Eight Must-See Arts and Entertainment Events in May 2012

Photo courtesy of the Howard Yezerski Gallery.

“Faces in the Breeze,” by Morgan Bulkeley. His work will be at the Howard Yezerski Gallery from May 25 through June 26. 

1. Hit the A.R.T.’s Woody Sez for a celebration of Woody Guthrie’s life and music, then stay after the show for a real live hootenanny (that’s a “raucous jam session” to you city folk). 5/5–5/26

2. Jennifer Miller reads from Year of the Gadfly, her new novel about a Boston teen investigating a secret society at her boarding school, at Brookline Booksmith. Think A Separate Peace meets Gossip Girl. 5/9

3. Forget Fashion Star: See who you’ll be wearing in 2017 when students run the catwalk at the annual MassArt Fashion Show in the Revere Hotel’s Space 57. 5/11

4. Cuteness alert: The Friends of the Public Garden host the Duckling Day Parade, which traces the path of the little quackers in Robert McCloskey’s famous children’s book. 5/13

5. Long before Enya got big, Celtic music was arcane — and Beethoven was a fan. At the Cutler Majestic, the Mark Morris Dance Group performs The Muir, a ballet set to folk songs arranged by Ludwig van. 5/17–5/20

6. If a hair-metal band can rock with one lead singer, just imagine what it can do with 20. That’s Boston’s own Bang Camaro, playing a reunion show at Brighton Music Hall. 5/18

7. At Worcester’s Hanover Theatre, Joan Rivers celebrates “135 Years & Counting” of disarmingly crass standup. Hecklers, beware: She’ll crush you. 5/22

8. At the Howard Yezerski Gallery, painter, sculptor, and Bay Stater Morgan Bulkeley combines Rousseau’s dreamlike nature scenes, Dali’s surrealism, and Hopper’s ghostly towns into work that’s somehow both bleak and fun. 5/25–6/26