Compass A&E

Real theater people don’t give up when times are tough — they put on a matinee!

This is it, folks, the year when you actually have a legitimate excuse to stay home for Thanksgiving and the winter holidays and cook whatever you want. There is no pressure this year to include all the main and side dishes that your sister and your mother and your Aunt Suzanne consider an irreplaceable part of the season.

On Nov. 4, the Hudson Jazz Festival decided to postpone its online concerts until the spring of 2021.

The harp isn’t an instrument you normally associate with improvisational jazz, free jazz, avant garde jazz, bebop or … well, you get the idea. 

You might think you know a lot about chickens because you live in the country, but you probably don’t know how punk rock they can be.

One of the pleasures of the annual art calendar is the juried show of the Kent Art Association in Kent, Conn. Happily, the association was able to host its show this autumn, as always, with prizes awarded in October.

There are 36 artists in the show, from Connecticut, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Maine, New York and New Jersey. 

If all you know about Herb Alpert is the Tijuana Brass … well, that’s probably OK, because the iconic 1960s band sure made some exuberant swingy jazz that still sounds fresh today and still gets your toes tapping and your hips swinging.

The Wadsworth Atheneum in Hartford is the host of a wide-ranging exhibition, “Made in Connecticut,” that celebrates the 25th anniversary of the Connecticut Art Trail.

The show opened Oct. 15 and runs through Feb. 7.

Not everyone sees it as cuisine; some people just consider it food. But whether you’re devoted to the simple cooking of your childhood or the elevated gastronomy of kings and socialites, you understand that what we cook and what we eat shapes more than just our bodies; it also shapes our culture and our view of the world.