Upcoming Events

Tanglewood Marionettes’ master puppeteers will discuss some of the construction and stringing techniques used when building marionettes, and then demonstrate the basics of marionette manipulation. Participants will be provided with marionettes for the duration of the workshop. 

Each puppet has been lovingly handmade by Tanglewood Marionettes artisans and has been left uncostumed and unpainted to showcase the construction and joining techniques that go into the craft of marionette creation. 

Participants will experience firsthand what it is like to work a professional-quality marionette that has been balanced and tuned like a fine instrument. The marionettes are short-strung to allow the participants to work them at floor level.

Intended for ages 8 years old and up

Set against the colorful backdrop of a giant storybook, Tanglewood Marionette’s Hansel & Gretel is based on the classic fairytale by the Brothers Grimm, and features melodies from the Humperdinck opera.

As the pages of the storybook turn, each new and exciting scene is revealed. All the staging, scenery, and lavishly costumed 30″ marionettes are handcrafted by Tanglewood Marionettes. Together they represent over a year of construction time.

The story itself is set in the mid-nineteenth century. As the tale unfolds, Hansel and Gretel must call upon their inner reserves and learn new methods to overcome the challenges they encounter while lost in the woods.

You loved them so much last fall, the local legends are returning for another raucous klezmer spectacle, joined by virtuoso pianist, keyboardist, producer, & composer, Jamie Saft. 

In the spirit of the season, this concert will include a number of classic Chanukah songs – in both Yiddish and Ladino – plus some great traditional klezmer with the Tummlers groove, and some wonderful improvisational klezmer featuring Jamie on keyboards.

The Casco Bay Tummlers are well known for inspiring and soulful performances that range from traditional klezmer to related roots genres – to original music that stretches those boundaries. 

Jamie Saft‘s stylistic versatility, multi-instrumentalist capabilities, and production skills have been featured with Beastie Boys, Bad Brains, HR, The B-52s, John Zorn, John Adams, Laurie Anderson, Donovan, Antony and the Johnsons, and Iggy Pop. Saft leads the New Zion Trio, Jamie Saft Trio, and Jamie Saft Quartet. Saft has collaborated with legends of music including Wadada Leo Smith, Roswell Rudd, Marshall Allen, Danny Ray Thompson, Dave Liebman, Joe Morris, Hamid Drake, Bobby Previte, Steve Swallow, Darryl Jenifer, and Cyro Baptista.

Miraculous Bodies is a joyous collection of collaborative paintings by the artists at The Art Department.

Taking inspiration from the Surrealist movement’s game Cadavre Exquis (exquisite corpse), each of TAD’s artists imagined fantastical creatures and brought them to life on canvas. 

Each of the artists created an original body using photos, sketches, and their imagination and painted a head, torso, and lower portion of the body. 

Pieces were mixed together and arranged in exciting combinations to show how an idea is the sum of its parts. Visitors may not touch the artwork itself, but we encourage everyone to participate in creating their own Miraculous Bodies using our Skeleton Board.

Join Mayo Street Arts & The Art Department for the opening reception on Friday, January 5 from 5:00 PM to 8:00 PM. Libations and snacks will be served! Open to all ages!

Take a step back in time and have your tintype portrait made on-site by Cole Phillips!

Using materials and processes dating to the 1850s, wet-plate photography gives you the chance to experience and take home the product of one of the oldest known photographic processes. 

Tintypes date back to the 1850s and replaced then-industry-standard daguerreotype photography as an alternative photographic process which created more stable and easily visible results. Throughout the late-middle 19th century, tintypes were used to document everything from the American Civil War, and political figures of the time, all the way down to working-class families and domestic pets. By the 1900s, the process had been all but replaced by the rapidly growing alternative processes of the time and had become a novelty. Today, it is preserved and practiced by those who are unwilling to see it fade into time.

This photography event is in celebration of Puppetkabob’s The Snowflake Man, an antique truck show featuring Czech-style marionettes. The matinée performance of “The Snowflake Man” will take place at 2:00 PM, immediately following the Tintype pop-up. 

Curl up for the cozy, wintery tale of “The Snowflake Man” and be blissfully lost in a world of marionettes, miniatures, pop-up paper art, music, storytelling, and a bit of New England history told with fun, dramatic, and personal touches.

Wilson “Snowflake” Bentley– the self-educated farmer and scientist– attracted worldwide attention in 1885 by adapting a bellows camera to a compound microscope. Not only did Bentley become the first person to capture the image of a single snow crystal, he coined the phrase “no two snowflakes are alike. 

Inspired by Bentley, this unique trunk show features beautifully designed Czech-style marionettes and a pop-up book of striking watercolor scenery. The tiny details of this production, when placed next to the intricate designs within a snow crystal, bring harmony and focus to the wondrous beauty of the minute in nature. 

Curl up for the cozy, wintery tale of “The Snowflake Man” and be blissfully lost in a world of marionettes, miniatures, pop-up paper art, music, storytelling, and a bit of New England history told with fun, dramatic, and personal touches.

Wilson “Snowflake” Bentley– the self-educated farmer and scientist– attracted worldwide attention in 1885 by adapting a bellows camera to a compound microscope. Not only did Bentley become the first person to capture the image of a single snow crystal, he coined the phrase “no two snowflakes are alike. 

Inspired by Bentley, this unique trunk show features beautifully designed Czech-style marionettes and a pop-up book of striking watercolor scenery. The tiny details of this production, when placed next to the intricate designs within a snow crystal, bring harmony and focus to the wondrous beauty of the minute in nature. 

Puppeteers’ Happy Hour is a recurring informal gathering for puppet artists and enthusiasts to share their work and ideas, catch up on the latest puppet dirt, and hang out. 

For this very special Happy Hour, Sarah Frechette of Puppetkabob will lead a workshop on Ball and String: Concentration Exercises.

Each participant will be invited to build individual ball and string marionettes, with Frechette sharing wisdom from Meisterklasse drawing on her years of study with German Master Albrecht Roser and assistant Ingrid Höfer.  

Together, we’ll explore topics such as the role of gravity, predictability vs surprise, production vs creation, connecting with materials, and partnering with the string puppet and with the audience.  All of this while guiding a series of practice exercises with the simplest marionette: Ball and String!

Please register ahead of time and consider donating to help cover material costs (suggested donation is $5 – $10).

This workshop is intended for an adult audience, but all are welcome.

Expect raucous dancing and cool swing tunes by The Zoot Jumpers at this Swing Crawl adventure. Join us at Mayo Street Arts for an open dance floor, libations, and live music.

The Zoot Jumpers are a Maine-based band that plays hot jump blues and swing, including the great music of Count Basie, Louis Jordan, Squirrel Nut Zippers, and more. The band features Bruce Couillard on saxophones, Michelle Boggs on trumpet, Bess Jacques on piano, Tom Jacques on bass and harmonica, and Per Hanson on drums and harmonica. Everybody sings!

As part of a Swing Crawl, the festivities will begin immediately following the Ragtime Destroyers‘ concert at Urban Farm Fermentory.

Born and raised in Portland, Maine, SNAEX play to and for no one, and everyone, all at once.

The band has finished its seventh studio album in twelve years of music making and the best little record label outside of Dallas, El Gran E. Records, will release HAS BEEN GIVEN this December, performed at Mayo Street Arts on January 12.

HAS BEEN GIVEN blends the acoustic/electronic and concrete/abstract elements, between which SNAEX are constantly toggling. Both the record and the show will and do feature SNAEX as Chris Teret (Company), Chriss Sutherland (Olas, Fire on Fire, Cerberus Shoal), Tyler Heydolph, and Tom Rogers (An Evening With, Cerberus Shoal).

Joining the SNAEX stage this time will be TOM K. with a set of piano music as well as an acoustic set from NYAH of Portland’s STREAM REGGAE.

Playing both solo and in collaboration, this concert highlights and melds the Swedish nyckelharpa & 5-string fiddle with traditional Gaelic piano by two top exponents of traditional music in America. 

Steeped in Swedish music traditions, Massachusetts-based lydia ievins performance is an energetic and engaging variety of new and old traditional tunes on nyckelharpa and fiddle — including waltzes, schottises, polskas, and more. Thanks to her love of harmony playing and her pet project from the pandemic, she now uses looper-pedal magic to weave melodic and harmonic lines.

Neil Pearlman has been described by Gaelic singer and radio personality Mary Ann Kennedy as “one of the finest traditional pianists I have ever had the pleasure of hearing.” His approach to the piano blends a deep knowledge of the Scottish Gaelic music tradition with a love of spontaneity and improvisation that makes each concert unique.

Come find out why jazz standards and Mozart definitely belong together.

Jazz Meets Counterpoint is Rasa String Quartet’s upcoming winter concert at Mayo Street Arts. It tells a tale of two seemingly disparate styles that come together beautifully, ending in the exhilarating finale of Shostakovich’s unrelenting ninth-string quartet. 

By exploring the connection between music and storytelling at the heart of folk traditions, Rasa String Quartet delivers engaging and accessible programs that showcase works from a variety of cultures and highlight unknown composers. They seek to educate their audiences by contextualizing the genres, styles, and composers they present, inviting their listeners to approach both familiar and unfamiliar sounds with an open and curious mind.

Portland’s legendary INTERNATIONAL OPEN MIC is here to bring you a wide range of songs, poetry, and beyond.

Please join us for curated (& spontaneous!) performances featuring a wide variety of international and American artists who call the Greater Portland area home. 

The Greater Portland area is one of the most linguistically diverse regions in the entire United States. The event celebrates the international community that is our Portland, Maine with an evening of traditional and innovative performances.

Who’s performing? The event features experienced and emerging performers, as well as some open mic slots. ADVANCE SIGNUPS ARE STRONGLY ENCOURAGED. To sign up, email jennyvanwestmusic[at]gmail[dot]com.

This very special evening will include a little extra love.

Warm up at Mayo Street Arts with communal crafting and make a sock monkey (or any kind of sock creature)! 

Bring your neighbors, pals, and family to this free-for-all, monkey-making bonanza. Sock Monkey Saturday is a time to sit together to figure out the construction process while making new friends.

MSA will provide stuffing and baubles, sewing needles, yarn/thread, how-to zine, and lots of fun.

Bring 1 clean pair of socks + 1 good pair of scissors.

This is a familiy-friendly event that is FREE and open to all. The activity is suggested for children 6 and older, with an adult. 

An exploration of the bizarre, dazzling world of professional wrestling through two characters in constant relational flux. As a classic babyface-vs-heel match takes shape, the duo assumes a collection of increasingly unreliable personas, filling all the roles of those present for the fight and speckling the landscape with historical and personal wrestling anecdotes.

This glittering (un)professional wrestling dance theater is performed, directed, and designed by Dani Robbins, in collaboration with Sophia Eliana.

A positive mental attitude and joyous laughter are mandatory for entry to this sketch comedy show. 

Hey Party People! is Maine’s fourth or fifth-best sketch comedy group. They have been featured in the Portland Maine Comedy Festival, PortFringe Fest, the Georgia Comedy Film Festival, and scored a 980 on their SATs.

Dress code: casual. Plus ones encouraged. Please, no gifts. Recommended for ages 14+.

Larry & Joe were destined to make music together.

Larry Bellorín hails from Monagas, Venezuela, and is a legend of Llanera music. Joe Troop is from North Carolina and is a GRAMMY-nominated bluegrass and old-time musician. Larry was forced into exile and is an asylum seeker in North Carolina. Joe, after a decade in South America, got stranded back in his stomping grounds in the pandemic. Larry worked construction to make ends meet. Joe’s acclaimed “latingrass” band Che Apalache was forced into hiatus, and he shifted into action working with asylum-seeking migrants. Then Larry met Joe.

Currently based in the Triangle of North Carolina, both men are versatile multi-instrumentalists and singer-songwriters on a mission to show that music has no borders. As a duo, they perform a fusion of Venezuelan and Appalachian folk music on harp, banjo, cuatro, fiddle, maracas, guitar, upright bass, and whatever else they decide to throw in the van. The program they offer features a distinct blend of their musical inheritances and traditions as well as storytelling about the ways that music and social movements coalesce.