Weekend Guide: April 22-24

In The Daily Dumpster Blog by Matthew Everettleave a COMMENT

Here’s a guide to some of this weekend’s entertainment and culture highlights. For a full list of events, visit the Mercury’s online calendar.

FRIDAY, APRIL 22
Association of Sultana Descendants and Friends Reunion
Mount Olive Baptist Church • 7 p.m. • Free
For many years, the only memorial to the sinking of the troop-carrying riverboat Sultana on April 27, 1865—the worst maritime disaster in American history—was in a cemetery off Maryville Pike. It’s there because hundreds of the men who died on that boat, and dozens who survived, were on their way to the Knoxville area as Civil War POWs. The Association of Sultana Descendants and Friends holds its annual reunion this weekend in Knoxville: A free program with speakers and music at Mount Olive Baptist Church in South Knoxville on Friday and a seated dinner ($22) at Bearden Banquet Hall on Saturday. Read Jack Neely’s 2015 story on the Sultana here.

Clarence Brown Theatre: South Pacific
Clarence Brown Theatre • 7:30 p.m. • $26-$32
CBT ends its 2015-16 season with the Rodgers and Hammerstein spectacle, a classic of mid-century American exoticism and music theater.

Dawes with Hiss Golden Messenger
Tennessee Theatre • 8 p.m. • $25.50Dawes (Dan Martensen)

The L.A. folk-rock band Dawes—veterans of Knoxville’s Rhythm N’ Blooms festival—have risen from obscurity to critical and commercial success on the strength of four solid albums, energetic live shows, and well-timed appearances on late-night TV and NBC’s Parenthood.

Cattywampus Puppet Council Spring Revue and Variety Show
Pilot Light • 9 p.m. • $5
A night of puppet-filled fun with the local art-minded puppet troupe for grownups (and kids, too)—puppets of all shapes and sizes, dancing, live music, and more.

SATURDAY, APRIL 23
Marble City Comicon
Knoxville Expo Center • 10 a.m.-7 p.m. • $20-$99secret wars
Cartoonist Mike Zeck—responsible for Marvel’s game-changing 1984 Secret Wars miniseries and the Spider-Man crossover “Kraven’s Last Hunt,” from 1987, as well as a distinguished run with writer Doug Moench on Master of Kung Fu in the late ’70s—headlines this two-day orgy of comics, sci-fi, cosplay, and TV and movie stuff.

Rossini International Street Fair
Downtown • 10 a.m.-9 p.m. • Free
Knoxville Opera takes over downtown for its annual celebration of Old World music, art, food, and more—one of Knoxville’s biggest parties, rivaling UT football games in scale. Up to 100,000 people will fill Gay Street, Market Square, and the adjacent blocks for four entertainment stages, offerings from upscale artisans, fair food, beer and wine tastings, and kids’ events. Jack Neely has some insight into the event’s historic significance here. Look for the official program guide in this week’s Mercury, and come visit us at our booth on Saturday!

Tennessee Association of Vintage Base Ball
Historic Ramsey House • Noon • FreeKHP_0421_KnoxvilleHolstons
The Knoxville Holstons host the Highland Rim Distillers from Goodlettsville in a match of 1860s-style base ball clubs. Read details on the recent revival of one of the earliest recognizable forms of America’s pasttime here.

UT Ready for the World Music Series: Sounds of the Middle East
McClung Museum of Natural History and Culture • 2 p.m. • Free
Rescheduled from January, this installment of the UT Music School’s globetrotting series of performances focused on concert music from around the world features the Arabesque Music Ensemble, from Chicago, playing “Middle Eastern compositions that combine Eastern and Western sonorities and instruments.” There’s a reception and exhibition starting at 12:30 p.m.

Drivin’ N’ Cryin’ with the Blackfoot Gypsies
The Shed at Smoky Mountain Harley-Davidson (Maryville) • 6 p.m. • $20
The cult Southern college favorites from Atlanta have been hard to pin down during their 30-year career—a little bit punk, a little bit ’80s college jangle-pop, a little bit (maybe a lot) good old Southern rock, with just enough hippie DNA to pass for a jam band when they need to. Expect hits like “Straight to Hell,” “Honeysuckle Blue,” and “Fly Me Courageous,” but you’ll also get plenty of new material—Kevn Kinney and company have stayed busy since the release of their 12th album, The Great American Bubble Factory, in 2009, with a series of four EPs, a greatest-hits collection, and an archival live album.

Mobius Trio
Episcopal Church of the Good Samaritan • 7 p.m. • $15

Mobius Trio #18

Mobius Trio #18

This young San Francisco trio, founded in 2010, expands the boundaries of classical guitar on its 2012 album, Last Light, which has more in common with the work of avant-garde and improv guitarists like Derek Bailey and Bill Orcutt than the traditional concert guitar repertoire. Hosted by the Knoxville Guitar Society.

SUNDAY, APRIL 24
Cornel West: Race Matters
UT Alumni Memorial Building • 1:30 p.m. • Free12974451_988040114598297_866632804970986293_n
The “prominent and provocative democratic intellectual” Cornel West revisits his 1994 book, Race Matters, at this UT lecture, to see how things have changes in the last 22 years, how they’ve stayed the same, and to underscore the fact of the title.

Public Cinema: Cemetery of Splendor
Knoxville Museum of Art • 2 p.m. • FreeCEMETERYOFSPLENDOUR_APICHATPONGWEERASETHAKUL_05 copy
The next-to-last installment of the Public Cinema’s spring 2016 schedule features renowned Thai director Apichatpong Weerasethakul’s 2015 meditation on memory, history, dreams, and art.

Tour de Knox Bike Rally
University of Tennessee
Meet in UT Parking Lot 9, at the corner of Phillip Fulmer Way and Peyton Manning Pass, for a “scavenger hunt on wheels” to find prizes donated by local business. The rally covers campus and the nearby greenways and benefits the Legacy Parks Foundation. (Check out the Get Out and Play guide to outdoor recreation in Knoxville that we published in partnership with Legacy Parks earlier this month—it’s available at Knox County schools, health care facilities around the area, and the Outdoor Knoxville Adventure Center. Or pick a copy up at the Mercury booth at the Rossini International Street Fair on Saturday!)

KSO Chamber Classics: Lefkowitz Plays Mozart
Bijou Theatre • 2:30 p.m. • $13.50-$31.50
Knoxville Symphony Orchestra concertmaster Gabriel Lefkowitz headlines KSO’s final chamber concert of the 2015-16 season, with Benjamin Britten’s Simple Symphony, Mozart’s Violin Concerto No. 3 in G Major, and Dvořák’s Serenade in E Major.

Hellcannon with Sadistic Ritual and Jean-Claude God Damn
Pilot Light • 6 p.m. • $6 • 18 and upHellcannon
Thrash in the afternoon, with bands from Buffalo, Atlanta, and Knoxville.

Senior Editor Matthew Everett manages the Knoxville Mercury's arts & entertainment section, including the comprehensive calendar section—Knoxville’s go-to guide for everything worth doing in the area. You can reach Matthew at matthew@knoxmercury.com.

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