ProArteDanza: Season 2017
Kevin O'Day has created a ballet piece set to the music of Toronto's Lemon Bucket Orkestra. Should someone tell Tchaikovsky the news? A top-notch contemporary ballet company trips the light allegro with a triple bill of premieres that includes not only two new works from O'Day, but a collaboration between choreographer Matjash Mrozewski and playwright Anna Chatterton that explores timely issues, including global warming.
To Nov. 4, 8 p.m. $22 to $50. Fleck Dance Theatre, 207 Queens Quay W., 416-973-4000 or harbourfrontcentre.com.
Black Star
Speaking of global warming, necks seem to be redder than ever these days. Which makes the first film in the retrospective Black Star, which celebrates a century of black excellence on screen, as timely as ever. Norman Jewison's sweaty 1967 drama In the Heat of the Night (Nov. 17, 6:30 p.m.) is set in a segregated Mississippi town, with stinging performances from Rod Steiger as the chief of police at odds with Sidney Poitier as a detective.
Nov. 3 to Dec. 22. $10 to $14. TIFF Bell Lightbox, 350 King St. W., 416-599-8433 or tiff.net.
Bela Fleck and Abigail Washburn
He's a little bit banjo. And she's a little bit, well, she's a little bit banjo, too. The new album from the husband-and-wife duo is Echo in the Valley, a followup to their Grammy-winning self-titled debut from 2014. Three-finger and clawhammer styles are employed for an innovative take on old-timey Appalachia, from a couple with elegant pluck and tasteful roots music ideas.
Nov. 3, 8 p.m. $59.50 to $74.50. Danforth Music Hall, 147 Danforth Ave., 855-985-5000 or ticketmaster.ca.
Vikings: The Exhibition
Odin-loving rape-and-pillagers? Hunky blonde sailors with a taste for roughhousing? A purple-wearing professional football team based in Minnesota? An exhibition of interactive and immersive experiences (along with objects rarely displayed outside Scandinavia) aims to explore myths, challenge clichéd perceptions and illuminate an ancient culture.
Nov. 4 to April 2, 2018. $21 to $32. Royal Ontario Museum, 100 Queen's Park, 416-586-8000 or rom.on.ca.
The Semer Ensemble
The music of Berlin-based Semer Records was lost for 60 years, the victim of Nazis who, in 1938, destroyed a record shop and all of the label's master recordings. Ethnomusicologist Rainer Lots scoured the world to find the original vinyl copies and reassemble the catalogue of Yiddish folk and theatre songs, Berlin cabaret, Russian and Ukrainian folk songs, operatic arias and cantorial music, all which a touring all-star troupe now presents.
Nov. 8, 8 p.m., $40. George Weston Recital Hall, 5040 Yonge St., 855-985-2787 or ticketmaster.ca.
Brad Wheeler