Galactic featuring Anjelika “Jelly” Joseph (far left) will perform at the 2025 Crawfish Fest in Augusta.
Here is a roundup of major arts events taking place around New Jersey, through June 5.
MUSIC
• Galactic will perform with singer Anjelika “Jelly” Joseph at 5 p.m. — and the New Orleans-based band’s drummer, Stanton Moore, will also perform a set of his own at 1 p.m. — on May 31, the first full day of this year’s Crawfish Fest, taking place at Sussex County Fairgrounds in Augusta. Moore has released a number of solo albums since 1998 — in addition to his work with Galactic, the band Garage a Trois, and other projects.
Other May 31 performers will include Bonerama, Maggie Koerner, Eddie 9V, Rockin’ Dopsie Jr. & the Zydeco Twisters, Amis du Teche and Cold Hill, with Carolyn Wonderland and Corey Harris performing at night, for campers and King Crawfish Krewe members only.
The lineup for June 1 is Jon Cleary & the Absolute Monster Gentlemen, George Porter Jr. & the Runnin’ Pardners, Marcia Ball, Terrance Simien & the Zydeco Experience, Southern Avenue, Ocean Avenue Stompers and United by Music USA.
Johnny Sketch & the Dirty Notes, Uncle Shoehorn’s Big Easy and Amis du Teche will perform the night of May 30, for campers and King Crawfish Krewe members only.
Louisiana native Michael Arnone has been presenting Crawfish Fest (featuring Louisiana music and food) annually in New Jersey since 1989, though there were no events in 2023 and 2024.
JOHN CAVANAUGH
Tony Orlando performs at The New Jersey Hall of Fame ceremony at NJPAC in Newark in 2023.
• Tony Orlando retired from touring last year, but is still making some occasional appearances. One will be at a free show presented by The Garden State Arts Foundation, June 5 at 7:30 p.m. at The PNC Bank Arts Center in Holmdel.
Veteran disk jockey Bruce “Cousin Brucie” Morrow will host the show, and Andy Kim, whose vintage pop hits include “Rock Me Gently” and “Baby, I Love You,” will also perform.
See a video message from Orlando about the show, below.
• Tony Orlando, who was inducted into The New Jersey Hall of Fame in 2023, will also make an appearance at the Hall itself, at the American Dream mall in East Rutherford, June 3 from 1 to 3 p.m. He will meet fans, participate in a question-and-answer session, and perform a karaoke duet with his own hologram.
• The Bongos — Richard Barone, James Mastro, Rob Norris and Frank Giannini — will reunite to celebrate the release of their archival concert album, The Shroud of Touring: Live in 1985, May 31 at 7:30 p.m. at The Wonder Bar in Asbury Park, with The Grip Weeds opening.
The Bongos formed in 1980 in Hoboken, and the album was recorded at the now-defunct Tradewinds nightclub in Sea Bright. The band broke up soon afterwards, but has continued to reunite occasionally in the years since then.
• June 5 at 7:30 p.m. — the night before his 86th birthday — Gary U.S. Bonds will sing classic-rock hits such as “New Orleans” and “Quarter to Three” at The Vogel at The Count Basie Center for the Arts in Red Bank. Bonds, of course, has deep ties to the New Jersey rock scene; after not having any hits since the early ’60s, he made a successful comeback in the early ’80s with the help of Bruce Springsteen and other members of The E Street Band, reaching the Top 40 again with two Springsteen-written songs, “This Little Girl” and “Out of Work.”
Glen Burtnik, far right, in an early ’90s Styx publicity photo.
• Glen Burtnik of The Weeklings has also released solo albums and written hits for other artists. And from 1990 to 1991 and then again from 1999 to 2003, he was a member of the band Styx. And in the first of those two stints, he co-wrote the band’s hits “Love Is the Ritual” and “Love at First Sight.”
He will present a show titled “Glen Burtnik Plays the Music of Styx” — marking the first time he has done anything like this — May 30 at 8 p.m. at The Count Basie Center for the Arts in Red Bank. Joining him will be guitarists Jimmy Leahey and August Zadra and drummer Dave Anthony — who have all played in former Styx member Dennis DeYoung’s solo band — along with bassist Kasim Sulton and keyboardist Eric Troyer.
• The Dave Matthews Band — who were inducted into The Rock and Roll Hall of Fame last year (Julia Roberts gave the induction speech, praising “the joyous, spontaneous abandon with which they play”) — will perform at The PNC Bank Arts Center in Holmdel, June 3 at 7:30 p.m., and also will return to New Jersey later in the summer, for shows at The Freedom Mortgage Pavilion in Camden, July 25-26 at 7:30 p.m.
• The Montclair Jazz Festival will take place on Sept. 13, but various events connected to it will be presented before then, including a free June 1 kick-off concert, titled “Swingin’ on the Plaza,” that will also start this summer’s Outdoor Concert Series at The Wellmont Arts Plaza in Montclair. Bands associated with Jazz House Kids, the educational organization that presents the Montclair Jazz Festival, will perform from noon to 4 p.m.
• Stanley Clarke, a leading jazz bassist since the 1970s, is performing with younger musicians — drummer Jeremiah Collier, keyboardist Beka Gochiashvili, guitarist Colin Cook and saxophonist Emilio Modeste — in his new band, billed as Stanley Clarke N • 4EVER (a nod to the influential fusion band he co-founded in 1972, Return to Forever). They will perform at The McCarter Theatre Center in Princeton, June 1 at 7:30 p.m.
• The South Orange Downtown organization will present a free Under Cover Music Fest, June 1 from 2 to 10 p.m. at The Sloan Street Parking Lot, with performances by Workingman’s Jed (Grateful Dead tribute), Chaance Barnes (Erykah Badu tribute), The Local Heroes (Sheryl Crow tribute), Valarie Adams & the Dimension Band (Tina Turner/Motown tribute), Blues People (B.B. King/Albert King/Freddie King tribute), Eli Bolin & Allison Posner (Fleetwood Mac tribute) and others. (Note: This show was moved from May 31 to June 1 because of a forecast of bad weather on May 31.)
MARTIN SEXTON
• The Outpost in the Burbs will present Martin Sexton‘s “Abbey Road Show” at The First Congregational Church in Montclair, May 31 at 8 p.m. Sexton will perform The Beatles’ great 1970 album — including songs such as “Here Comes the Sun,” “Something,” “Come Together,” “Octopus’s Garden” and the epic Side 2 medley — in its entirety, before a set of his own material.
This will be the last show of The Outpost’s 2024-25 season.
• Among the acts performing at the free, May 30-31 Jersey City Jazz Festival this year will be The Rumble featuring Big Chief Joseph Boudreaux Jr., who are scheduled for May 30 at 8 p.m. at the RWJBarnabas Health Plaza Stage on the Hudson River Waterfront. The group, nominated for Grammys in the Regional Roots Music Album category both last year and this year, makes funky Mardi Gras music with influences from the worlds of jazz, hip-hop and more.
For a complete list of festival offerings, visit riverviewjazz.org/jersey-city-jazz-festival.
• Low Cut Connie — which released a new protest single, “Livin in the USA,” this week — will present a free show in the Sundown Music Series at McLaughlin Norcross Memorial Dell at Haddon Lake Park in Haddon Heights, June 4 at 7:30 p.m. with singer-songwriter Sug Daniels opening.
In the song, frontman Adam Weiner sings from the point of view of someone who is living in the United States “but it ain’t my home … my kind of people, they ain’t never gonna leave us alone.”
He also sings about “screaming in the midnight, ‘Don’t take my child away,’ ” and compares the country’s current situation to Halloween, “when you realize the dream is gone.”
BRANTLEY GUTIERREZ
CONRAD TAO
• New Jersey Symphony will wrap up its 2024-25 season with shows at The Mayo Performing Arts Center in Morristown, June 5 at 7:30 p.m.; The Richardson Auditorium at Princeton University, June 6 at 8 p.m.; The Count Basie Center for the Arts in Red Bank, June 7 at 8 p.m.; and Prudential Hall at NJPAC in Newark, June 8 at 3 p.m. The orchestra’s music director, Xian Zhang, will conduct, and Conrad Tao will be featured on piano. The program will include Sergei Rachmaninoff’s Piano Concerto No. 2; and Dmitri Shostakovich’s Symphony No. 5.
THEATER
• Luna Stage in West Orange will present “The Ground on Which We Stand (Abridged),” June 5-7, 12-14, and 19-22. Conceived and directed by Luna Stage’s artistic director Ari Laura Kreith, this work was inspired by the history of the James Howe House (the first home in Montclair to be owned by a formerly enslaved person) and addresses more than 200 years of African American history. It was written by Turron Kofi Alleyne, Jenny Lyn Bader, Sakinah Hofler, Stephen Kaplan, Kyle Mazer, Kathleen McGhee-Anderson, Diane Polledri, Martine Sainvil, TyLie Shider, Mo Schlick, Melissa Toomey and Richard Wesley; abriged by Shider; and will be performed as a solo piece by Naja Selby-Morton, who starred in Luna Stage’s recent production of “the ripple, the wave that carried me home.”
• The Lord Stirling Theater Company will launch its 10th anniversary season at The Farmstead Arts Center in Basking Ridge with Oliver Goldsmith’s 1773 comedy “She Stoops to Conquer” — which it describes as “a rom-com for the ages that is part ‘Downton Abbey ‘and part Monty Python” and “a play about deception and romance in a proper British family” — on May 30-31 and June 1 and 6-8.
• The Passage Theatre Company will present staged readings of David Robson’s “Muleheaded,” May 31 and June 1. In this “based on a true story” work, writers Zora Neale Hurston and Langston Hughes clash while teaming up to write the 1930 play “Mule Bone.”
DANCE
• The Montclair Dance Festival will take place at Montclair State University, May 31, with free performances by established and emerging artists, studios and schools in the university’s amphitheater from 2 to 5:30 p.m.; and a ticketed show featuring performances by professional New Jersey artists (Carolyn Dorfman Dance, Freespace Dance, Jason Samulson Smith, Leanna Cotton, Nai-Ni Chen Dance Company, New Jersey Ballet, Nimbus Dance Works, Roxey Ballet, Sukayana & Dancers, Umoja Dance Company) at The Kasser Theater at 7:30 p.m.
The cover of Dave Davies’ book “Living on a Thin Line: The Autobiography.”
BOOKS
• Dave Davies of The Kinks will sign copies of his 2022 book “Living on a Thin Line: The Autobiography,” June 1 at 11 a.m. at the Bookends bookstore in Ridgewood. Attendees will need a book for entry.
Davies, who now lives in Bergen County, formed The Kinks with his brother Ray (plus drummer Mick Avory and bassist Pete Quaife) in London, in 1963. Dave was the group’s dynamic and inventive lead guitarist, and though Ray was the frontman, Dave occasionally wrote songs and sang lead on them.
According to promotional material, “In his autobiography, Davies revisits the glory days of the band that spawned so much extraordinary music, and which had such a profound influence on bands from The Clash and Van Halen to Oasis and Blur. Full of tales of the tumultuous times and the ups-and-downs of his relationship with his brother Ray, along with encounters with the likes of John Lennon and Jimi Hendrix, this will be a glorious read for Kinks fans and anyone who wants to read about the heyday of rock ‘n’ roll.”
OTHER
• “Sinatra Meets the Sopranos” — taking place at The Count Basie Center for the Arts in Red Bank, May 31 at 7:30 p.m. — will feature discussion by actors Vincent Curatola, Federico Castelluccio and Jason Cerbone, plus Frank Sinatra music performed by singer Michael Martocci with his Blue Eyes Orchestra. Curatola, Castelluccio and Cerbone played Johnny “Sack” Sacramoni, Furio Guinta and Jackie Aprile Jr., respectively, in the landmark HBO mob series.
REVIEWS
“James Prosek: At Work” at Morris Museum, Morris Township. (Through June 8)
“Tatyana Kazakova: In Spite of Our Fears” at Grover House Gallery, Caldwell. (Through June 27)
“Disney’s The Little Mermaid” at Paper Mill Playhouse, Millburn. (Through June 29)
“Nanette Carter: A Question of Balance” at Montclair Art Museum. (Through July 6)
“Andrea Chung: The Ocean Doesn’t Recognize Tears” at Project for Empty Space, Newark. (Through Aug. 17)
“Indigenous Identities: Here, Now & Always” at Zimmerli Art Museum, New Brunswick. (Through Dec. 21)
“Morven Revealed: Untold Stories From New Jersey’s Most Historic Home” at Morven Museum & Garden, Princeton. (Through March 1)
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