Ten curated Scope NYC picks for Thursday, October 1, 2026.
Pen and Brush opens Deborah Buck’s first major retrospective, gathering four decades of paintings and mythic female forms; the reception runs from 6 to 8.
Craig Taborn joins bassist Thomas Morgan and drummer Kayvon Gordon at Close Up, bringing a piano trio to the Orchard Street Jazz Festival.
J. Hoberman introduces Jean Rouch’s Moi, un noir at L’Alliance, then signs Across the Movi-Verse—a screening with a critic’s perspective built in.
Arlo Parks brings the Desire tour to Knockdown Center with Baird opening; doors at 7 for a night of intimate songs on a warehouse scale.
Turn the Roxy’s screen into a participatory San Francisco history project: archivist Rick Prelinger plays a 128-year panorama assembled from some 300 moving images and invites the audience to supply its own soundtrack and memories. Stay for a Q&A with Prelinger, moderated by Mackenzie Lukenbill.
Stephanie Acosta gathers Andrea Soto, Matt Rossi and mun for performances and conversation about ecology, with soil, plants and bodies shaping the evening at CPR.
Laura van Dernoot Lipsky discusses the revised Trauma Stewardship at Greenlight, with a Q&A about sustaining a life of caring for others.
Brendan Scannell brings The Abyss to the Bell House for its New York debut after Edinburgh Fringe, mixing stand-up with personal storytelling.
David Longstreth, Haley Fohr, Mal Devisa and Mutual Benefit each perform with the Wordless Music String Quartet at this benefit celebrating Silent Barn.
Somi brings her jazz vocals and African musical roots to Sony Hall as part of World Music Institute’s Women’s Voices series; the show starts at 8.