Ten curated Scope NYC picks for Monday, May 18.
Chris Marker at BAM gives Monday a serious repertory anchor, especially with the Pynchonesque framing around a restless political epic.
NYSID thesis openings are a smart early-evening art stop: student work, design-world foot traffic, and more energy than a passive gallery browse.
Ted Nash steering a Miles Davis centennial program at Dizzy's is polished without being sleepy, and it keeps the night tied to actual players.
CPR open labs are good bets when you want dance and performance work while it is still being shaped, not after every edge has been sanded down.
The Joy Formidable at LPR is the clean indie-rock pick of the night, with enough venue intimacy to keep it from feeling like a nostalgia booking.
A drawing program inside the Noguchi Museum is a quieter but very Queens-specific way to make an art night feel deliberate.
The Met Orchestra Chamber Ensemble at Carnegie is the formal pick, but it earns the slot because the scale is chamber-size rather than gala-heavy.
The Vanguard Jazz Orchestra remains one of the city's great Monday defaults, and this is a default worth keeping in the mix.
Harmony Holiday and Zoe Imani Sharpe at The Poetry Project gives the night a sharper literary-performance lane than most Monday readings.
MUNA doing an album-release night at Music Hall of Williamsburg should pull a crowd that is there for the new record, not just the hits.