and 02/27.

Posted in Uncategorized | Tagged , , , , , | Leave a comment

NYC Events,”Only the Best” (03/02) + Today’s Featured Pub (Upper West Side)

Posted on 03/02/2019 by GregD

Today’s Elite 8 NYC Events > SATURDAY/ MARCH 02, 2019

“We search the internet everyday looking for the very best of What’s Happening, primarily on Manhattan’s WestSide, so that you don’t have to.” We make it as easy as 1-2-3.

For future NYC Events, check the tab above:  “March NYC Events”
It’s the most comprehensive list of top events this month that you will find anywhere.
Carefully curated from “Only the Best” NYC event info on the the web, it’s a simply superb resource that will help you plan your NYC visit all over town, all through the month.
To make your own after dinner plans TONIGHT, see the tab above;  “LiveMusic.”

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Have time for only one NYC Event today? Do this:

Elsewhere, but this looks worth the detour:

On Air Fest (Mar.1-3)
Wythe Hotel, Bklyn / 9AM-6PM, $79
(tickets only available for Sunday, better jump on this right now)
“Why just listen to the radio when you can discuss how to to harness the technology for the better? Through Sunday, the On Air Fest contributors including Roxane Gay, Radiolab’s Jad Abumrad, Amber Tamblyn, Still Processing’s Jenna Wortham, and more converge at the Wythe Hotel for discussions, performances, live podcast tapings, and more, all exploring the future of audio.” (grubstreet)

“On Air Fest may be about bringing podcasters to Brooklyn in front of an audience — but don’t call it a podcast festival. Instead of just sitting in a room watching people talk to each other, On Air Fest 2019 features immersive soundscapes, live concerts, poetry, stories told with projections and art installations.” (Metro)

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7 OTHER TOP NYC EVENTS TODAY (see below for full listing)
>> KURT ELLING
>> NEW YORK CITY BALLET
>> ALFREDO RODRIGUEZ AND PEDRITO MARTINEZ
>> Cyrille Aimee: A Sondheim Adventure
>>Andy Warhol After Pop
>> New York City Drone Film Festival
>> Target First Saturday at the Brooklyn Museum

Continuing Events 
>> NYC Beer Week
>> Bank of America Winter Village at Bryant Park

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Music, Dance, Performing Arts

KURT ELLING (March 1-2)
at the Rose Theater / 8 p.m.; $40+
“An esteemed jazz crooner whose vocal power is matched by his cool sensitivity to each song, Elling presents the premiere of “The Big Blind,” a drama in the format of an old radio musical. Written by Elling and the composer Phil Galdston, it tells of a young jazz singer in midcentury Chicago who’s trying to catch his big break. The show’s cast includes the vocalist Dee Dee Bridgewater (a National Endowment for the Arts Jazz Master), the stage actor Ben Vereen, the drummer Ulysses Owens Jr.’s New Century Jazz Orchestra and a Foley artist providing live sound effects.” (NYT-GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO)

NEW YORK CITY BALLET (through March 3).
at the NYS Theater, Lincoln Center / 8PM, $35+
“The final weekend of City Ballet’s winter season offers a tidy recap of the previous weeks. On Friday and Saturday afternoon, the company presents a Balanchine double bill with “Prodigal Son” and “Liebeslieder Walzer”; on Saturday evening it serves up a triple bill of new and revised work by William Forsythe, Kyle Abraham and Justin Peck; and on Sunday it concludes the season with a trifecta of works by Jerome Robbins, featuring “Interplay,” “In the Night” and “N.Y. Export: Opus Jazz.” (NYT-Brian Schaefer)

ALFREDO RODRIGUEZ AND PEDRITO MARTINEZ (Feb. 28-March 3)
at Jazz Standard / 7:30 and 9:30 p.m.; $30
“Rodriguez, a pianist, and Martinez, a percussionist and vocalist, are masters of Afro-Cuban rhythm who both hail from Havana, though they learned their craft in different settings: Rodriguez at clubs and solares — the housing units where much of Cuba’s African musical inheritance is passed down — and Martinez at various conservatories in the city. On “Duologue,” their new, Quincy Jones-produced album, the pair find plenty of generative energy in the space between their styles. They appear at the Standard in an unadorned duo.” (NYT-GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO)

Cyrille Aimee: A Sondheim Adventure (Feb.26-Mar.2)
Birdland, 315 W. 44th St./ 8:30PM, +11PM, $30-$40
Six decades after Stephen Sondheim’s ascendance as the doyen of Broadway composers, many jazz-inflected vocalists have yet to fully warm to his oeuvre, which bursts with songs whose musical constructions are as adroit as their lyrics are emotively penetrating. But the ever-game Cyrille Aimée is diving right in: on her smart new album, “Move On: A Sondheim Adventure,” she does justice to the master’s work with his warhorse “Send in the Clowns” nowhere in sight.” (Steve Futterman, NewYorker)

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Smart Stuff / Other NYC EventS

Andy Warhol After Pop
The New School, 66 W. 12th St./ 10AM-3PM, FREE, reservation required
“Andy Warhol’s activities after 1968 have long been understood as less influential and less innovative than his work in the early 1960s. However, his wide-ranging production in the ‘70s and ‘80s reveals a period of great experimentation, in which the artist further explored the possibilities of painterly abstraction, media technologies, studio practices, mass cultural forms and phenomena, and underground subcultures.

This symposium brings together scholars, curators, and artists to reassess Warhol’s activities in the period from 1968 until his death in 1987 in light of the Whitney exhibition Andy Warhol—From A to B and Back Again.”

Elsewhere, but these two Brooklyn events definitely  look worth the detour:

Target First Saturday at the Brooklyn Museum
Brooklyn Museum, 200 Eastern Parkway (Washington Ave.) / 5PM-11PM, FREE
“The free Target First Saturday at the Brooklyn Museum celebrates the special exhibition Half the Picture: A Feminist Look at the Collection with a night of film, music, and dance. Highlights include a performance by Ajna Dance Company, a film screening of Little Woods, and music from Quay Dash. ” (ThoughtGallery)

This is not exactly Manhattan’s WestSide but it is just across the river. Take the ferry.

New York City Drone Film Festival (Mar.1-2)
Liberty Science Center, NJ / Fri 5pm-12am; Sat 10am-4pm, $15-$25
“Drone enthusiasts can see the object of their affections and its cinematographic applications at the New York City Drone Film Festival on Friday and Saturday at the Liberty Science Center, with panels, screenings of movies shot using drones, and classes with hands-on experiences. Try it at your own risk.” (grubstreet)

“Drone camerawork has already attained new realms of astonishment. What’s so cool about the New York City Drone Film Festival is that it culls the best of that brilliance, and presents to the world the best of the best. I thought I’d seen it all—I was wrong.”  -David Pogue, Founder, Yahoo Tech

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Continuing Events

NYC Beer Week (Feb. 23-March 2)
The best week for craft beer lovers
“The NYC Brewers Guild’s annual celebration of all things hops, malt and a little madness, NYC Beer Week, returns with over 60 breweries taking part in more than 150 events, from walk-around tastings to tap takeovers, brewer talks and pairing dinners. With beers brewed special for the festival, it’s a chance to taste things you won’t find anywhere else in the company of people who love one thing above all else”. (Metro)

Bank of America Winter Village at Bryant Park
Midtown Manhattan’s winter wonderland.
Bryant Park (btw 5th/6th Ave. @42nd St.) / shops to 8PM, rink to 10PM
Enjoy The Lodge by Urbanspace, and The Rink, the centerpiece of Winter Village and New York City’s only free admission ice skating rink.
The Rink
This 17,000 square foot rink features free admission ice skating, high quality rental skates, and free skating shows, special events, and activities.
​October 27, 2018 – March 3, 2019 (only 3 more days!)
Daily, 8am-10pm (Rink hours are weather permitting and Rink may be closed for events – check here)

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♦ Before making final plans, we suggest you call the venue to confirm ticket availability, plus dates and times, as schedules are subject to change.
♦ NYCity, with a population of  8.6 million, had a record 65 million visitors last year and was TripAdvisor’s Traveler’s Choice Top U.S. Destination for 2018 – awesome! BUT quality shows draw crowds. Try to reserve seats for these top NYC events in advance, even if just earlier on the day of performance.

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Bonus: Nifty 9 – Best Cabarets / Piano Bars NYCity
These are my favorite places for an after dinner night on the town – music and drinks.
Hit the Hot Link and check out what’s happening tonight:

Feinstein’s/54 Below – 254 W 54th St.

The Green Room 42 – 570 Tenth Ave.

Don’t Tell Mama – 343 W 46th St.

The Rum House, in the Hotel Edison – 228 W. 47th St.

Laurie Beechman Theatre – 407 W 42nd St.

Marie’s Crisis – 59 Grove St.

The Duplex – 61 Christopher St.

Sid Gold’s Request Room – 165 W 26th St.

Cafe Carlyle, in the Carlyle Hotel – 35 E. 76th St.
This is the only one not located on Manhattan’s WestSide, and it ain’t cheap, but it has some of the finest singers.

For a comprehensive list of the best places to hear All Types of Live Music in Manhattan see the tab above “LiveMusic.”

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NYCity Vacation Travel Guide Video (Expedia):
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A PremierPub / Upper West Side

Dinosaur Bar-B-Que / 700 W125th St. @ 12th ave.

Walk only five minutes from the 125th St. station on the #1 line to find this authentic honky-tonk barbecue joint. Some folks think Dinosaur is just a place to eat ribs. Au contraire. With 24 carefully selected taps, this is a place to drink beer, and eat ribs.

HarlHostStandNo food goes better with American craft ales than American barbecue. Dinosaur may be the best combo of good beer drinking and hearty eating in town, which makes the trip uptown to West Harlem totally worthwhile.

This second incarnation of Dinosaur in Harlem is in a two story, old brick warehouse near the Hudson River. Don’t let that run down exterior fool you. Inside it’s a large space with huge, rough wooden columns and unfinished wooden floors and brick walls – just right for a bbq joint. As soon as you open the front door you are hit with that tantalizing aroma of barbecue coming from the large open kitchen. Reminds me of those great rib joints I frequented when stationed in North Carolina all those years ago. If your stomach wasn’t grumbling before, it is now.

Head to the bar, sit down and try to decide on a beer. It’s not an easy decision – a good problem to have. This is a pretty damn good beer list to choose from, one that most beer bars should be jealous of. I love that they feature NY craft beers. You may want to try the four beer sampler, which is always fun, and in this place may be necessary.

The blues music playing in the background will get you in the mood for their North Carolina style barbecue, and even when it’s a full house your order shouldn’t take too long (assuming you snagged a table). The food is all slow smoked, so it’s already mostly done and ready to go. I always start with an order of their giant, spice rubbed wings, so good they may make you give up Buffalo wings.

Unfortunately, a place this good does not fly under the radar. There can be some long waits for a table at dinnertime. So you need a strategy – avoid prime time, and try not to arrive with your entire posse, which will limit your seating options.

A seat at the bar, a small table in the bar area, or in the summer, an outside table underneath what’s left of the elevated West Side Highway, all may open before a table inside the main dining room. Otherwise, try Dinosaur for lunch, or come very late for dinner, maybe after a show at the nearby Cotton Club nightclub.

Website: http://www.dinosaurbarbque.com/
Phone #: 212-694-1777
Hours: Mo-Th 11:30am-11:00pm; Fr-Sa 11:30am-12:00am;
Su 12:00pm-10:00pm
Happy Hour: 4-7pm every day; $1 off all drinks
Music: Fri / Sat 10:30pm
Subway: #1 to 125th St.
Walk 2 blk W on 125th St. to Dinosaur Bar-B-Q,
just past the elevated highway.
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“Pub” is used in it’s broadest sense – bars, bar/restaurants, jazz clubs, wine bars, tapas bars, craft beer bars, dive bars, cocktail lounges, and of course, pubs – just about anyplace you can get a drink without a cover charge (except for certain jazz clubs).

If you have a fave premier pub or good eating place on Manhattan’s WestSide let us all know about it – leave a  comment. 
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