To honor UMass Amherst's deep roots in the performing and fine arts, the UMass Fine Arts Center and the College of Humanities & Fine Arts will host the third annual Spring Arts Festival.
Held in the late spring semester, the festival reaffirms the institution’s commitment to the arts — both student-focused and professional — through a series of high-caliber events, theater and musical performances, art exhibitions, conferences, open classrooms, and more.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Visual Art, Artists, and Cultures
Monday, March 24
10:10-11 a.m.
Integrative Learning Center, room S231
Sonja Drimmer, Department of History of Art and Architecture
This course explores the discipline of art history and the tools of visual analysis it employs. The course focuses on issues such as classicism, "primitive" art, realism, and modernity, presented in roughly chronological order. Discussion of these issues is situated in relation to contemporary visual culture.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Research Forum
Monday, March 24
11:30-12:45 p.m.
Olver Design Building, room 225
Pari Riahi, architecture
This course explores a variety of approaches to research in architecture, helping students develop their interests and configure methods and processes that will allow them to advance in their thesis projects. While exploring the landscape of research, in writing and drawing, issues of agency, creativity, and positionality are discussed to situate each student’s interest within a larger and more nuanced fabric of social, cultural, and environmental landscape.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Race, Sexuality, and the Law in Early America
Monday, March 24
2:30-3:45 p.m.
New Africa House, room 311
Anne Kerth, W.E.B. Du Bois Department Afro-American Studies
What is race? What is sexuality? How did early American history shape the legal structures that would come to define racial and sexual identities and possibilities? And how do modern American ideas about race and sexuality reflect historical legal conflations of race and sexuality? In this course, students will examine how African, European, and Native American ideas about race and sexuality influenced the development of colonial, early republican, and antebellum America, with a special focus on the evolution of American legal frameworks undergirding racial and sexual hierarchies.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Fundamentals of Acting
Tuesday, March 25
11:30-12:30 p.m.
Randolph W. Bromery Center for Arts, room 204
Gina Kaufmann, theater
This joyful performance class required for theater majors, but open to all majors, is a professionally focused introduction to the process of acting. The emphasis is on spontaneity; ensemble building; listening and responding; objectives, actions and obstacles; and given circumstances. While these are foundational skills for performers, they are also the skills needed for empathetic and charismatic communication in any field.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Mystical Literature
Tuesday, March 25
1-2:15 p.m.
Herter Hall, room 108
Jessica Barr, languages, literatures, and cultures
This class will explore mystical literature of a variety of religious traditions. Reading these texts as literary expressions of union or contact with the transcendent, we will analyze the ways in which they seek to capture what is usually considered to be an inexpressible, non-verbal experience. Readings will draw from the mystical traditions of Islam, Christianity, Judaism, Hinduism, Taoism, and Buddhism.
Success Stories: Undergraduate Award Winners
Thursday, March 27
10-11 a.m.
Randolph W. Bromery Center for the Arts lobby
Undergraduate panel moderated by Cara Takakjian, associate dean for DEI and professional development .
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Seminar on Plato’s Republic
Thursday, March 27
10-12:30 p.m.
South College, room E301
Vanessa de Harven, philosophy
Plato’s Republic is an intricate and sophisticated work of ethics, moral psychology, metaphysics, epistemology, and, of course, politics. Over the course of the semester we will undertake a close reading of this powerful dialogue, and discover Plato’s enduring relevance to society and the human condition. The triumphs and woes of the Athenian democracy are not far from our own. There is much talk of justice, but virtually no agreement as to what justice even is.
Faculty Lightning Talks
Thursday, March 27
11-1 p.m.
Randolph W. Bromery Center for the Arts lobby
HFA Faculty Lightning Talks invite HFA faculty to present on their ongoing research and creative projects during a "lightning" discussion of 10 minutes each.
“Public Art, Emerging Technologies, and Archives,” Juana Valdes, art
"Shit Greek Poetry," Simon Oswald, classics
“Yes, There Were Student Loans in the Middle Ages!” Jen Adams, English
“Power in Play: The Drawings of Laylah Ali,” Karen Kurczynski, history of art and architecture
“MEGA Protests and Far-Right Performances,” David Rodriguez-Solas, languages, literatures and cultures
“Conducting Business,” Marianna Ritchey, music and dance
“Guesses and Degrees of Belief,” Sophie Horowitz, philosophy
Graduate Student Exposition
Thursday, March 27
1-3 p.m.
Randolph W. Bromery Center for the Arts lobby
Convened by Lisa Green, associate dean for graduate education and student success, this event will showcase graduate student research and scholarship.
Faculty Special Initiatives
Thursday, March 27
3:30-5:30 p.m.
Integrative Learning Center, room N400
“Too Small to Succeed?” Ray Mann, architecture
“Slavery North Initiative,” Charmaine Nelson, history of art and architecture and David Montero, artist-in-residence fellow
Regina Galasso, languages, literatures, and cultures
“Decolonial Graduate Studies: The World Studies Interdisciplinary Project, the Graduate Certificate in Decolonial Global Studies, and Beyond," Asha Nadkarni, English and Mwangi wa Gĩthĩnji, economics
Toussaint Losier and Yolanda Covington, W.E.B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies
“Question Everything: A residential pre-college program for high school students from Springfield and Holyoke,” Ned Markosian and Julia Jorati, philosophy
“10 years of Civic Art Lab: A laboratory for art, design, and sustainability,” Jeff Kasper, art
Exhibition and Artist Talk
Thursday, March 27
4-6 p.m.
Herter Gallery
Tumulus: a multimedia exhibition by Iranian artist Iman Tash
Why do I Learn Languages?
Friday, March 28
10-11 a.m.
Randolph W. Bromery Center for the Arts lobby
Undergraduate panel moderated by Professor Ela Gezen, languages literatures and cultures, and Professor Teresa Ramsby, classics.
Faculty Lightning Talks
Friday, March 28
11 a.m - 1 p.m.
Randolph W. Bromery Center for the Arts lobby
HFA Faculty Lightning Talks invite HFA faculty to present on their ongoing research and creative projects during a "lightning" discussion of 10 minutes each.
“Meaning-Making in Community-Engaged Architectural Design Studio Practice,” Erika Zekos, architecture
“Imperial Addiction: British India and the Origin of the Opium War,” Matt Wormer, history
“Carpet Craze: Oriental Rug Merchants in the West,” Aviva Ben Ur, Judaic and near Eastern studies
“Memory Activism and Remembering Activism in Documentaries about and around 1989,” Mariana Ivanova, languages, literatures, and cultures
“Logic Penguin: An Open Educational Resource,” Kevin Klement, philosophy
“Word internal code-switching,” Faruk Akkus, linguistics
“The You-Cube: a new model of theater-making,” Anya Klepikov, theater
Student Art Sale
Friday, March 28
Noon-4 p.m.
Studio Arts Building
Master of Architecture Thesis Review
Friday, March 28
12:30-3:30 p.m.
John W. Olver Design Building commons
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Friday, March 28
Jazz Dance
4-5 p.m.
Totman, room 204
Lauren Cox, dance
Experience jazz rhythms through movement while learning about the basic elements and history of Black Sanctuary Practices in the Americas. Come prepared to move, as this class will take you through a warm up, touch upon cleansing rituals and teach authentic solo jazz combinations.
Polish Classical Music Concert by award-winning violinist Wojciech Niedziółka and pianist Tony Lin
Sunday, March 30
3 p.m.
Bowker Auditorium
Presented by: Comparative Literature Department, Amesbury Chair
Come and enjoy this exciting performance of pieces for violin and piano by Paderewski, Wieniawski, Szymanowski, and Chopin.
Free and open to the public.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Art & Code
Monday, March 31
9:05-11:50 a.m.
Studio Arts Building, room TBD
Roopa Vasudevan, art
This studio course explores the creative possibilities of code-based art. Students explore interactive artwork using both analog and digital processes; learn computer programming fundamentals in an arts context; and gain an understanding of procedural, generative, and algorithmic logic as seen within a range of art and design practices. Emphasis is on the development of creative studio projects that demonstrate independent experimentation with the tools and concepts explored in class.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Intermediate Italian II
Monday, March 31
11:15 a.m. - 12:05 p.m.
Herter Hall, room 205
Melina Masterson, languages, literatures, and cultures
Italian 240 consists of continued study of the structural and communicative components of Italian language and has the goal of further developing proficiency at the intermediate level. Students will develop mastery of essential grammatical forms, increase knowledge of specialized vocabulary, further explore Italian history and culture, and strengthen oral and written communication skills.
Jason Kotoch MFA Thesis Exhibition 'The meaning is as thin as the breath between us'
Exhibition: March 31 – April 5
Opening Reception: Monday, March 31; 4-6 p.m.
Herter Art Gallery
Presented by: Department of Art
The meaning is as thin as the breath between us explores meaning making through visual, written and spoken language, starting from the artist’s bi-cultural experience as a Lebanese American and examining culture, family mythologies, and histories.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Fundamentals of Speech Sounds
Tuesday, April 1
11:30 a.m. - 12:45 p.m.
Hasbrouck Laboratory, room 242
Joe Pater, linguistics
This course provides an introduction to the rich diversity of the sounds of the world’s languages and the different ways that they are used across those languages. Students learn how to analyze individual sounds and their patterning in a language.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Caribbean Literature: The Sea Is History
Tuesday, April 1
1-2:15 p.m.
South College, room W205
Rachel Mordecai, English
Contemporary works from the English-, French-, and Spanish-speaking literatures of the Caribbean, comprising a mixture of "canonical" and emerging authors. Mordecai’s class develops a collective interpretation of a Caribbean text through a series of guided writing and discussion activities.
Jazz Ensemble I Plays Benny Carter's Kansas City Suite
Tuesday, April 1
7:30 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
Jazz Ensemble I plays Benny Carter’s Kansas City Suite as recorded by the Count Basie Orchestra. Jeffrey W. Holmes, director, with Hugo Sanbone Ensemble.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Wind Ensemble
Wednesday, April 2
10:10-11:50 a.m.
Randolph W. Bromery Center for Arts, room 36
Matthew Westgate, music and dance
The UMass Wind Ensemble is the premiere wind, brass, percussion performance ensemble at UMass. Westgate will lead musicians in the wind ensemble to prepare diverse repertoire for an upcoming performance.
New Chamber Music Concert
Wednesday, April 2
7:30 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
New Chamber Music Concert with Steven Beck
Mindfulness at the Museum / First Thursday
April 3
5-8 p.m.
University Museum of Contemporary Art
University Museum of Contemporary Art
The museum stays open late on the first Thursday of each month. Come visit our amazing exhibitions, Is anything the matter? Drawings by Laylah Ali and High Five/Take Five. Make the night even more enriching by participating in a thirty-minute mindfulness session using our two exhibitions as jumping off points into mindfulness. The sessions are led by artist Mike Medeiros, who is certified by Brown University’s Mindfulness to teach a mindfulness-based stress reduction course.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Water, Oil and Blood: The Middle East in Global Policy
Thursday, April 3
10-11:15 a.m.
Integrative Learning Center, room S311
David Mednicoff, Judaic and Near Eastern studies
Using the substances of water, oil, and blood as metaphors for aspects of history, sociopolitical development, identity, and conflict, this course serves as a broad, multi-disciplinary introduction to the societies and politics of the contemporary Middle East and North Africa.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Africa Since 1500
Thursday, April 3
1-2:15 p.m.
Herter Hall, Room 206
Elizabeth Jacob, history
Jacob narrates the oft-forgotten history of African soldiers’ participation in World Wars I and II.
HFA Days 2025 Open Classrooms
Greek Archaeology
Thursday, April 3
2:30-3:45 p.m.
Herter Hall, room 111
Shannon Hogue, classics
This course introduces students to the fundamental methods of archaeology, including excavation, survey, and dating techniques as a means of systematically gathering evidence regarding ancient societies. Students will then learn methods of analyzing and interpreting archaeological evidence to understand the social institutions and human behavior during major periods of ancient Greek history, from the Late Bronze Age through the Classical period (1700 BC – 323 BC).
Amesbury Spring Lecture: Piotr Gorecki (UC Riverside): "'But Perhaps You Germans Don't Fully Understand … ': Law and Identity in Medieval Poland"
Thursday, April 3
5 p.m.
TBA
Presented by: Comparative Literature, Amesbury Chair
Identity and law are subjects of long-standing interest among historians of medieval Europe. The German and Polish legal systems have been studied on its own terms; this talk brings them together. Reception to follow.
Graphic Novels & Comics Pop-Up Library Fest
Thursday, April 3
11a.m. - 4:30 p.m.
W.E.B. Du Bois Library
Book Fest: lobby
Book display: lower level throughout April.
Presented by: Arts and Humanities Unit, Academic Engagement, University Libraries
All are invited to the W.E.B. Du Bois Library to explore a showcase of graphic novels and comics from the libraries’ collections and enjoy candy from all over the world. Guided zine-making and embroidery activities offer a hands-on opportunity to be inspired by and engage with the creative works on display through the month.
https://guides.library.umass.edu/graphic-novels-and-comics/fest.
Be Revolutionary: UMass Student Solidarity with Central America in the 1980s
Exhibition: April 3 – April 30
Opening reception: 4-6 p.m.
Randolph W. Bromery Center for the Arts lobby
Presented by: Department of History
This student-curated exhibition explores US intervention and collective struggle in Central America, and how UMass students attempted to create a more just future. During the 1980s, students and workers at the University of Massachusetts Amherst organized against the US government’s support for right-wing terrorism in Central America. Student protests against CIA recruitment on campus and university ties to weapons contractors led to arrests and effectively turned the case into a public trial of the CIA. They also worked to end US military aid.
Exhibit website
Reception and curator’s talk for Multiverse curated by D. Dominick Lombardi
April 4
5-7 p.m.
Hampden Gallery
Multiverse focuses on the recognition, conscious or subconscious, and interpretation of the concept of the multiverse in contemporary visual art. Featuring digital art from Europe and the Americas, juxtaposed with analog works by artists from the northeastern United States, Multiverse’s curator D. Dominick Lombardi gives visitors the opportunity to see and discuss previously unimagined possibilities.
Opening reception for Your Ghost Haunts My Shores by Eva Lin Fahey
April 4
5-7 p.m.
Augusta Savage Gallery April 4
5-7 p.m.
Augusta Savage Gallery
Your Ghost Haunts My Shores is a collection of paintings and mixed media works by Eva Lin Fahey that explores the complexity of adoptee loss by drawing past and future ghosts into the messiness of the present. Fahey’s work considers how familial, geographic, and cultural loss follows her experience as part of the Asian adoptee diaspora. Layered with imagined ghosts and dreamt oceans, the imagery exists in a liminal world that grasps what-ifs, dreams, and longings — creating narratives of belonging that arrive and depart without answers
Almanac Arts Workshop with Artist in Residence Felicity Sheehy
Friday, April 4
4:30 p.m.
Arthur F. Kinney Center for Interdisciplinary Renaissance Studies
The Kinney Center features a workshop with the newest Renaissance of the Earth Artist in Residence Felicity Sheehy. One of Narrative Magazine's 30 below 30 emerging writers, Sheehy’s 2021 debut chapbook Losing the Farm won first place in the Munster Literature Centre's international chapbook competition. Sheehy is a poet and a PhD candidate in Renaissance Literature at Princeton University.
Gallery Opening and Student Exhibits: Marios Philippides Collection of Ancient Greek Artifacts
Friday, April 4
1:30 p.m.
Herter 524
Presented by: Department of Classics
The classics department is hosting an event to mark the opening of our first student-curated gallery. Classics undergraduates whose internships have been supported by the Kress Foundation will present their research on the department's new Marios Philippides collection of ancient Greek artifacts.
MFA for Poets and Writers’ Juniper Literary Festival 2025
Friday, April 4
5-9 p.m.
Goodell Hall, Bernie Dallas Room
The MFA for Poets and Writers presents a two-day celebration of poetry, fiction, and creative non-fiction. The festival features readings, panel discussions, conversations with agents, editors, and publishers, and opportunities to talk with emerging and established literary artists.
Reception: 5 p.m.
MFA faculty reading with Desiree C. Bailey and Gabriel Bump: 6 p.m.
Reception and book signing: 7 p.m.
Live Lit featuring students from the MFA for Poets and Writers: 7:30 p.m.
27th Annual High School Jazz Festival
Saturday, April 5
9 a.m. - 5 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall and Frederick C. Tillis Performance Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
With UMass jazz faculty, guest adjudicators, and Etienne Charles, guest clinician
Seasonal Distortions: An Almanac for the Anthropocene
Saturday, April 5
1-2 p.m.
Arthur F. Kinney Center for Interdisciplinary Renaissance Studies
A Renaissance of the Earth poetry reading with artist in residence Felicity Sheehy
Created in conversation with the Kinney Center’s early modern almanacs, husbandry guides, and botanicals, this collection of original poems explores enduring themes of seasonal instability that link our current climate crisis to early modernity’s little ice age. Artistic poet and early modern scholar, Felicity Sheehy (Princeton University), reimagines four months of the year —February, April, June, and November — in her original almanac, which will be displayed alongside Kinney Center collections in the library and gallery.
Etienne Charles: Creole Soul
Saturday, April 5
8 p.m.
Frederick C. Tillis Performance Hall
Reserved $40, $30
Youth 17 and under and Five College students $15
Trinidad-born trumpeter and bandleader Etienne Charles’ compositions evoke musical traditions from the Caribbean and across the African diaspora while remaining firmly rooted in jazz. Charles has earned critical acclaim with his exciting performances, thrilling compositions, and knack for connecting with audiences worldwide. JazzTimes calls Charles a “daring improviser who delivers with heart wrenching lyricism." DownBeat magazine says, "Charles delivers his ebullient improvisations with the elegance of a world-class ballet dancer."
“Almanac Arts” Reading with Artist in Residence Felicity Sheehy
Saturday, April 5
1-3 p.m.
Arthur F. Kinney Center for Interdisciplinary Renaissance Studies
Created in conversation with the Kinney Center’s early modern almanacs, husbandry guides, and botanicals, “Almanac Arts” explores enduring themes of seasonal instability that link our current climate crisis to early modernity’s little ice age. Artistic poet and early modern scholar, Felicity Sheehy, reimagines four months of the year in her original almanac, which will be displayed alongside Kinney Center collections.
MFA for Poets and Writers’ Juniper Literary Festival
Saturday, April 5
3:30-7 p.m.
Herter Hall, 231
The MFA for Poets and Writers presents a two-day celebration of poetry, fiction, and creative non-fiction. The festival features readings, panel discussions, conversations with agents, editors, and publishers, and opportunities to talk with emerging and established literary artists.
Editors and publishing panel: 3:30
Featuring Nadxieli Nieto, Algonquin; Suzanna Tamminen, Wesleyan University Press; and others
MFA Alumni Reading: 5 p.m
Featuring Jedediah Berry, Gion Davis, Emilie Menzel, and Okey Ndibe
Reception and book signing: 6 p.m.
UMass Bassoon Day
Sunday, April 6
All day
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
Rémy Taghavi, coordinator
2025 Writer-in-Residence Alan Taylor
April 7 – April 11
Presented by: Department of History
The History Department’s 2025 writer-in-residence is Alan Taylor, a historian who has been awarded the Pulitzer for two of his many books: William Cooper’s Town: Power and Persuasion on the Frontier of the Early American Republic (Knopf, 1995) and The Internal Enemy: Slavery and War in Virginia, 1772-1832 (W.W. Norton, 2013).
Guest Artist Concert: Ignacio Corrales & Fernanda Gonzalez, percussion
Monday, April 7
7:30 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
The People’s Supper: Is anything the matter? Drawings by Laylah Ali
With artist Laylah Ali
Free to all UMass students. Registration required.
Tuesday, April 8, 5-8 p.m.
University Museum of Contemporary Art and Randolph W. Bromery Center for the Arts lobby
Enjoy a family-style People’s Supper meal. Laylah Ali will give a talk on her exhibition at the University Museum of Contemporary Art, and students will participate in an art and poetry activity.
Faculty Concert: Joshua Michal, horn
Tuesday, April 8
7:30 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music & Dance
Free to the public
Ruthie Baker MFA Thesis Exhibition: Noise of Time
Exhibition: Monday, April 7 through Saturday, April 12
Opening reception: Tuesday, April 8, 4-6 p.m.
Herter Art Gallery
Presented by: Department of Art
Noise of Time explores grief, memory, and the impermanence of life using the ethereal effects of Pepper's Ghost. The exhibition features a combination of 35mm photographs and 16mm film alongside reflections and projections that create ghostly, layered images. The work invites viewers into a space where the boundaries between presence and absence blur—echoing the fleeting nature of memory and the traces of loss.
An Evening with Sandra Cisneros
Tuesday, April 8
5 p.m.
Old Chapel
Presented by: Comparative Literature Department
A reading and conversation with award-winning poet, short story writer, novelist, essayist, performer, and artist Sandra Cisneros.
Sponsored by the Comparative Literature program; the Department of Languages, Literatures, and Cultures; the Spanish and Portuguese program; the College of Humanities and Fine Arts; the Department of English; the Department of Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies; the Amherst College Program in Latin American and Latinx Studies; the Mount Holyoke College Departments of English, Spanish, and Critical Race & Political Economy; the Smith College Program in Latin American and Latino/a Studies; and the Five College Lecture Fund.
Laylah Ali artist talk
April 9
6 p.m.
Old Chapel
Is anything the matter? Drawings by Laylah Ali includes more than one hundred drawings dating from 1993 to 2020. In her work, Ali explores the amalgam of race, power, gendering, human frailty, and murky politics. Join Ali for an artist talk about her exhibition.
Wind Ensemble & Symphony Band
Wednesday, April 9
7:30 p.m.
Frederick C. Tillis Performance Hall
Presented by: Department of Music & Dance
Bands will perform together “Of Our New Day Begun” (Omar Thomas)
Matthew Westgate & Lindsay Bronnenkant, conductors
Free for UMass students with ID
Outdoor Concert Series
Thursday, April 10
4:30-6:30 p.m.
Southwest Residential Area beach
Head to the Southwest Residential Area beach for a free outdoor concert featuring Skruple, the 2023 Battle of the Bands winner, followed by indie-rock headliners The Baxbys. Free!
An Evening with John Cameron Mitchell featuring Amber Martin
Friday, April 11
8 p.m.
Bowker Auditorium
Reserved $75, $60, $40
Youth 17 and under and Five College students $20, $15. Youth 17 and under and Five College students $20, $15.
Tony Award-winning star of stage and screen John Cameron Mitchell (Hedwig and the Angry Inch) presents a hair-raising, hilarious romp of songs, stories and characters. The performance also features international cabaret star Amber Martin. And join us at Amherst Cinema on Saturday, April 12, for a screening of Hedwig and the Angry Inch with live director commentary from JCM. (Screening tickets available via the Amherst Cinema box office.)
UMass Symphony Orchestra
Friday, April 11
7:30 p.m.
Frederick C. Tillis Performance Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
Gonzalo Hidalgo Ardila, conductor; featuring winners of the Concerto/Aria Competition
Free for UMass students with ID
CJ Hill MFA Thesis Exhibition "Fooling"
Exhibition: Monday, April 14 – Saturday, April 19
Opening Reception: Thursday, April 17, 4-6 p.m.
Herter Art Gallery
Presented by: Department of Art
Fooling is an exhibition of drawings, paintings, sculptures and written works that attempt to reconcile the act of art making with the individual's experience of our specific and shared societal moment.
“Reading Elias Khoury in Tel Aviv / Reading Theodor Herzl in Ramallah” and other Palestine/Israel cultural events
April 15 – April 18
Various locations at UMass, Smith College, and Amherst College
Presented by: Comparative Literature Department
A variety of panels, presentations, and discussions with sociologists Honaida Ghanim (Birzeit University, Palestine) and Yehouda Shenhav-Shahrabani (Tel Aviv University) engaging topics such as translation and conflict, reading the literature of the other, literary utopia/dystopia. Intended as a window into Palestinian and Israeli societies beyond the hegemonic focus on war and conflict.
Jazz Lab Ensemble
Wednesday, April 16
7:30 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
Forest Loomis-Dulong, director
Free to the public
The Troy Lecture on the Humanities and Public Life: Dionne Brand
Wednesday, April 16
4:30-6 p.m.
Campus Center Auditorium, first floor, Campus Center
Presented by: Department of English
Dionne Brand is the author of numerous volumes of fiction, poetry, and nonfiction. Her latest poetry collection, Nomenclature: New and Collected Poems, won the Los Angeles Times Book Prize for Poetry. Her works of nonfiction include Bread Out of Stone, A Map to the Door of No Return: Notes to Belonging and most recently, Salvage. From 2009 to 2012 she served as Toronto’s poet laureate.
Outdoor Concert Series
Thursday, April 17
4:30-6:30 p.m.
Southwest Residential Area beach
Head to the Southwest Residential Area beach for a free outdoor concert featuring South Pleasant Revival, a rock ‘n’ roll band with roots in classic rock and the blues. The headliner, The Greys, blends soulful melodies, art rock sensibilities, and introspective lyrics. Free!
Complexions Contemporary Ballet
Thursday, April 17, 7:30 p.m.
Frederick C. Tillis Performance Hall
Reserved $65, $50, $40, $30
Youth 17 and under and Five College students $20, $17, $15
Hailed as a “matchless American dance company” by the Philadelphia Inquirer, Complexions Contemporary Ballet blends methods, styles and cultures from across the globe. The result is a continually evolving form of dance that reflects the movement of our world — and all its cultures — as an interrelated whole. The program for this performance, which is part of the company’s thirtieth anniversary celebration tour, will center on WOKE, an activist piece created in response to continuing racial violence and discrimination in American society.
String Chamber Ensembles
Thursday, April 17
7:30 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music & Dance
All-University Orchestra
Thursday, April 23
7:30 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music & Dance
Gonzalo Hidalgo Ardila, conductor
Free to the public
Hayle Lovestedt MFA Thesis Exhibition "Body of Work"
Exhibition: Wednesday, April 22 – Tuesday, April 29
Opening Reception: Thursday, April 23
Herter Art Gallery
Presented by: Department of Art
Hayle Lovstedt is a ceramic artist and teacher from Southern California. Her work is focused on form and function.
Meshell Ndegeocello: No More Water — The Gospel of James Baldwin
Thursday, April 24
8 p.m.
Bowker Auditorium
Reserved $60, $45, $35
Youth 17 and under and Five College students $15 Meshell Ndegeocello is a virtuoso of the electric bass and a songwriter and arranger whose work spans multiple genres. She is an eleven-time Grammy nominee and two-time Grammy winner. Her first album for the iconic Blue Note label, The Omnichord Real Book (2023), took the first-ever Grammy for Best Alternative Jazz Album. She leads her quintet in a celebration of the late writer, civil rights activist, and UMass professor James Baldwin.
Brass Chamber Ensembles
Thursday, April 24
7:30 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music & Dance
Free to the public
Spring Artwalk
April 25, 3-6 p.m.
University Museum of Contemporary Art, Augusta Savage Gallery, Hampden Gallery
Celebrate the incredible art on campus by visiting the Fine Arts Center’s three visual arts venues. This once-a-semester event features free snacks, hands-on art activities, exhibitions, music, and fun! Visit all three venues and be entered to win great prizes.
Shakespeare's Maimed Rites of Hospitality, 2025 Dan S. Collins Lecture
Friday, April 25
4:30 p.m.
Old Chapel
Presented by: Arthur F. Kinney Center for Interdisciplinary Renaissance Studies
Annual Dan S. Collins Lecture with Jean Howard, George Delacorte Professor Emerita in the Humanities, Columbia University.
2025 Bach Festival & Symposium
Friday, April 25 – Sunday, April 27
All Day
Bezanson Recital Hall and Frederick C. Tillis Performance Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
The biennial UMass Amherst Bach Festival and Symposium attracts exceptional musicians and scholars of international stature to UMass Amherst, connects them to our students, alumni and faculty, and through robust collaboration, creates an event of artistic and academic excellence that enriches all who come in contact with it.
Bach Festival: The Goldberg Variations, BWV 988
Friday, April 25
4 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
The Goldberg Variations, BWV 988; Steven Beck, piano
Bach Symposium: Why Bach? Navigating 21st Century Scholarship, Performance & Pedagogy
Friday, April 25
All day
Daniel R. Melamed, keynote speaker 1:15 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 and Christmas Oratorio 1-3
Saturday, April 26
7:30 p.m.
Grace Church, Amherst
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
Bach Festival: Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 and Christmas Oratorio 1-3
Andrew Megill, guest conductor with soloists and the Bach Festival Orchestra and Chorus
Tickets: $25-20, students free
Bach Festival: Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 and Christmas Oratorio 1-3
Sunday, April 27
3 p.m.
Grace Church, Amherst
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
Bach Festival: Brandenburg Concerto No. 5 and Christmas Oratorio 1-3
Andrew Megill, guest conductor with soloists and the Bach Festival Orchestra and Chorus
Tickets: $25-20, students free
Graduate Wind Quintet
Sunday, April 27
12 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
Free to the public
Woodwind Chamber Ensembles
Monday, April 28
7:30 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
Free to the public
Yoga at the Museum
April 29, 5:30-6:30 p.m.
University Museum of Contemporary Art
Relax and rejuvenate in a guided yoga session surrounded by the museum’s art. Register through UMass Recreation and Wellbeing.
Brass & Trombone Choirs
Tuesday, April 29
7:30 p.m.
Bezanson Recital Hall
Presented by: Department of Music and Dance
Greg Spiridopoulos, director
Free to the public
Bruce Hornsby & YMusic Present BrhyM
Friday, May 9, 8 p.m.
Frederick C. Tillis Performance Hall
Reserved, tickets start at $54
Youth 17 and under and Five College student tickets start at $19
Fine Arts Center fees vary but will not exceed $5 per ticket
Bruce Hornsby’s fans come from a variety of places. Some have been with him since The Way It Is, his Grammy-winning 1986 debut album with The Range. Others signed on during his stint as keyboardist for the Grateful Dead in the early 1990s, a time during which he performed in more than 100 concerts in North America and Europe. And still others at a host of points along the way through twenty-four albums — spanning such genres as rock, jazz, blues, and bluegrass — thirteen Grammy nominations, and three Grammy wins.
Be with us for this beautiful finale to a season spent exploring the power of the arts to unite and strengthen community, spur action, and inspire positive change.
Xanadu
May 2, 3, 8, 9, 7:30 p.m.
May 3 and 10, 2 p.m.
May 7, 10 a.m., 7:30 p.m.
The Rand Theater
Presented by: Department of Theater
Book by Douglas Carter Beane and music and lyrics by Jeff Lynne and John Farrar
Directed by Rose Schwietz Malla
Escape with us into the glittering world of the pastels, spandex and synthesizers of the roller disco! Ancient Greek Muse Clio goes undercover as a leg-warmer-wearing Australian to help hapless wannabe artist Sonny find his purpose. Along the way, she finds she has an important choice to make between immortality, or love and art. Xanadu is pure joy and silliness, with the hummable tunes of ELO mastermind Jeff Lynne.
$5 students, seniors, Card to Culture, $17 general admission
