concert crowd
Photograph: Shutterstock
Photograph: Shutterstock

The best concerts in NYC this week

Get set, go! We've rounded up the best gigs in the five boroughs during the next seven days

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Update: With the current ban on public gatherings of any size, many of the concerts  and events below may be postponed to a later date or canceled. 

As any NYC music fan will tell you, there are no off nights here. If you're game for going out, the city's guaranteed to have a gig for you, whether it's a pop blowout, a cozy country show, a set at a world-famous jazz club like the Village Vanguard or a raging metal bill. Our monthly concert calendars are your first stop for news on shows coming up, but this list of the best concerts in NYC is designed to help with your last-minute showgoing plans. Why not take a chance on a new name? Every gig you see below gets the Time Out New York stamp of approval.

RECOMMENDED: See our guide to concerts in NYC

  • Music
  • Cabaret and standards
  • Hell's Kitchen
  • price 2 of 4
  • Recommended
Mosher is one of those talents you need to see to believe: warm, funny, biting, ferociously committed. In her biweekly series—now held at the Green Room 42 after years at Birdland—she invites a gaggle of performers from Broadway and beyond to show their talents. Guests at the April 15 edition include Jelani Remy, Jeff Harnar, Richard Jay-Alexander, Ava Nicole Frances, Keve Wilson, Yael Rasooly, Ivory Fox, Juson Williams, Annie Thomas, Ella Miller and Izzy Casciani.
  • Music
  • Cabaret and standards
  • Hell's Kitchen
  • Recommended
The longtime New York entertainer, drag performer and political activist Marti Gould Cummings hosts a new weekly late-night talk show at Red Eye, joined by different guests from the theater world each week and Yaz Fukuoka at the piano. The series kicks off this month with an impressive roster of interviewees: Broadway soprano Ali Ewoldt (April 2), songwriters Stephen Trask and Our Lady J (April 9), musical comedian Cat Cohen (April 16), silver-voiced leading lady Melissa Errico (April 23) and masked country star turned Cabaret emcee Orville Peck (April 30).
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  • Music
  • Cabaret and standards
  • Lower East Side
  • price 2 of 4
  • Recommended
PJ Adzima, who currently plays the hopeful but hopelessly repressed Elder McKinley in Broadway's The Book of Mormon, hosts a neovaudevillian monthly variety show at the Slipper Room that proffers an eclectic mix of musical-theater, comedy, drag, circus and burlesque performances. A down-and-dirtier version of the show also plays there every week on Saturdays at midnight.
  • Music
  • Cabaret and standards
  • Hell's Kitchen
  • price 2 of 4
  • Recommended
Part cabaret, part piano bar and part social set, Cast Party offers a chance to hear rising and established talents step up to the microphone (backed by the slap and tickle of Steve Doyle on bass and Billy Stritch at the ivories, plus the bang of Daniel Glass on drums). The waggish Caruso presides as host.
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  • Music
  • Cabaret and standards
  • East Village
  • Recommended
He’s worked with Liza Minnelli, Kylie Minogue and just about every downtown act in NYC. Now composer, pianist and performer Lance Horne hosts his own wild night of singing, drinking and dancing, strip-teasing and bad behavior at the East Village nightlife hub Club Cumming. Expect advanced show-tune geekery and appearances by Broadway stars looking to get down by the piano. Plan to sleep in on Tuesday.
  • Music
  • Cabaret and standards
  • Gramercy
  • price 3 of 4
  • Recommended
The smart and droll Paul F. Tompkins (BoJack Horseman), a master of character improv and a  booming voice in comedy podcasting, brings his spirited old-school variety show to New York City, joined by musical director Jordan Katz and the Varietorchestra. Hosted by Tompkins, this traveling vaudeville features splashes from the local pool of comedians, musicians and other entertainers.  
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  • Music
  • Cabaret and standards
  • Gramercy
  • price 2 of 4
  • Recommended
Grab your tambourine, toss on a black lace shawl and sleep with your boyfriend’s drummer: The Jackie Factory's annual commune honoring rock and roll's greatest sorceress makes Comic Con look quaint. Bow down and worship at the altar of white witch Stevie Nicks as a grand coterie of drag queens, musicians and style icons from across the country twirl in endlessly mesmerizing performances. This year's 33rd edition, "Dances of Rhiannon," celebrates Nicks's signature stage moves. Founders and nightlife icons Chi Chi Valenti and Johnny Dynell are joined this time by returning favorites Vikki Martin, Maryanne Piccolo, Mike Greco, Niki Luparelli, Danielle Marie Fusco, Bright Light Bright Light, JMV (Just My Vibe) and local Butoh star Vangeline—along with newbies Lexxe, Anthony Cherrie, Krystofer Maison, Eddie Lockwood and the Welsh tribute act Rhiannon UK. DJs Sammy Jo and Tommie Sunshine keep you grooving between sets. 
  • Music
  • Cabaret and standards
  • Hell's Kitchen
  • price 1 of 4
  • Recommended
The irrepressible Paul Iacono, who played the title role in MTV’s hung-teen series The Hard Times of RJ Berger, uses hits by Elton John and Bernie Taupin to regale audiences with tales of times he spent as a youth with the wind to his candle: the legendary Broadway battle-axe Elaine Stritch. (Stritch's never-realized final project was an Elton-themed cabaret.) Green Room impresario Ben Rimalower directs, and musical director Drew Wutke helps Iacono hit the John. 
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  • Music
  • Cabaret and standards
  • Hell's Kitchen
  • price 3 of 4
  • Recommended
After originating the web-singing title role in the ill-fated Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark, Reeve Carney swung back onto Broadway as Orpheus in Hadestown and has also played Dorian Gray in Penny Dreadful and Tom Ford in House of Gucci. Now he brings his otherworldly tenor to a residency at the Green Room 42; he usually focuses on his original material, but in this particular set he offers a more traditional cabaret assortment of songs made famous by great ladies of musical theater. 
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