Past Events
Multicultural Arts Center Presents
The Outlet
March 08, 2024 at 8:00pm
The Outlet is back and better than ever, with an open mic platform that offers a unique opportunity for creatives to showcase their skills. Created by Elae Weekes, The Outlet is a celebration of local talent. As an artist and Dorchester native, Elae understands the importance of supporting local talent and is passionate about bringing communities together. If you're a poet, dancer, or singer, this is the perfect chance to shine! So, join us, and let your creativity take center stage!
No Sleep Presents
Takaaki Itoh
February 19, 2024 at 3:00pm
Active in the scene since the early '90s, Takaaki has been one of Japan's most prominent and influential figures of techno, as a DJ, producer, promoter and founder of the record label WOLS. Takaaki's production and track selection is hypnotic, cerebral, and heavy in ambience. In more visceral terms, the sound is dark, deep, and often, as he has described, "wet". Throughout his sets, there's a consistent feeling of venturing into the unknown.
Those Assembled Theatre Company
and Multicultural Arts Center Present
God's Ear
February 17 - 18, 2024 at 7:00pm
Jenny Schwartz’s God’s Ear is an honest look into a family’s journey after the loss of their ten-year-old son. This play is liminal – it rambles. It is loud, mean, and heartbreaking. A mixture of magic and the raw edges of grief, this production from Those Assembled Theatre Company will make you lean in and lean in again for meaning as the characters work to find it themselves.
The Cambridge Jazz Foundation
Presents
Celebrating Blues and
Swing
February 16, 2024 at 7:00 PM
Immerse yourself in the soulful melodies and infectious rhythms that have defined generations. Whether you're a fan of the classic blues or love to dance to swinging tunes, this event promises an unforgettable experience for all. Tap your feet to the sounds of Bobby Broom on guitar, Greg Groover, Jr. on sax, and vocals by Farayi Malek. To bring you the best of these iconic genres, the Ron Savage Trio is attending with Ron Savage on drums, Ron Mahdi on bass, and Consuelo Candelaria-Barry on piano. Bring your friends and loved ones to enjoy a night of toe-tapping music, energetic performances, and a vibrant atmosphere.
Celebrity Series of Boston Presents
Nebulous String
Quartet
February 09, 2024 at 7:30 PM
The Nebulous Quartet might have traditional string quartet instrumentation, but their sound is all their own. On Friday, February 9th, at 7 PM, prepare to experience unique musical arrangements and beautifully original compositions. Drawing from their distinct musical identities, this young quartet, all recent Berklee graduates, create music in an improvisational style and nebulous state. Celebrate the joyful spirit that brings them together as you embark on a cosmic experience at the Nebulous String Quartet concert!
Valkyrie Heels Crew presents
Valkyie:
Rise
February 03, 2024 at 8:00 PM
Prepare to be amazed, inspired, and uplifted at Valkyrie: Rise! Embracing creativity as their cornerstone, the Valkyrie Heels Crew is a queer-led and queer-founded heels group passionate about providing a safe space for dancers to experiment with original Choreography and develop their artistic voice. Join us for an electrifying evening of dance by the Valkyrie Heels crew and guest performers representing various dance styles.
Juventas New Music Ensemble Presents
Anne Howarth: Center Stage
January 27, 2024 at 8:00 PM
Viewing classical music as a vibrant, living form, the Juventas New Music Ensemble is a contemporary chamber group focused on uplifting emerging voices. On Saturday, January 27, at 8 pm, attend a unique solo program celebrating hornist Anne Howarth’s five years with the Juventas New Music Ensemble.
The Multicultural Arts Center Presents
For Nina
Saturday, December 16, at 7:30pm
We exhale to remember, we perform to call in. Performing art uniquely positions a person to look for and embody freedom. Nina Simone is one of the most beautiful Freedom Seekers. Her work paved the way for Black artists and underrepresented voices to claim liberation. This piece is titled “For Nina” as a thank you letter for the work she has done and as a reflection on the lineage - old and young - of artists like Nina Simone. “For Nina” will celebrate the songs of Nina Simone through dance by Victoria Lynn Awkward, vocals by Desiré Graham, piano by Hua Ye (Jane), lighting design by Elmer Martinez, sets by Mikayla Williams and will include guest youth dancers.
The Multicultural Arts Center Presents
qUaRtEr LiFe cRiSiS
Friday, December 15, at 8:00pm
In "qUaRtEr LiFe cRiSiS," a captivating dance show by Miranda Lawson, audiences are taken on a rollercoaster journey through the ups and downs of young adult-hood. Through a perfect blend of dance and stand-up comedy, Miranda fearlessly explores life's great questions and shares glimpses of her own experiences.
Juventas New Music Ensemble Present
Encore
Saturday, November 11, 2023 at 8pm
Juventas New Music Ensemble is a contemporary chamber group with a special focus on emerging voices sharing classical music as a vibrant, living art form. They bring audiences music from a diverse array of composers that live in today’s world and respond to our time.
Beehive Chamber Series
Homeland
Thursday, November 9, 2023 at 7pm
Palaver Strings Ensemble performs Homeland; a performance that explores folk-inspired music by a diverse group of composers paying homage to their homelands: Carlos Guastavino (Argentina), Violetta Parra (Chile), Leos Janacek (Czech Republic), and Bela Bartok (Hungary). These pieces explore the essence of each composer’s cultural-political landscape, using folk material from everyday life.
Multicultural Arts Center presents
Dvidha
Friday, October 13, 2023 at 7:30pm
DVIDHA is an enriching performance showcasing the duality
of two distinct styles of Indian Classical Dance, Bharatanatyam and Kathak.
Swathi Jaisankar will present Bharatanatyam, which originates from South India, and Ariaki Dandawate will present Kathak,
which originates from North India. Together, the two artists will use an interactive format to highlight the beauty in the similarities and differences of their respective dance styles. The
harmonious confluence of dance, the artistic synergy between the dancers, and the richness of movement will make the DVIDHA a spellbinding experience for all audiences!
Maitreyee Chakraborty (Tagore, Me and You) presents
Women, Gender, Caste and Colorism in Tagore's Compositions
Saturday, October 7, 2023 at 5pm
Women's stories, gender issues, caste and colorism will be explored in Tagore's songs, stories, dances and acting in a feast for the senses. Come watch this amazing show with vocals, live music, dance and drama (with English subtitles).
This program is supported and funded by The Cambridge Arts Council and by NEBAF (New England Bangladeshi American Foundation).
Multicultural Arts Center presents
The Soggy Po Boys
Thursday, October 5, 2023 at 8pm
The Elliot Fisk Guitar Academy is bringing the Boston Classical Guitar Fest to East Cambridge! Join us at the Multicultural Arts Center for the Boston International Guitar Challenge on Wednesday evening, followed by stellar performances Thursday through Saturday!
Winsor Music Presents
Pulse: Kevin Harris Project
Sunday, May 14, 2023 at 8pm
Kevin Harris is a Boston and New York based jazz pianist and composer. “Pulse” is a large, compelling chamber composition combining improvised and fully notated music. In Winsor’s twenty-year history of commissioning new works, “Pulse” will be the first piece directly linked to jazz. This project is made possible by a Live Arts Boston grant from the Boston Foundation.
Infinity Dance Collective Presents
Activate
May 5 - 6, 2023
Collective consciousness and energy inspire the interdisciplinary art performance, Activate. The performance dives into the collective human experience and the interconnectedness of souls, the universe and higher energies to empower and inspire.
Sheffield Chamber Players Present
Shared Spaces
An evening of music and spoken word reflecting on the Japanese-American experience. Internment survivor David Sakura shares the stage with a series of works including the premiere performance of Kenji Bunch’s new “String Quartet No. 5, Songs for a Shared Space,” commissioned by Sheffield Chamber Players.
BOLT
Choreography by IJ Chan, Olivia Moon,
and Jeryl Palana Pilapil Brown
April 27 - 28, 2023 at 7:30pm
BOLT is a multidisciplinary performance uplifting femme voices from the Asian-American diaspora. BOLT will explore themes such as belonging, identity, and heritage: a merging of past and present. Featuring choreography by IJ Chan, Jeryl Palana Pilapil Brown, and Olivia Moon.
Abilities Dance Presents
Intersections V2
United Dance Company Presents
JOY
April 14-15, 2023
Celebrity Series of Boston Presents
Hub New Music
April 1, 2023 at 3pm
Presented by the Celebrity Series of Boston, Hub New Music celebrates its tenth anniversary with new works by Angélica Negrón and Jessica Meyer as well as "Scenes from Surreality," a work by Boston-based erhu player and violinist Shaw Pong Liu that was originally commissioned for Neighborhood Arts.
Urbanity Professional Company Presents
Of the Ether
March 24 & 25, 2023 at 7pm
Urbanity Professional Company will present a performance exploring the concept of the Ether. The performance will be a creative collaboration between Urbanity’s Company Director, Meg Anderson, Choreography Fellow and members of MASARY Studios. The creative team, along with the dancers, will aim to create, not just a performance, but an immersive experience for the audience.
Farayi Malek Band
Featuring Lihi Haruvi
With Guests Caio e Jess
March 17, 2023 at 7:30pm
The Multicultural Arts Center brings you an evening of live music influenced by Jazz, Gospel and Americana with Grammy-nominated vocalist Farayi Malek and her band. Malek is a jazz and contemporary vocalist, composer, and educator. Also in the line-up that evening will be the amazing duo Caio e Jess. Don't miss this special night full of creativity, beauty and live music!
Soca Fusion Presents
A Journey Through Weekend
March 11 - 12, 2023
Join us for a beautiful showcase that helps bring awareness to The Lung Transplant Assistance Fund at Mass General Hospital in honor of Soca Fusion’s founder and lead director, Ms Ella, and her journey through a double-lung transplant almost 2 years ago. The showcase will be followed by a full day of workshops
Celebrity Series of Boston
Presents
Sandeep Das and Suhail Yusuf
Khan
Soundscapes of India with Boston City
Singers
February 25, 2023 at 3:00 pm
Join tabla virtuoso Sandeep Das and Suhail Yusuf Khan, who brings a rock sensibility to India’s traditional stringed sarangi, as they team up to present Soundscapes of India. We can guarantee that these two artists will present a wide-ranging concert that blends the traditional and modern, and vividly conjures the diverse landscapes, cityscapes, and cultures of India.
Das and Khan share the stage with students from Boston City Singers in what will be the culmination of their February vacation tabla camp, where they will spend the week learning the basics of the twin hand drums.
Urbanity Dance Presents
Reverberate
February 17 & 18, 2023 at 7:00 pm
Urbanity Dance's Creative Class of Urbanity Underground and Junior Apprentice dancers will perform and present new work.
Urbanity Underground is Urbanity's second company comprised of accomplished dancers who are pursuing various professions or advanced studies, but still want to stay connected to dance at a high level. Urbanity's Junior Apprentices are talented high school students ages 14+ who are interested in pursuing a career in dance.
The Bridgeside Cypher Presents
Love & Rhythm
February 3, 2023 at 7:00 pm
Love and Rhythm will showcase talented, local RnB artists performing with a live band. Located in the Multicultural Arts Center ballroom, it will also include a "cypher" portion, where the live band will play RnB cover songs and artists can sign up to sing and or freestyle in a fluid, collaborative concert.
There will be plenty of Valentine's day themed decorations, a photo booth, refreshments, and hor dourves. This elegant event will be the perfect place to celebrate Valentine's Day early!
The Multicultural Arts Center Presents
Hear Her Sing for Freedom
January 13 - 16, 2023
Each year, we host an annual event in honor of Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. For over 30 years, we have celebrated his legacy through our Joyful Noise concert with Harlem Gospel Choir. This year, returning from a 2 year hiatus due to the pandemic, our new Artistic Director Najee Brown will be reimagining the event to focus on the legacy of Coretta Scott King, who’s role in the Civil Rights Movement is often underrepresented. Scott King presented concerts to fund the movement, and was responsible for the salaries of many of the men employed at the SCLC. In Hear Her Sing for Freedom, visitors will have the chance to experience what it might have been like to witness Coretta Scott King perform a Freedom Concert.
United Dance Presents
December 9-10, 2022
Come and discover the origin story of the Nutcracker! The untold story of the Extraordinary Nutcracker by artistic director and choreographer Gianni Di Marco is an epic story ballet of love, adventure, and magic. Follow our heroine as she embarks on a magical adventure to save the love of her life. Immerse yourself in a new tradition with our holiday market, arts and crafts, and photo booth.
Love in the Time of
Based on and incorporating Schumann’s Dichterliebe Performed with piano accompaniment
November 10-12 , 2022
In this extraordinary musical pairing, Robert Schumann’s beloved Dichterliebe is intertwined with Love in the Time Of..., a brand new song cycle commissioned by BOC. 10 poets and 8 composers have created 16 new songs, each one a reflection or response to the brilliant works in Schumann’s cycle. In a fully staged narrative, this piece explores the love we aspire to and the things we must let go amidst all the promise, turmoil, wonder and heartache of the 21st century.
An Evening of Spanish Music with Tomomi Kohno and Zaira Meneses
Tomomi Kohno
Born in Tokyo, Ms. Kohno started piano at age of 4. She has won many prestigious competitions, such as the Tokyo International Guitar Competition, Asian International guitar Competition. She is the president of The Spain-Japan Guitar Society.
Zaira Meneses
International classical guitarist, dancer, singer, and Sonja Rocho performance artist.
She is highly regarded by the international press as a leading performing artist of classical guitar. Founder and president of the Entrepreneurs' Online Academy, EFGA Music was founded in 2020 and named after her husband, world-renowned classical guitarist Elliott Fisk.
Cambridge Jazz Foundation Presents
Join us November 4th, as we present Cambridge Jazz Foundation's second fall concert featuring the Ron Savage Trio, Gabrielle Goodman, Dominique Eade, and Farayi Malek. Concert starts at 8pm with cash bar reception at 7pm!
Fermata Chamber Soloist presents
Fermata Chamber Soloists is excited to open our 5th season, featuring music from the 20th and 21st centuries. Modern and contemporary music can sometimes be a turn-off for audiences, who often feel more alienated by the sounds they hear than anything else. Join us as we bravely dive into this unique language, and uncover the powerful meaning beneath.
Celebrity Series of Boston
Poet Regie Gibson and world-funk-and-more band Atlas Soul once again join forces in a return to the Series for an afternoon of powerful words and music, featuring covers and originals, as well as Gibson’s resonant, dazzling, and thought-provoking wordplay.
Celebrity Series of Boston
Traka, the newest work from Cambridge-based Haitian choreographer Jean Appolon, means “Troubles” in Haitian Creole and explores how dance, community, and culture are pathways to healing from traumatic events. Inspired by Appolon’s own healing process after his father was murdered in Haiti’s 1991 coup, Traka uses Haitian folkloric dance and contemporary dance to depict the journey of a country and a people working through generational trauma.
Appolon teams with Haitian composer, turntablist, and Afro-futurist Val Jeanty (Val-Inc), who creates Vodou-inspired contemporary soundscapes that provide the rhythmic foundation for Appolon’s heartfelt and thought-provoking work.
Also available as a streaming performance premiering October 13, 2022 at 4pm.
Infinity Dance Collective presents
Transmute is about the energy that connects us all and the soul expansion & transformation that can happen with universal love of community. One love, one light, transmuting darkness to light.
As we transmute energy for ourselves and those around us, we collectively heal humanity. Transmute brings artists together across different ages & various styles of dance, with live music, poetry, and voice. The show brings a community heart healing component in the per-formance with audience involvement and energetic healing for all. Dance styles are contemp-orary, modern, structured & contact improvisation, and ballet.
With guest artists Erica Cornejo and Carlos Molina and pre-professional dancers of Integrarte.
Flamenco a la Mexicana:
Featuring María Aliaga
Friday, September 9, 2022
In September, Mexico and Mexican people across the world commemorate Mexican Independence. However, through the heart of Mexico runs Prehispanic and Spanish blood, because Mexico is the result of a “mestizaje”, a very deep cultural mixture. Flamenco a la Mexicana is a celebration of that miscegenation of which all Mexicans are a product. It is a show created by the Mexican flamenco dancer María Aliaga, where music, costumes, dances and traditions fuse with flamenco, a Spanish art. Mexican boleros meet the chords of the Andalusian guitar, Mexican textiles turn into a flamenco dress, and La Catrina, the Mexican skull, dances flamenco. This show, created in 2014, has been presented in Mexico City and New York. September 9 at the Multicultural Arts Center will be the first time it will be presented to commemorate the Independence of Mexico, celebrating our “mestizaje”.
Come along with us to
Clement Morgan Park (The Port) for Arts in the Park this Saturday, June 25th from 1 pm - 5 pm! Artist and designer Ayana Mack (pictured here) will join us in leading
a hands-on craft activity all about JOY.
Adius Arts Initiative,
Everbody Gotta Eat, and the Cambridge Department of Public Works present Arts in the Park, a day of learning, a celebration of the arts, and building community in The Port
neighborhood! The event will also include FREE performances, tastings, interactive exhibits, children's games, and and more as part of The Port Infrastructure Improvements
Project.
Mark your calendars for this rarely performed operatic gem! Composed in the late 1600s, Venus & Adonis is believed to be the earliest surviving English opera. Playful Cupid pierces his mother Venus with one of his arrows. She promptly falls in love with the beautiful youth Adonis and sends his off hunting with his comrades. Then the drama begins as Adonis is felled by a wild boar! Our opera is a fascinating window into the period and a musical gem that sparkles anew for us today.
Ekti Abhinaba Natoker Mohora (In search of a novel play) is a dark absurd comedy that reflects the state of humankind in current
times. It takes us on
a spiral of stories that are repeatedly fragmented leaving one wondering what is
true. An ensemble cast of human and non-human characters create a collective collage of the despair and ludicrousness of our current life.
Off-Kendrik Presents
Ekti Abhinaba Natoker Mohora
(In search of a novel play)
Saturday, June 4, 2022, 6:30pm
Sunday, June 5, 2022, 3pm
Urbanity Dance
10th Anniversary Series
Boston Jazz United for Ukraine
A Jazz Benefit for the People of Ukraine
Featuring Maxim Lubarsky & Special Guests
Friday, May 13th, 2022, 7:30-9:30pm EST US
Conceived by Jay Hoffman & CJ Kelley, this event is presented by JazzBoston, the Multicultural Arts Center (MAC), and the Cambridge Community Center for the Arts (CCCA), with partial funding provided by Kjell Christiansen and Stephen Adams.
Join us for Wonderland: a Hip Hop film screening and panel conversation on Hip Hop and Placemaking. This project created by Paul Willis uses art to create a conversation about home through digital storytelling, music and community engagement.
If you attended and enjoyed the events at the Multicultural Arts Center, let us know! If there's anything you'd like to see more of, or if you have any vendor recommendations, drop us a comment on our Facebook page.