A groundbreaking reimagining of William Shakespeare’s beloved tragedy, “Romeo and Juliet: In Memoriam” is poised to make its debut on Friday, October 13, 2023, in Asheville.

The adaptation is written by Elias Hamilton and Ronnie Z. Nielsen of Asheville. Their unique vision transports audiences to the solemn and emotional setting of the star-crossed lovers’ funeral, infusing new life into Shakespeare’s iconic play and exploring themes of love, loss and reconciliation in a fresh way.

Don’t miss your chance to witness this exceptional adaptation of “Romeo and Juliet,” where young visionaries take center stage, breaking boundaries and proving that age is no barrier to artistic excellence.

“Romeo and Juliet: In Memoriam” premieres on Friday, October 13, 2023, at Attic Salt Theater and runs through Sunday, October 21.

The nation’s largest comedy club network is back! After a popular run last season, this hilarious collective returns to bring top-notch comedians for four weekends of side-splitting laughter. Some of the hottest stand-up comedians of today — seen in specials on Comedy Central, HBO Comedy, Netflix, Hulu and more — deliver witty one-liners, preposterous punchlines and hysterical anecdotes that will keep you laughing all night long. Contains adult content.

Headliner Leonard Ouzts

At 26 years old, Leonard Ouzts is a distinct rising voice in the world of stand-up comedy. A native of Virginia, his southern upbringing shaped his down to earth, observational comedic style. Leonard can most recently be seen in a breakout role of the producer Lawrence in season two of the Netflix series MASTER OF NONE. He has performed stand-up on CONAN, ADAM DEVINE’S HOUSE PARTY, and AXS’ GOTHAM COMEDY LIVE. He can also be seen in multiple episodes of TruTV’s COMEDY KNOCKOUT, MTV’s JOKING OFF, upcoming episodes of the MTV series WILD N OUT. Leonard was selected as a NEW FACE at the prestigious Montreal Just For Laughs Festival and was most recently named by RollingStone.com as a Top Ten Comic To Watch. Leonard can currently be seen playing James on the NBC comedy Abby’s opposite Natalie Morales.

The Sublime Theater presents the world premiere of David Brendan Hopes’ “Ben & Angela,” starring Scott Fisher & Kirby Gibson, directed by Steven Samuels. “No matter how long people have been doing it, marriage remains a mystery. In “Ben & Angela,” a young couple follow the twisty, sometimes hilarious, road from first infatuation through the kinks and perils of living life together for the long haul. They each know the other’s weakness. They each know each other’s strength. They know what it will look like when it is perfect.”

Written by Samuel D. Hunter

Keith, a mortgage broker and Ryan, a yogurt plant worker, are two men who, at first glance, have nothing in common. Their meeting, in Keith’s cubicle, evolves from a business discussion to a thoughtful exploration of parenthood, financial insecurity, and empathy. Both intimate and expansive, Samuel D. Hunter’s heartbreaking new play argues for hope even in the face of extreme disappointment as two men with seemingly very different lives grow to care for one another.

Content advisory: strong language

Our Black Box series continues as we welcome to the stage the magnificent work of William Shakespeare. Surrender to a haunting story of ambition and its dark consequences, as a military hero and his wife conspire to seize political power. A terrifyingly prophetic tale of revenge, murder, and madness, Macbeth lays bare the fallout when the darkest side of humanity cheats its way into a position of power.  One of Shakespeare’s bloodiest, scariest, and yet, most popular tragedies.

Written by Will Storrs
Directed by Deanna Braine Smith
Just in time for Halloween, local playwright Will Storrs brings us this World Premiere reimagining Alice and the characters of Lewis Carroll’s story in a seasonally-appropriate way. Sure to be a horribly good time!
 
All shows will run Fridays through Sundays and all will be presented at 7:30pm and prime seats can be reserved.

Montford Park Players has been bringing some of theater’s greatest works to Western North Carolina for over 50 years. Montford Park Players continues its mission of bring free theater to the community. The summer season allows everyone to come spend an evening under the stars, seeing some of the best live performances presented in Asheville.

GRAMMY-nominated rock band NEEDTOBREATHE is set to bring their “high-energy, infectious” (Music Row) live show to arenas across the country this fall with “The CAVES World Tour.” The first leg of the tour is set to kick off October 13 in Savanah, GA and will feature alternative rock band Judah & The Lion as special guests. Tickets will be available starting Monday, June 5 with an Insider’s presale. Additional presales will run throughout the week ahead of the general onsale beginning Friday, June 9 at NEEDTOBREATHE.com.

NEEDTOBREATHE has built a “massive live following” (Rolling Stone) and developed a reputation for their energetic “southern groove” (New York Times) and “some of the best vocal performances, instrumentation and stage presence” (Toronto Star).

The tour will support NEEDTOBREATHE’S ninth studio album CAVES, which is set to release this fall. The collection will feature a new batch of songs “that will be brimming with anthemic arena-worthy sounds” (American Songwriter).

“CAVES is the most ambitious album we’ve made so far, and it really feels like a new chapter for us as a band,” said NEEDTOBREATHE frontman Bear Rinehart. “We can’t wait to take this new energy to our fans on the road and perform these songs live. It’s going to be special.”

THE SPLATTER PLAY
By Abby Auman
Directed by Jessica Johnson

It’s the day of the open house for Tina’s childhood home, which also happens to be her deceased mother’s evil laboratory. Determined to turn the terrors of the lab into selling points, Tina and her optimistic realtor parade a cast of unsavory potential buyers through the home, tormented all the while by the resident creepies and crawlies who aren’t quite as ready to move on as Tina would hope. *Note: there will be blood, so much blood.

By Abby Auman
Directed by Jessica Johnson

It’s the day of the open house for Tina’s childhood home, which also happens to be her deceased mother’s evil laboratory. Determined to turn the terrors of the lab into selling points, Tina and her optimistic realtor parade a cast of unsavory potential buyers through the home, tormented all the while by the resident creepies and crawlies who aren’t quite as ready to move on as Tina would hope. *Note: this is an immersive experience and there will be blood, so much blood.

**Content notification: language; violence; blood; gore; strobe light effects; audience-immersive scenes that may include audience members being splattered with stage blood and gore.

Illiterate Light thrives on subverting expectations. Though just a duo, the Harrisonburg, Virginia-based singer-guitarist Jeff Gorman along with Nashville, Tennessee-based drummer Jake Cochran make surprisingly pummeling and thoughtful alternative rock. Since the band’s 2015 inception, they’ve intently focused on their unorthodox live show with Cochran standing behind his kit and Gorman playing synth bass with his foot as he sings and strums his guitar. Fiercely egalitarian and independent, the two not only split up songwriting duties and arrangement ideas, they even built bike-powered stages: bringing the fans into the live experience and envisioning a greener future for shows.

With their latest album Sunburned, out January 27 via Thirty Tigers, Gorman and Cochran have turned their attention inward to their songwriting and studio craft. It’s their most fully-realized and ambitious LP yet, one that’s full of immediate songs that update and revolutionize the band’s approach to making music. There are rich keyboard and programmed percussion textures now populating their songs, as well as soaringly anthemic choruses, and hefty doses of fuzz. “On our first record, we were very live-focused and wanted to make sure whatever we were writing was translated in person,” says Gorman. “Without that crutch, we could be more adventurous and take more risks. We definitely weren’t timid in the studio.”

A BIG THANKS TO 98.1 THE RIVER FOR SUPPORTING LIVE MUSIC IN ASHEVILLE, NC

Kristian Matsson has never remained in one place for very long. Having spent much of the last decade touring around the world as The Tallest Man on Earth, Matsson has captivated audiences using, as The New York Times describes, “every inch of his long guitar cord to roam the stage: darting around, crouching, stretching, hip-twitching, perching briefly and jittering away…Mr. Matsson is a guitar-slinger rooted in folk, and his songs are troubadour ballads at heart.”

Then came 2020, when Matsson left New York City and returned to his farm in Sweden. There, during that quiet, dreary time of isolation, he drowned out his thoughts by manically growing vegetables in his garden. When he tried writing again, during those many months of collective forced solitude, “I just found myself commenting on the darkness,” Matsson says. “I lost my imagination.” Playing live, music and inspiration returned near the end of 2021, and his produce became less of a priority. “When I’m in motion, I can focus on my instinct, have my daydreams again. When I was finally able to tour again, I started writing like a madman.” He eventually had twenty songs he wanted to record in ten days.

Now, Matsson returns as The Tallest Man on Earth with Henry St., his sixth studio album following 2012’s There’s No Leaving Now, full of “vivid imagery, clever turns-of-phrase, and devastating, world-weary observations” (Under The Radar) and 2015’s Dark Bird Is A Home, his “most personal record… surreal and dreamlike” (Pitchfork). Henry St. notably marks the first time he recorded an album in a band setting. “My entire career I’ve been a DIY person––mostly fueled by the feeling that I didn’t know what I was doing, so I’d just do everything myself.” But now, longing for the energy that’s only released when creating together with others, Matsson invited his friends to come and play.

Nick Sanborn (of Sylvan Esso) produced Henry St., which includes contributions from Ryan Gustafson (of The Dead Tongues) on guitar, lap steel and ukulele, TJ Maiani on drums, CJ Camerieri (of Bon Iver) on trumpet and French horn, Phil Cook on piano and organ, Rob Moose (of Bon Iver, yMusic) on strings and Adam Schatz on saxophone. “They opened everything up, and understood what the songs that I’d written needed: sounds that I couldn’t ever have thought of or created myself. We recorded so many of the songs live in the studio, playing, having fun and being really open with each other.”

An overarching theme of Henry St., he says, is “how to be a person in this world.” The title track is about the deception that, “as individuals, we’re told that we should strive for success. But when we have it, it doesn’t solve anything. The song is about stepping away and thinking: why am I actually doing this?” While writing the song back in Sweden, he knew it would be the centerpiece of the album. “It’s the low point and the turnaround: the other songs are a reminder that I will always be a stubborn optimist, even at the darkest of times.” He was about to record the track as a solo piece, until Phil Cook came in on his first day in the studio. “I had Phil basically hanging over my shoulders at the piano while we were playing, and then he recorded it. He improvised that beautiful outro. When he did, our jaws dropped––I was in tears.”

“Looking for Love” is one of those songs about Matsson’s stubborn optimism, and a shining example of Sanborn’s influence on the album. “The first day in the studio, Nick created this hissing noise while I was feedbacking electric guitar. We had so much fun jamming like that. Then Nick put down some piano to overdub my guitar, and we knew we had the song.” The tone for their collaboration was set. “Nick is so emotionally intelligent, and we share an almost childlike joy in things that can happen with music. He makes the songs come truly alive by keeping the performances and the humanity in––the kind of stuff that just happens during the session.”

The song “Every Little Heart,” he says, came from a feeling of fearlessness, a confidence in making music after two years of relative silence. “But of course I still have little demons inside of me. I wrote some key changes in the song that came natural to me, but I worried they might sound unnatural to others. When TJ Maiani heard it, he straightaway went into this drumbeat that shocked me a little at first, but came completely natural to him. It fit the song perfectly.”

Matsson’s longing for social interchange, after months spent with only his crops, led to the collaboration that delivered the warm, unique and sprawling sound of Henry St. “It’s the most playful, most me album yet, because it covers so many of the different noises in my head. When you overthink things, you get further away from your original ideas. And God knows I overthink things when I’m by myself.” The time in isolation also brought him some newfound peace of mind. “Having been away from it taught me that making music and performing is what I’m doing for the rest of my life, and I’m so grateful for it. It has given me new confidence and playfulness. This is what I do. It’s unconditional.”

The nation’s largest comedy club network is back! After a popular run last season, this hilarious collective returns to bring top-notch comedians for four weekends of side-splitting laughter. Some of the hottest stand-up comedians of today — seen in specials on Comedy Central, HBO Comedy, Netflix, Hulu and more — deliver witty one-liners, preposterous punchlines and hysterical anecdotes that will keep you laughing all night long. Contains adult content.

Headliner Leonard Ouzts

At 26 years old, Leonard Ouzts is a distinct rising voice in the world of stand-up comedy. A native of Virginia, his southern upbringing shaped his down to earth, observational comedic style. Leonard can most recently be seen in a breakout role of the producer Lawrence in season two of the Netflix series MASTER OF NONE. He has performed stand-up on CONAN, ADAM DEVINE’S HOUSE PARTY, and AXS’ GOTHAM COMEDY LIVE. He can also be seen in multiple episodes of TruTV’s COMEDY KNOCKOUT, MTV’s JOKING OFF, upcoming episodes of the MTV series WILD N OUT. Leonard was selected as a NEW FACE at the prestigious Montreal Just For Laughs Festival and was most recently named by RollingStone.com as a Top Ten Comic To Watch. Leonard can currently be seen playing James on the NBC comedy Abby’s opposite Natalie Morales.

Burlesque Brunch is a monthly burlesque and bellydance show with a classic speakeasy feel. Join our dancing dames and dandies every third Sunday of the month for a little singin’, strippin’, and sippin’ starting at noon. It’s a Sunday afternoon to delight the senses!

Written by Samuel D. Hunter

Keith, a mortgage broker and Ryan, a yogurt plant worker, are two men who, at first glance, have nothing in common. Their meeting, in Keith’s cubicle, evolves from a business discussion to a thoughtful exploration of parenthood, financial insecurity, and empathy. Both intimate and expansive, Samuel D. Hunter’s heartbreaking new play argues for hope even in the face of extreme disappointment as two men with seemingly very different lives grow to care for one another.

Content advisory: strong language

Our Black Box series continues as we welcome to the stage the magnificent work of William Shakespeare. Surrender to a haunting story of ambition and its dark consequences, as a military hero and his wife conspire to seize political power. A terrifyingly prophetic tale of revenge, murder, and madness, Macbeth lays bare the fallout when the darkest side of humanity cheats its way into a position of power.  One of Shakespeare’s bloodiest, scariest, and yet, most popular tragedies.

Jack of the Wood : Sunday-Irish Session 

Sundays

1 till who knows when?

Traditional Irish music is kept alive at Jack of the Wood with our unplugged Sunday session.

Jack of the Wood

95 Patton ave

Asheville, NC 28801

(828) 252.5445

http://www.jackofthewood.com/

THE SPLATTER PLAY
By Abby Auman
Directed by Jessica Johnson

It’s the day of the open house for Tina’s childhood home, which also happens to be her deceased mother’s evil laboratory. Determined to turn the terrors of the lab into selling points, Tina and her optimistic realtor parade a cast of unsavory potential buyers through the home, tormented all the while by the resident creepies and crawlies who aren’t quite as ready to move on as Tina would hope. *Note: there will be blood, so much blood.

By Abby Auman
Directed by Jessica Johnson

It’s the day of the open house for Tina’s childhood home, which also happens to be her deceased mother’s evil laboratory. Determined to turn the terrors of the lab into selling points, Tina and her optimistic realtor parade a cast of unsavory potential buyers through the home, tormented all the while by the resident creepies and crawlies who aren’t quite as ready to move on as Tina would hope. *Note: this is an immersive experience and there will be blood, so much blood.

**Content notification: language; violence; blood; gore; strobe light effects; audience-immersive scenes that may include audience members being splattered with stage blood and gore.

Join us for Black Mountain’s original Sunday Jam! Hosted by Spiro and Friends, this jam features original jams and favorite covers. Bring your instrument! Sign-ups at the stage starting at 6 PM!

Pisgah Beer, Gluten Free and N/A options available. Family and dog friendly venue.

The taproom is open from 2:00 to 9:00 PM with music beginning at 6:30 PM.

If you’re wondering what Australian singer, songwriter and one-of-a-kind guitar virtuoso Daniel Champagne did after his 44-city US tour over the summer of 2022, he proceeded immediately to Canada for 30 mostly sold-out shows and then to New Zealand for another 30 mostly sold-out shows. There’s a Christmas break, and then a monumental tour of Australia. Obvi-ously the best word to describe Daniel is “relentless”.

Daniel will brings his tour back to America starting in mid-July 2023 and continuing through October for an even more ambitious 50 shows! He’ll return to many venues he performed in 2022, and will be adding new shows in places he hasn’t performed in many years.

One reviewer recently wrote “Daniel Champagne exudes a natural ease on stage, as he sings poignant lyrics and beautifully crafted melodies that invariably whisk the heart up with grand romanticism. Coupled with an exhilarating guitar talent that transcends mere acoustic playing to replicate a whole band, Champagne must be seen to be believed’

The story goes that Daniel first picked up his instrument of choice as a 5-year-old following in the footsteps of a musical father. He began writing songs at 12, training classically throughout his teens and performing wherever he could, honing his craft and developing the dynamic live show that he is renowned for today. At 18 he left school, turned professional and hit the road without looking back.

The following decade saw him release 5 studio albums, tour relentlessly around the globe with upwards of 300 shows per year, play some of the biggest festivals under the sun and share stages with the likes of Tommy Emmanuel, INXS, John Butler, Lucinda Williams, Ani DiFranco, Judy Collins and Rodrigo y Gabriela.

In early 2020 as the COVID pandemic ground all touring to a halt, Daniel returned to Australia writing music and further honing his craft and returned to international audiences with a swag of new songs and a complete new live show.

His current release, “Shimmer Through The Windscreen” is making waves on the streaming services and promises great critical acclaim once it is circulated to the media.

For fans of guitar, songs or just artistic expression at its finest, this show is a must see!

WHAT THE PRESS SAY..

“The word Prodigy seems to entirely fall short of this soft-spoken young man’s skills, he coax-es sounds and melodies out of his instrument that literally drop jaws.” The Calgary Herald, CANADA

“Today I saw the future of Folk – Festival goers flocking in the thousands towards the main stage to witness a young musical phenomenon from Australia dish out an absolute show-stopper.” The Firefly Column, USA

“Daniel Champagne is a crossroads. Fusing the strong traditions of Blues, Folk and other roots art with pop showmanship and admirable lyrical ability. I firmly believe that he will become an ambassador for roots music in a time where it desperately needs representation.” The Indie Blender, CANADA

“reinventing roots guitar” Rhythms Magazine, AUSTRALIA

“Watching Daniel Champagne perform is a once in a lifetime experience. He is a true prodigy that plays like no one else could possibly play unless they spent at least two lifetimes studying the art.” BW Review, NEW ZEALAND

Here Come the Mummies is a nine-piece funk-rock band of 5000 year-old Egyptian Mummies with a one-track mind. Their “Terrifying Funk from Beyond the Grave” is sure to get you into them (and possibly vice versa).

Since their discovery HCTM has been direct support for P-Funk, Al Green, Mavis Staples, KC and the Sunshine Band, and Cheap Trick; rocked Super Bowl Village; become a regular on The Bob and Tom Show; played massive festivals like Summer Fest, Summer Camp, Common Ground, Musikfest, and Suwannee Hulaween; and sold tickets by the thousands across large swaths of North America.

Maybe that’s why the ladies (and some dudes) can’t stop losing their minds over these mayhem-inducing mavens of mirth.
Some say they were cursed after deflowering a great Pharaoh’s daughter. Others claim they are reincarnated Grammy-Winning studio musicians. Regardless, HCTM’s mysterious personas, cunning song-craft, and unrelenting live show will bend your brain, and melt your face. Get ready, for Here Come The Mummies.

The Nat-O-Ween Spooktacular returns! This time spookier than ever. Join us in our Black Box Theater to experience the one-and-only Nat Zegree while sitting on the stage, just a few feet away from his dazzling performance. Nat Zegree will take you on a spooky musical adventure that is sure to delight and entertain. Tickets for this fundraising event are 100% tax-deductible and go directly to support Flat Rock Playhouse’s production and operating expenses. ONE NIGHT ONLY, don’t wait! Costumes are welcome!!