By Charlie Hunt and Gary Graff

With splendid weather and some operational changes, the 46th Annual Detroit Jazz Festival had both downtown and midtown bopping and grooving throughout Labor Day Weekend, with more than four dozen acts playing at stages in Hart Plaza and Cadillac Square and in the Gretchen C. Valade Jazz Center on the Wayne State University campus.

It was also livestreamed globally via the festival web site and social media.

Festival organizers surprised fans with new security protocols and checkpoints for entering and leaving Hart Plaza, as well as a repositioned Absopure Waterfront Stage, which now faced east rather than towards the Detroit River. The JPMorgan Chase Main Stage at Cadillac Square, meanwhile, was repositioned in the same direction, which allowed the Campus Martius Park fountains to provide a playful backdrop to the performances (although the setting sun was brutal for about a half-hour or so each evening).

This year’s festival also included an aggressive Keep It Free fundraising campaign to help the event maintain its status as the world’s largest free-admission jazz festival. On Sunday, festival chief Chris Collins announced that $78,500 of the $100,000 goal had been reached so far; further updates are expected in the near future.

The music, meanwhile, remained spectacular throughout the four days — which started Friday, Aug. 29 with Artist-In-Residence Jason Moran’s exciting collaboration with electronic pioneer Jeff Mills and Detroit poet laureate Jessica Care Moore. It was hard to catch everything, but these were 10 of the best things we caught during the weekend (all reviews by Charlie Hunt unless otherwise noted)…

* Chris Potter Trio, Carhartt Amphitheater Stage, Saturday, Aug. 30

Dressed in black jeans and solid color shirts, tenor saxophonist Chris Potter’s trio looked understated and plainspoken — but its set was anything but. The trio played without pretension and burst right into a turbulent, heady and purposeful jazz opening with “7-11,” named after its complex rhythmic cycle. On the next composition, “Kudu,” Potter, who breathes fire through his reed, improvised a succinct and delirious sequence of buzzing notes that built to mountainous heights but still left space for bassist Matt Brewer to pound out a robust solo. Potter said he couldn’t imagine coming to Detroit without playing a Stevie Wonder tune, and he picked “Send One Your Love.” Potter switched to a low-register bass clarinet for the new composition “Voices Remembered,” then jumped to “Good Hope,” a song he recorded with bassist Dave Holland and the late tabla-master Zakir Hussain as the Crosscurrents Trio. Potter and drummer Kendrick Scott energized each other’s solos into another sonic realm. The trio closed with the Jerome Kern standard “Pick Yourself Up,” imbued with unparalleled improvisation sequences across many octaves and registers.

* Maria Schneider Orchestra, JPMorgan Chase Stage, Saturday

In a rare opportunity to hear a much-heralded maestro, multiple Grammy Award winner Maria Schneider led her 18-piece big band comprised of veterans and newcomers with joy, style, grace and panache. Opening with “Bluebird,” from her 2023 album “Data Lords,” the extraordinary and enterprising composer/arranger featured Brazilian Vitor Goncalves on accordion, a rarely used instrument in big band jazz but a signature component of her exquisite and visionary artistry. Charismatic, gracious and charming, Schneider plucked compositions from throughout her 30-year career, including “Wyrgly” and the title track from her 1994 debut album “Evanescence,” and “Walking by Flashlight” from her 2012 classical album “Winter Mornings Walk.”

Stylistically, Schneider’s music emanates from the influential jazz bandleader Gil Evans; each of her compositions followed a path, with featured soloists supported by exquisite and carefully layered overtures by the large ensemble, enabling her to conjure any sound scheme she designs. “The thing about jazz that is so amazing is it’s all about listening,” she said as the introduced “American Crow,” a new composition that she described as music for our tense and tension-filled times; it featured trumpeter Mike Rodriguez and electric guitarist Jeff Miles, among other soloists. Always stylish, the strawberry blonde bandleader wore a black dress and enthusiastically led the band with fluid hand motions and moved ballet-like across the stage. She smiled throughout the evening sit as she obviously enjoyed the experience.

* James Carter Organ Trio, Gretchen C. Valade Jazz Center at Wayne State University, Saturday

Detroit’s own James Carter reigns supreme among jazz saxophonists. Few can match his otherworldly power, intensity, passion and showmanship. After-hours on n Saturday he hosted a Carter family all-star party that was enthralling and exhilarating receiving, multiple standing ovations from the standing-room-only crowd. Carter saluted his 99-year-old mother and spoke about his Detroit jazz upbringing before fearlessly leading his trio of Gerard Gibbs on Hammond B-3 organ and drummer Alex White through a wildly-varied set, starting with the jazz standard “Tenderly.” The repertoire included Billy Strayhorn’s “A Flower is a Lovesome Thing” and a pair of gypsy jazz numbers — “La Valse Des Niglos,” aka “The Hedge Hog Waltz,” and Django Reinhart’s “Impromptu,” the latter featuring a knock-out drum solo by White. Carter choreographed astonishing body movements synced to each breath note, blurt, blast, screech and phrase as he performed on a matched set of three gleaming red-and-gold saxophones — tenor alto and soprano. He brought out his brothers, and they tore up the joint. Vocalist Robert Carter crooned Marvin Gaye’s “What’s Going On” and the Isley Brothers’ “For the Love of You,” while guitarist Kevin Carter played Carlos Santana-like stylings on Jimi Hendrix’s “Red House” and Chick Corea’s “Spain,” which featured lead vocals by cousin Stuart Scaggs.

* Lakesia Benjamin, Carhartt Amphitheater Stage, Sunday, Aug. 31

Also saxophonist Lakecia Benjamin, a rising star, unleashed her relentless firepower in what she said was her first-ever Detroit appearance. “We’re going to be celebrating jazz tonight! We’re going to be celebrating life tonight! We’re going to be celebrating music tonight!” she practically screamed from center stage, jolting a spellbound crowd to full attention before she played her first sassy and spunky notes. Dressed in a shiny gold jumpsuit, with gold-rimmed glasses and gold-polished fingernails, Benjamin hoisted a matching gold alto saxophone to her lips and converted her energized breath into staggering, high-energy streams of rapid-fire improvisation. “We’re going to be celebrating women in jazz next,” she announced, setting up her rendition of “My Favorite Things,” dedicated to the late Detroit harpist Alice Coltrane. Subsequently declaring “it’s about to get a little wilder up here,” Benjamin was her own best cheerleader all night, and as promised the former student of Detroit saxophonists Kenny Garrett and James Carter roused the amphitheater audience with her band’s scintillating performance.

* Detroit Jazz Queens, Absopure Waterfront Stage, Sunday

In memory of the recently passed, Detroit-born vocalist Sheila Jordan — whose photo sat on stage, Joan Belgrave rallied some of her Detroit-based singing friends to pay homage to all the great and glorious jazz songstresses of the past. Her team of Detroit Jazz Queens included: Diane Mathis, who belted out two classics popularized by Nancy Wilson (“(You Don’t Know) How Glad I Am” and “I Can’t Take My Eyes Off of You”); Tanya Hood, who took on a Sarah Vaughn favorite “September in the Rain” and Betty Carter’s “Tight;” and Joan Crawford who checked the Ella Fitzgerald box by singing Duke Ellington’s “Sophisticated Lady.” Exquisitely dressed in a flowing red dress, Belgrave sang “Come to Me” and “Caravan” with trumpet accompaniment from John Douglas. The resplendent women regrouped to sing a rousing and bluesy round-robin blues medley of “Rock Me Baby,” “Stormy Monday” and “Going to Chicago.”

* Jason Moran presents the music of Duke Ellington with the Detroit Jazz Festival Collegiate Jazz Orchestra, Sunday on the JPMorgan Chase Main Stage:

Two days after his galvanizing opening night collaboration, Artist-In-Residence Jason Moran was back on duty, guiding the Detroit Jazz Festival Collegiate Jazz Orchestra through a 75-minute program of Duke Ellington music. “This is y’all’s people!” the white-clad pianist told the crowd as he gestured to the horn-dominated 15-member ensemble, crediting the students’ parents for their support as well. Though Moran said he’d only met the musicians three days prior, they troupe was clearly well-prepared as it rolled through 10 songs from the Ellington songbook — including “Kinda Dukish,” “Such Sweet Surrender,” “Braggin’ in Brass” (so hot Moran had the group play it twice) and “Jeep’s Blues,” as well as a segue from Billy Strayhorn’s “Northern Lights” into “East St. Louis Toodle-Oo.” The students deftly executed their paces through a succession of solos, while vocalist Tiffany Gridiron — who performed Monday on the Absopure Waterfront Stage — joined for three songs. The set’s highlight came as “It Don’t Mean a Thing (If You Ain’t Got That Swing)” transitioned into “Mood Indigo,” fronted by a clarinet and muted trumpet and trombone players. — Gary Graff

* Branford Marsalis Quartet, Carhartt Amphitheater Stage, Sunday

Of the many saxophone headliners powering this year’s festival, Branford Marsalis stood out as the eminent elder. He called out eight tunes over his quartet’s 75-minute set, typically taking on the first melodic lead on tenor or soprano saxophone, then stepping behind his bandmates — pianist Joey Calderazzo, bassist Eric Revis and drummer Justin Faulkner — to jam magnificently with extended improvisational finesse, starting out with Calderazzo’s “The Mighty Sword.” The quartet next reinvented pianist Keith Jarrett’s 1974 composition “Long as You Know You’re Living Yours” from Jarrett’s famed European quartet album, “Belonging,” which Marsalis replicated in its entirety and released in March as his first recording on Blue Note Records. Faulkner rose to the forefront on that piece, emphasizing the melody with captivating, rock-imbued passages. The drummer stood out again on Revis’ sneaky ballad “Nilaste,” keeping pace with Marsalis’ fast-paced, serpentine passages with his full-throttled drum work. Nodding to the next generation of saxophonists, Marsalis surprised everyone by inviting two guest saxophonists to the stage — Lakecia Benjamin and Chris Lewis — who delivered their own charged-up solos on “Teo,” a Thelonious Monk tribute.

* Sonder, Absopure Waterfront Stage, Monday, Sept. 1

Out of seemingly nowhere, the astonishing young jazz quintet Sonder, from the Manhattan College of Music, made its first-ever Detroit Jazz Festival appearance and grabbed listeners’ ears with a set of inspired modern jazz — quite the formidable debut by the winner of the festival’s Collegiate Combo Competition. Led by guitarist Noah Myers, the captivating performers – pianist Eric Stern, double bassist August Bish, drummer Adam Wacks, and saxophonist Ian Weidmann — presented intricately interlaced jazz instrumentation. Myers composed all the tunes in the set except for a rousing cover version of Wayne Shorter’s “Joyrider.”

* James Francies Trio, JPMorgan Chase Main Stage, Monday

Keyboardist Francies, who gained notoriety with drummer Jeff “Tain” Watts and in guitarist Pat Metheny’s Side Eye trio, worked through a set of mesmerizing original compositions bolstered by his pulse keepers — bassist Luca Alemanno and drummer Jeremy Dutton. His sweeping approach melded complex, low-register chord phrasings with agile, bright melodic lines. The trio performed a title-less new tune, though Francies said he likes to call it “Garlic Parmesan” because, “I like chicken wings, and who doesn’t?” The trio played “Sway” from Francies’ 2018 album on Blue Note Records and finished the set with a vibrant take on “The Sound of Music” standard “My Favorite Things.” Throughout, Francies’ fingers zipped across the keyboards, sometimes with complex, single-note flurries, then countering with cascading chordal runs.

* Marion Hayden & Legacy with Kamau Kenyatta, Absopure Waterfront Stage, Monday

Bassist Hayden, one of the founders of the celebrated all-female jazz quintet Straight Ahead, furthered her role among Detroit’s lineage of jazz musicians by taking her intergenerational band, Legacy, through an afternoon set of hand-selected compositions. Deepening the Detroit roots of her music, she invited Grammy Award-winning pianist, producer and arranger Kamau Kenyatta, who she referred to as her brother, “my mentor, my peer,” recollecting that they started playing jazz together when they were nine. years old. “That must have been pretty funny,” she noted. Legacy drew from what Hayden called “a deep bench of wonderful musicians” in Detroit, introducing Steve Wood on tenor saxophone and flute, Tim Blackman on trumpet, her son Tariq Gardner on drums and high-schooler Kahlil Childs on alto saxophone. The inspired set included: “Isis,” composed by Detroit piano legend Ken Cox; two Herbie Hancock compositions — “Oliloqui Valley” and “Speak Like a Child,” that put Kenyatta in the spotlight, as did “Peter Bobia.” Hayden also played her own composition, “Gateway to Black Eden,” proudly and elegantly.

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“I know it’s jazz fest,” Detroit poet laureate Jessica Care Moore told the crowd at Hart Plaza on Friday night, Aug. 29, “but we’re doing something different.”

No lie there.

Moore’s remark came in the midst of a groundbreaking combination of her, electronic pioneer Jeff Mills and pianist Jason Moran, the Artist-In-Residence for the 46th annual Detroit Jazz Festival that runs through Monday, Sept. 1. More than merely unique, the 80-minute exposition was unlike anything that’s been part of annual Labor Day weekend tradition before, a multi-disciplinary interweaving of sensibilities and philosophies that used obvious preparation to create a foundation for anything-goes improvisation, and the trio delivered it as smoothly as if they’d been playing together for years.

The New York-based Moran began the set by expressing his honor for being this year’s Artist-In-Residence and explaining that he views the piano itself as a machine, like any in the array of devices Mills used during the performance.

He then started on a traditional note, with a solo rendition of John Coltrane’s “After the Rain” while smoke swirled around him. But the audience didn’t have to wait long for the sonic fireworks to begin.

Mills joined Moran for the second number, living up to his nickname The Wizard as he incorporated syncopated beats, looped sounds, ambient keyboard washes and conga drum patterns that responded to and occasionally drove what Moran was doing on the keyboard. The two shared a keen knack for not only hearing what the other was doing but anticipating what they’d do next, Moran using repetitive rhythmic patterns as jumping-off points for his piano rides.

It was an enveloping alchemy that drove a clearly energized — and perhaps somewhat surprised — Moran to shout “Come on!” at the conclusion of the piece and then launch into an equally inventive and occasionally playful rendition of the late Detroit pianist Geri Allen’s “Feed the Fire.”

Moore’s arrival brought yet another element, lyrical and melodic, to the performance as she essayed four of her poems into the sound swirl — including “Where Are the People?” from her acclaimed 2023 mini-film project of the same title. More than reciting, she too found places within the pieces to extemporize and expand, repeating and recasting lines as she followed the instrumentalists (or, if you prefer, machinists), who in turn followed her. It was a textbook display of jazz ethos, in its own way as “traditional” as it was otherworldly — and certainly an exciting way to fire up another year for the world’s largest free-admission jazz festival.

Keyon Harrold did a bit of that earlier in the evening, too, flexing a musical orientation that hails from both hip-hop and R&B (he’s played with Beyonce, Rihanna and Jay-Z) and jazz.

Following the traditional festival-starting performance by Shannon Powell and Dr. Valade’s Brass Band, the Missouri-born trumpeter and his quintet — driven by monster drummer Charles Haynes — opened with a pair of unreleased songs one of which, “Commission 8,” doesn’t even have a formal title yet.

Mostly, however, his 70-minute set focused on his Grammy Award-nominated 2024 album “Foreverland,” and the Harrold troupe was joined on three of the four tracks performed by Detroit vocalist Malaya Watson, a Season 13 “American Idol” finalist who appears on the album.

She added more dimension to “Foreverland’s” title track, then sang a bit of Antia Baker’s “Sweet Love” during “Don’t Lie” before the ensemble finished with “Grounded,” with Harrold inserting a bit of the standard “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” into his solo.

The Detroit Jazz Festival runs through Monday, Sept. 1, at two stages in Hart Plaza, one in Cadillac Square, with additional performances at the Gretchen C. Valade Jazz Center on the Wayne State University campus. Performances will also be livestreamed free via the festival’s web site and social media. Schedules and other information can be found at detroitjazzfest.org.

If there was any doubt about Benson Boone’s fast-rising star power, his American Heart Tour stop before a roaring, nearly sold-out crowd on Wednesday night, Aug. 27, at Detroit’s Little Caesars Arena put it to rest.

The crowd was mostly young, glittering with sequins, cowboy hats, American flag t-shirts, an ocean of red heart-bearing accessories and more than a few mullets. The energy was bright and youthful, perfectly matching the ambitious spectacle Boone presented onstage.

The nearly two-hour show opened with “I Wanna Be The One You Call” and continued over the course of five “acts” and 20 songs, mostly drawn from his studio albums “Fireworks & Rollerblades” and the two-month-old “American Heart. The 23-year-old Boone commanded the vaguely guitar-shaped stage, its long runway stretching into the arena floor like a fretboard, leading to a heart-shaped B-stage where he spent much of the night. Sometimes his piano was lifted by hydraulics, while during “Mystical Magical” Boone soared above the crowd on a chandelier and red and white hearts burst from confetti cannon during “Young American Heart”

Boone’s 70s-inspired wardrobe gave the night a playful, nostalgic edge. One tight white ensemble was anchored by a sleeveless tee with a bedazzled Firebird and a red heart belt buckle. And the powder-blue suit and open white shirt he wore during the encore of “Cry” was so retro that Tony Orlando himself might have claimed it. The look matched Boone’s mix of sincerity and showmanship, half heart-on-sleeve balladeer and half daring stuntman.

Indeed, he was as much an athlete as a vocalist. He nailed six flips — front, back and a very cool side combo number — and multiple leaps off the piano. He even hopped into the crowd on two different occasions, the last one including a lap around the entire stage, running a gauntlet of fans almost like a victory lap following the final song of the main set, the 2024 Tik Tok sensation “Beautiful Things.” The four-piece backing band — bass, drums, keyboards and guitar — sometimes overpowered the mix, but Boone’s voice was piercing, powerful and capable of some serious high notes.

There were quieter moments, too. “Momma Song,” paired with a home video montage, drew collective sniffles, while Lewis Capaldi’s “Someone to Love” — a cover chosen by using a cannon to send a T-shirt into the crowd for a random fan to decide — displayed Boone’s versatility. He promised each city a different cover, and Detroit got its own keepsake.

Between songs, Boone was chatty, playful and self-aware, joking that he worried about how many fans were watching his backside as he spun across the 360-degree stage. He called “Wanted Man,” “In the Stars” and “Reminds Me of You” his “favorites” but left fans free to choose their own. The giant video screen backdrop cycled through Partridge Family-style cartoon graphics, swirls of stars and close-ups of an earnest Boone performing.

The American Heart Tour is ambitious big, and occasionally teetering on excess, but Boone’s commitment and charisma held it together. Detroit got a show that was equal parts spectacle and soul, flips and fireworks, sequins and swagger. If Boone is still worried about who’s looking at his backside, he needn’t be; the crowd was too busy looking at the front of the stage, and the star rising on it.

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Nine Inch Nails’ Trent Reznor wasn’t kidding as he chanted “Nothing can stop me now” near the start of the band’s concert Friday night, Aug. 22 at Detroit’s Little Caesars Arena.

But the next part of that chorus phrase — “’cause I don’t care anymore” — was belied by a 95-minute show that was, indeed, a non-stop (and passionate) onslaught of meticulously crafted sensory assault, from the sonics to the ingenious visuals. It was a near-perfect kind of expression, one that played right to the expectations of fans who knew the group to be a consistently provocative live act but also accessible to any of the 15,000 at Little Caesars who may not have been as well-acquainted.

Those virtues were certainly to be expected, of course; when you have a group led by two EGO (Emmy, Grammy and Oscar) Award winners in Reznor and Atticus Ross, you’ll inevitably get something more clever than a basic rock band playing on a stage.

Nine Inch Nails’ first appearance in the metro area since a two-night stand in 2018 at Detroit’s Fox Theatre was decidedly that, blending the immersive qualities of vintage Pink Floyd with the artsy, almost avant garde physicality of David Byrne, with or without Talking Heads. The high concept even began with an opening 55 minutes from German EDM stalwart Boys Noize (celebrating his 42nd birthday on Friday), who performed from the rear of the arena floor and to the backs of those sitting in front of him — and well away from the general admission area beyond them. It seemed odd but was effective when he finished and a second later a black-clad Reznor appeared at a keyboard on a small square stage at the center of the arena, playing a hushed solo rendition of 2005’s “Right Where It Belongs” — back in the set for the first time in 16 years — and then joined by Ross, guitarist Robin Finck and and Alessandro Cortini during “Ruiner.”

After “Piggy (Nothing Can Stop Me Now),” the three walked to the main stage while drummer Josh Freese, returning after 17 years away from the band, played a drum solo with his larger-than-life image projected onto a sheer scrim in front. The next segment — which featured industrial-strength deliveries of “Wish,” “March of the Pigs” and “Gave Up” was a visual treat as well, with images of the quintet, including close-ups from a camera-toting crew member who roamed the stage throughout — soaring across the scrim and rear screens.

Best of that bunch was a percolating “Copy of A,” during which multiple Reznors, full and in silhouette, jetted above the band.

Reznor and Ross then returned to the satellite stage, joined by Boys Noize for a remix-style renditions of “Vessel,” “Closer,” “As Alive as You Need Me to Be” from his year’s “Tron: Ares” film soundtrack and “Come Back Haunted.” Boys Noize finished the latter as Reznor and Ross then journeyed back to the rest of the band for a closing barrage — sans scrim but still dramatically lit as the troupe pounded through “Mr. Self Destruct,” “Less Than” and “The Perfect Drug.” The group paid tribute to late friends collaborators David Lynch (“The Perfect Drug” from his 1997 film “Lost Highway”) and David Bowie (“I’m Afraid of Americans,” also from 1997), with Finck shredding at the end of the latter, with nods to Jimi Hendrix’s “Purple Haze.”

Hit singles “The Hand That Feeds” and “Head Like a Hole” were simply massive and mosh-worthy, setting up the gentle bleakness of “Hurt,” which Reznor and Finck began as a duo before the rest of the band built it into an elegant paean to angst.

In one of his very few comments to the crowd, Reznor thanked fans “for sticking with us…we really appreciate it.” The feeling was clearly mutual, and he can rest assured that they’ll continue to be there, still relishing what they saw on Friday and anticipating even more extravagant concert adventures to come.

Black Keys fans got their fix of the band on Thursday night, Aug. 21, at the Pine Knob Music Theatre — more than nine months after they initially expected.

The Akron-formed, now Nashville-based duo of Dan Auerbach and Patrick Carney planned to end its 2024 tour last November at Detroit’s Little Caesars Arena. The trek was canceled over logistical issues that led to an acrimonious split with the group’s management, leaving the Keys to retreat, make a new album (“No Rain, No Flowers”) and, basically, get back on the horse.

And on Thursday Auerbach and Carney — one of rock’s most consistently exciting live acts during the past 25 or so years — seemed no worse for the wear.

Following a 55-minute opening set by Austin, Texas guitar hero Gary Clark Jr. — whose ferocious playing cut through a 55-minute set mired by a muddy sound mix — the Keys came out nodding to the band’s Midwestern roots. While video screens bore the logo for the fictional WTBK public access station out of Akron, the warm-up tape paid homage to another famous Rubber Capitol export (Devo) and then to its northern neighbor’s rock heritage with a bit of Bob Seger’s “Ramblin’ Gamblin’ Man.” Guitarist Auerbach and drummer Carney — with a tiger rug sitting in front of his kit — then played as a duo in front of a red curtain, reaching back to the raw, bluesy garage glory of its earliest albums with a medley of “Thickfreakness,” “The Breaks” and “I’ll Be Your Man.”

As they tore into “Your Touch,” the curtain parted to reveal another five musicians, mixed mostly for sonic texture over much of the hour-and-45-minute show. The 23-song set shot both wide and deep into the group’s career, sampling from 10 of its 13 albums over the course of the show. Four came from “No Rain…” — including the live debut of the track “Down to Nothing” — but, disappointingly, none from last year’s fine “Ohio Players.”

The 8,000 or so fans were nevertheless pleased with what they got, and by the Keys’ return in general. The group’s own excitement could be heard in the adrenalized tempos of many of the songs, while Auerbach was his usual six-string madman self, ripping through hot solos on every song and stretching out in particular on “I Got Mine,” “Everlasting Light,” “A Little Too High” and “Man on a Mission.” Auerbach also made room for special guest “Little” Barrie Cadogan from England, who stepped out on “Lo/Hi,” “Weight of Love,” “Too Afraid to Love You” and “Next Girl” and dueled with Auerbach towards the end of “Heavy Soul.”

Keyboardist Ray Jacildo took the occasional spotlight spot as well, including a synthesizer solos on “Psychotic Girl” and a cover of Canned Heat’s “On the Road Again.”

The night included the Keys’ key hits — “Gold on the Ceiling,” “Wild Child,” “Howlin’ For You,” “Fever” — while Auerbach noted that 2010’s “Tighten Up” “couldn’t have happened without Motown.” “Thank you for that.” For the encore, meanwhile, a characteristically epic “Little Black Submarines,” which Auerbach started solo, preceded a hip-wiggling “Lonely Boy.” “Thanks for hanging out with us,” Auerbach told the crowd, promising to “see you next time.”

And most at Pine Knob on Thursday would say that can’t come too soon.

At the start of its new album, “No Rain, No Flowers,” the Black Keys’ Dan Auerbach sings that “Baby, the damage is done/It won’t be long ’til we’re back in the sun.”

That’s starting to become the case for the Nashville-based duo.

Last year the Keys — Auerbach and drummer Patrick Carney, friends since childhood growing up in Akron, Ohio — had to cancel a planned tour in support of its critically lauded previous album, “Ohio Players,” due to mismanagement and business conflicts of interest. The group scorched the earth, firing those involved and creating a new team, and openly expressing their dissatisfaction.

Auerbach and Carney also made new music — their 13th studio album, “No Rain, No Flowers,” which came out earlier this month, just 16 months after “Ohio Players.” After that’s sets collaborations with Oasis’ Noel Gallagher, Beck and others, the new 11-song set finds the Keys again playing nice with others, this time working with notable songwriters such Rick Nowels, Daniel Tashian, Scott Storch, Desmond Child and others.

It’s also returned the Keys to the road — in Europe earlier this summer and now back in North America, where the pair is making up for frustratingly lost time…

• Carney, 45 — nephew of the late saxophonist Ralph Carney — says he and Auerbach remain angry about the situation they found themselves in last year but are regaining their equilibrium. “I think it’s slightly reassuring to know that basically every peer of ours has been having to navigate the same bull****, and hopefully things will change for the better, for the artists and for the fans, soon. Basically it’s an exclusive problem to the United States, and I think every musician who tours has been encountering it throughout the years, and it’s just gotten to the point where it’s (expletive).”

• Carney adds that it was important, and natural, for the Keys to get back to work on another album as soon as possible. “‘Ohio Players’ is one of the favorite albums we’ve ever made. We worked our asses off on it, and in light of what happened last year the record became dead in the water, essentially, ’cause touring as a way to of promotion was gone. So we just did what we do — went in and made another album. Music is our passion; the whole point of starting that band is ’cause wanted to make albums. So we just went in and made another album.”

• The Keys have been co-writing with others since working with Danger Mouse on 2008’s “Attack & Release” and have become more interested in and adept at it on most of the albums since. “We figured out a way to incorporate a third person into our democracy,” Carney says. “Basically it’s like a three-way democracy, or however many people are in the room. If everyone’s on board, great, if everybody’s not on board you’ve got to move on to the next thing. It’s us wanting to give it an idea and being able to somehow convince these people to get in a room with us and then try to make something. That’s become our recent fascination.”

• Writing with Desmond Child — who’s written hits for Bon Jovi, Aerosmith, Alice Cooper, Cher, Kiss Ricky Martin and many more — on the “No Rain…” track “Make You Mine” was a standout experience, according to Carney. “He’s another guy that’s just incredibly talented and has put the time in and the hours learning his craft and is a master of it — and also just a pleasure to be around. He’s got the greatest stories, too. Getting to sit in a room with a guy like that and watch him work is super inspiring. He approaches his while craft so seriously; I’ll get texts from him at midnight, still, about revisions to songs we haven’t released yet, that he wants to change. He’s (expletive) serious.”

• Carney says that since completing “No Rain…” he and Auerbach have continued to work on new material which he anticipates will likely come out sooner than later. “We’ve been kind of working at a pretty quick clip lately, kind of like we were in the first 10 years of the band when we were basically making a record every year, year and a half. We’ve been on that same path lately. It’s just what we do. We have so much stuff right at this point now, extra songs from every record. This record could’ve been 18 songs long; we just have a surplus of music, and when we feel like, ‘OK, this makes a good collection for an album,’ or maybe we should put out a series of singles, we’ll create a project. Just making the music and then figuring out what you have is a fun way to work.”

The Black Keys and Gary Clark Jr. perform at 7:30 p.m. Thursday, Aug. 21 at the Pine Knob Music Theatre, 33 Bob Seger Drive, Independence Township. (313)471-7000 or 313Presents.com.

There are Barenaked Ladies concerts, and then there are Barenaked Ladies concerts in the Detroit area.

And then there are tour-ending concerts in the Detroit area.

The Toronto quartet has a long love affair with these parts as an acknowledged second home, a relationship that dates back to a 1994 showcase performance at the State Theatre (now the Fillmore Detroit) and includes 24 headline dates at the Pine Knob Music Theatre — where it recorded 2007 concert album and video “Talk to the Hand: Live in Michigan.” Thanks to that and routing logistics, Pine Knob has also been the site for the final concerts of BNL’s last few Last Summer on Earth tours, the latest coming Saturday, Aug. 2 with Sugar Ray and Fastball.

It was another combination of kindred and complementary spirits, but even moreso than other versions of the package. Members of all three bands — whose biggest hits came during the 90s — repeatedly spoke about it on stage as a favorite tour, ever. Just glancing at side stage made that evident throughout the night as the musicians all watched each other’s set, with Sugar Ray frontman Mark McGrath dancing and playing cheerleader in full view. They even dubbed themselves, collectively, Naked Sugar Balls, and that spirit was certainly contagious for the 9,500 fans at Pine Knob, another crowd of characteristically spirited BNL fans.

Closing nights are known for their shenanigans, of course, and those started early on Saturday. Astute fans noticed female undergarments placed on Fastball’s amplifiers and drum kit, and BNL’s Ed Robertson came on stage at one point to mop around singer-guitarist Miles Zuniga’ feet (an inside joke referencing a karaoke party a couple nights prior in Cleveland). The Austin group was also the beneficiary of the Last Summer esprit de corps as well; when drummer Joey Shuffield had to leave the tour early on, Sugar Ray’s Dean Butterworth — who was celebrating his birthday on Saturday night — threw in for the rest of the trek, while BNL’s Kevin Hearn played keyboards.

And on Saturday Robertson returned to join Fastball for its last two songs, “Fire Escape” and “The Way,” as he has throughout the tour.

Sugar Ray also found underwear on its amplifiers at the start of its set, and all four Barenaked Ladies’ crashed the stage early on, dressed as characters from “Scooby Doo” and, in Robertson’s case, Ken from “Barbie.” And during BNL’s show crew members dressed as aliens and monsters danced around the band as it played “Lookin’ Up.”

The hijinks complemented rather than distracted from the music, however, and only made Saturday’s show a touch more special for all concerned.

Fastball, for instance, may be known primarily for “The Way” but showed it had more than that during its half-hour set, including blazing versions of “Sooner or Later” and “Hummingbird,” which it dedicated to McGrath.

The white-suited Sugar Ray, with McGrath in exuberant, tattooed carnival barker mode, came out swinging with two of its biggest hits — “Someday” and “Every Morning” — and covered Ginuwine’s “Pony” and Ugly Kid Joe’s “Everything About You” in an “unnecessary 90s medley” before leading the Pine Knob crowd through the communal exuberance of “Fly.”

Barenaked Ladies closed things out with its usual action-packed array of musical dexterity and good humor (Robertson, also per usual, slipped a reference to the Big Beaver Road exit into “Pinch Me”) during its hour and 45 minutes on stage. The hits — “The Old Apartment,” “Brian Wilson,” the “Big Bang Theory” theme song, “One Week” and the bulletproof singalong “If I Had $1000000” — were spread throughout the set, but the group kept new material from 2023’s “In Flight” front and center, too, including acoustic performances of “One Night” and “What Do We Need?”

Among other highlights BNL wound its regular adlibbed rap into a swinging Hearn-sung rendition of Black Sabbath’s “War Pigs,” while “Hello City” finished with a bit of the standard “I Love You.”

Multi-instrumentalist Hearn, celebrating his 30th year in the band, stepped forward as guitar hero on songs such as his moving “Big Backyard” as well as “Pinch Me” and “Clearly Lost” and traded licks with Zuniga on a cover of AC/DC’s “Highway to Hell,” sung by drummer Tyler Stewart. Bassist Jim Creeggan, meanwhile, sang lead on the do-woppy “Just Wait” and led the crowd through “Sesame Street’s” “Mahna Mahna” during his bass solo.

BNL paid tribute to the late Brian Wilson with a bit of his “Love and Mercy” before launching into a tongue-in-cheek medley that included of Chappell Roan’s “Pink Pony Club,” Beyonce’s “Texas Hold `em,” Kenny Rogers’ “The Gambler,” Lady Gaga’s “Abracadabra” and Alphaville’s “Forever Young,” while Robertson wrapped Dan Hill’s “Sometimes When We Touch” by kissing a fan in the front row.

The night, and tour, finished with all 10 Naked Sugar Balls members on stage for a rendition of Bryan Adams’ “Summer of ’69,” visibly enjoying their final song together and giving the Pine Knob faithful what will surely be an enduring memory of the summer of ’25.

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During its 20 years of performing and 12 years of releasing music, the AJR has taken pride in not repeating itself often. So it was fitting that the 13,000 or so fans at the Pine Knob Music Theatre saw the sibling trio in a new way on Tuesday night, July 29.

The basic difference; it was not a trio. Eldest brother Adam Met (nee Metzger) busy promoting a new book, leaving Jack and Ryan — along with accompanists Arnetta Johnson on trumpet and keyboards and Chris Berry on drums — to carry the AJR mantle for the summer’s Somewhere in the Sky Tour. The pair did not mention reference Adam’s absence — which was announced prior to the tour — but did deliver the kind of exuberant, joyful performance that’s become the band’s stock in trade, belying the angst of some of its lyrics and elevating the group from street busking to arenas and amphitheaters over the course of its five studio albums.

And that ascent has been made without radio play and other conventional measures of success. Rather, AJR is emblematic of music, and especially pop’s, new world order of building audience through social media, streaming and direct methods of contact. Shared by the other four acts on Tuesday’s bill — all of whom paid degrees of deference to the headliner — it’s created a deeply personal, boy band/alt.rock connection between AJR and its fans that was on full display throughout the 85-minute show that touched on 19 songs from the group’s catalog, including the new single “Betty” from the upcoming “What No One’s Thinking” EP (out Aug. 29).

Youngest brother Jack, sporting his trademark fur trapper’s cap, and Ryan were as energetic and wired as ever, perhaps moreso to fill any perceived gaps without Adam. The music drove the night, but aided by some clever visuals — such as Jack interacting with three images of himself on the floor-to-ceiling video screening, using high fives to create the beat into “Yes I’m a Mess.” And a step-by-step explanation of how the group wrote “100 Bad Days” was genuinely illuminating, and entertaining.

At the end of the show, meanwhile, the quartet yielded the stage to a video percussion duel on the screen, which in turn ushered the Walled Lake marching band down the pavilion aisles to join AJR for an encore rendition of “Weak.”

Sometimes the schtick was done to a fault, however. Orchestrating a pre-crowd singalong to a-ha’s “Take on Me” or John Denver’s “Country Roads” or Chappell Roan’s “Hot to Go” or Queen’s “Bohemian Rhapsody” would have been fine; all four, in their entireties, was overkill. Similarly, a mid-set comic pause would have been fine if it was only Ryan taking a squid-shaped hat from a fan OR Jack having a Pi-reciting contest with another, named Skylar; both, back-to-back, felt labored and not nearly as intriguing as another song would have been.

But there was no shortage of musical highlights, which included favorites such as the opening “Way Less Sad,” “Karma,” “The Good Part,” a “Burn the House Down” that lived up to its name and “Bang!” Ryan’s solo rendition of “Inertia” gave his bandmates time to slip into the back of the pavilion for “World’s Smallest Violin” and “Wow, I’m Not Crazy,” and a six-minute medley featured five seldom-played songs, including “I’m Ready” for the first time in eight years, according to Jack.

AJR has, in many ways, reached the “best years” the group pines for in “The Good Part,” but with a sense that things may get even better. On Tuesday, however, they were just fine in the present.

It’s been 20 years since the Metzger brothers of AJR began busking on the streets of their home town, New York City, and 10 since they the trio released its debut album, “Living Room.”

Since then they’ve released four more studio albums and a series of EPs, including the upcoming “What No One’s Thinking.” AJR has also hit the charts with singles such as “I’m Ready,” “World’s Smallest Violin,” “Way Less Sad” and the Top 10 “Bang!,” and the siblings — who record and perform under the surname Met — have also collaborated with Weezer, Ingrid Michaelson, Mike Love of the Beach Boys and Grosse Pointe-raised Quinn XCII.

This year finds them hot off AJR’s first full-scale arena tour last year, and in the midst of working on a Broadway musical. The summer tour also finds Jack (nee Evan) and Ryan (nee Joshua) out mostly as a duo, while oldest brother Adam, who’s an adjunct professor at Columbia University and works on climate issues, has a Ph.D. and is executive director of the promotes his new book “Amplify: How to Use the Power of Connection to Engage, Take Action, and Build a Better World.” But his brothers are carrying the torch around the country, with a new single, “Betty,” advancing the EP…

* Jack Met says via Zoom that AJR’s career trajectory isn’t exactly what he expected but adds that “if it was going to happen, it’s exactly the way that I guess I thought it would or I expect it to go. We’ve never been the coolest thing…It’s been a very slow trajectory; we’ve been doing this for 20 years all told, and it took about 10 years to kinda start getting popular. And it really has been, like, one fan at a time, and I think that’s actually made us able to stay for such a long time.”

* He adds that he and his two older brothers have largely gotten along, without any Oasis or Kinks kind of drama between them. “We grew up in a pretty small apartment, and we all shared a bedroom growing up, like three of us, for 15 years until Adam went to college. It kind of forced us to be close. There was nowhere else to go. There was no other bedroom, couldn’t sleep in the bathroom. So it kind of forced us to make up games together and put on fake shows together in the living room, `cause you had no option. And once we started getting on (tour) buses and sharing dressing rooms, it just felt like we were back in the bedroom.”

* The “What Everyone’s Thinking” EP is due out Aug. 29 and came as a bit of a surprise for AJR. “We didn’t really have a plan to write this year at all. We were planning to work on this Broadway show that we’re writing, and essentially what happened was I said to Ryan, ‘I’m just curious in the moment, if we sit down, what will happen.'” After experiencing some writer’s block, he says, “we realized and we remembered that we’d been through some kind of crazy stuff during the last few years; we’ve dealt with the loss of family members (including their father during 2023), career stuff, friendships and everything. When we realized that, OK, we’re suppressing some stuff, it was like, ‘OK, there it is. Let’s just inject it into the music.’ So we did, and the songs kind of came pouring out — five songs that are very personal and very emotional. It’s definitely our most emotional body of work.”

* The song “Betty,” Jack says, “is about the fear of commitment and the fear of the idea of forever. It’s not so much about relationship issues as just issues within yourself, of that fear. We thought that was a brutally honest and scary thing to write about, but we kind of had to.”

* The Broadway musical, meanwhile, is an adaptation of Crockett Johnson’s 1955 children’s novel “Harold and the Purple Crayon; AJR is writing songs, while Rick Elice (“Jersey Boys,” “The Addams Family,” “The Cher Show”) is collaborating on the book. “We loved that book forever and reimagined it, basically. We took Harold’s character and reimagined him into an adult, facing adult issues and realizing that he kinda can’t draw his problems away anymore. He’s dealing with loss. It’s very much based on our own experiences. We’re in the middle of working on it now. This was conceptualized back in 2020. We’re a good amount down the road now, and we’ve written a bunch of songs and a story and everything like that. We just love it, ’cause Broadway is the first thing we ever wanted to do. It’s impacted every single song I think we’ve ever made, to some degree.”

AJR, Goth Babe, Cavetown and Madelyn Mei perform at 6:20 p.m. Tuesday, July 29 at the Pine Knob Music Theatre, 33 Bob Seger Drive, Independence Township. 313-471-7000 or 313Presents.com.

Wu-Tang Clan hardly seems like a group that needs to worry about its legacy. But Robert “RZA” Diggs and company are not taking any chances.

The 11-member collective’s Wu-Tang Forever: The Final Chamber tour — which stopped Tuesday night, July 8, at Little Caesars Arena in Detroit — is part of a five-year “exit plan” designed to ensure that the troupe is remembered, preferably as what El-P of opening act Run The Jewels called “the greatest rap group of all-time.”

The effort has included a documentary (“Wu-Tang Clan: Of Mics and Men”), a biopic series n Hulu (“Wu-Tang: An American Saga”), the first-ever rap residency in Las Vegas and the high-profile $2 million of the only copy of the “Once Upon a Time in Shaolin” album.

And, under the moniker Wu-Tang, the group released “Black Samson, the Bastard Swordsman,” for Record Store Day in April.

Farewell outings are often taken with a grain of salt, of course, and the fluid nature of Wu-Tang’s makeup and membership has kept the crew coming together and breaking apart into satellite components often since it formed during 1992 in Staten Island, N.Y. But if it truly is The Final Chamber, the group is certainly leaving on the highest of notes, when it can still raise a righteous ruckus.

Wu-Tang’s mythology — the Shaolin philosophy, kung-fu movie tropes and gritty street sensibilities — were on full display during the 95-minute show, especially on three massive video screens above and beside the stage. But the real allure of the Wu-Tang live is in its hot performance chops — skilled, often-breakneck rhymes and a smooth but aggressive ensemble sensibility that flows one member’s flow into the others’ with precise, seamless ease. A seven-piece live band and two female singers, meanwhile, brought a more organic and impactful flavor to the proceedings — even if a rendition of Barbra Streisand’s “The Way We Were” wasn’t necessarily on your Wu-Tang bingo card.

More tends to equal more with Wu-Tang Clan, which is why Tuesday’s best moments were when the full complement of MCs — which swelled to 11 during the closing “Triumph” — and longtime DJ Mathematics was karate-chopping it up together. That happened early, when after a politically tinged welcome speech from RZA — who promised “Wu-Tang Clan is something they can never exploit — group members trooped on one at a time for “Bring Da Ruckus,” “Clan in da Front” and an epic “Da Mystery of Chessboxin’,” all from 1993’s landmark “Enter the Wu-Tang (36 Chambers)” debut album. The latter was highlighted by Young Dirty Bastard, sporting a Detroit Pistons jersey and taking the place of his late father, Ol’ Dirty Bastard.

Method Man, dressed in preppy tennis whites, completed the picture with the song that bears his name, and Wu-Tang’s unified might was on full display during “Shame On a Nigga” and “Protect Ya Neck” before it began breaking into smaller group renditions of Cappadonna’s ’97 Mentality,” Raekwon’s “Ice Cream,” Method Man’s “All I Need” and the GZA/Genius classic “Liquid Swords.” Gang Starr’s “Above the Clouds” received an airing as a memorial tribute to that group’s Guru, and Wu-Tang also paid tribute during the show to “fallen soldiers” such as the Notorious B.I.G., Tupac Shakur, Nipsy Hustle, A Tribe Called Quest’s Phife Dawg and others.

Detroit also received plenty of love from the Wu, too, whether it was the Pistons and Tigers jerseys the MCs sported throughout the night or RZA shouting out Motown and saluting the city’s comeback. “This has always been a special place, ’cause y’all understand like we understand that…Wu-Tang Clan ain’t nothing to f*** with,” he said in introducing the song of that name.

The more than 12,000 at Little Caesars certainly understood, and were audibly thrilled to raise their W-shaped Wu-Tang hand salutes (maybe) one last time. Wu-Tang may be going, but this show, like most of its predecessors, will not be forgotten.

Downtown Royal Oak has always had a tasty food scene, and from July 3 to July 6, it will be highlighted by the Royal Oak Taco Festival.

This celebration includes plenty of family fun with music, Lucha Libre wrestling, special guests and, of course, Tacos. The deliciously fun-filled street festival will feature Mucho show-stopping entertainment, including live local music, DJs and street performers, taco eating contests, a variety of free activities and plenty of tantalizing tacos and tequila.

This year’s festival will showcase a delicious mix of over 50 taco vendors and food trucks serving everything from classic tacos to creative culinary mashups. Guests can look forward to a variety of mouthwatering options, including steak and fish, as well as vegetarian fare, along with summer favorites like BBQ, deep-fried treats, and shaved ice.

Newcomers and fan favorites, including The Taco Cartel, Dos Locos Burritos, Mezcal, Real Taco Express, Galindo’s, Azteca, Xav’s Jammin Caribbean, and Cousins Maine Lobster, are part of the lineup.

Jon Witz has led the event’s planning and is looking forward to a downtown packed with taco lovers.

“We have a new layout for this year, featuring a stage now in Centennial Commons, where DJs and top bands will perform,” Witz said. “We’re expecting 40 to 50 restaurants.”

A new addition to the entertainment lineup will be mechanical bull riding south of City Hall, along with Lucha Libre wrestling inside the Farmer’s Market.

“We’ve rearranged everything with a fresh layout, an array of great foods, new activities, and mechanical bull riding, taco eating contests, sales, and cannabis consumption. We’ll be here for the second year in a row, and we’ve got a lot of stuff brewing, so we’re pumped,” Witz said. “Tame the bull and tame your appetite should definitely be the theme.”

The event has averaged more than 50,000 attendees over the past three years, and Witz expects the same turnout for this year’s event. Pre-purchased tickets are $8 each, but a family pack of four is available at $6 per ticket. During the week of the event, individual tickets will be $10. At the gate, the cost will be $12.

“It’s definitely an incentive to save half off your ticket if you buy now versus during the show. The ticket gets you in, and the tacos and tequila are extra. But there’s a lot of entertainment value built in, and we have many reasonably priced tacos and taco trucks. I think everybody’s fine. It’s a good competitive marketplace with amazing food. And, you know, we have most of our great restaurants returning for another go-around this year.”

The ticket/wristband also includes the wrestling event and all activities and entertainment.

“Those wristbands are coded for each day, allowing you to go in and out. You can enjoy yourself, and many people will appreciate sitting in a cafe in Royal Oak or getting an ice cream somewhere after enjoying the music.”

Witz noted that “old school comedian Tommy Chong” is set to appear as part of the festival entertainment. The iconic actor, best-selling author, Grammy Award-winning comedian, activist and cannabis advocate will be on hand for a special appearance on July 5 and 6 for meet and greet and photos.

Several stages will be set up with entertainment for everyone. The Soaring Eagle Stage will feature Kalysta, Nique Love Rhodes & The NLR Experience, Detroit Fury, McKayla Prew, Shotgun Soul, Julian Joel, New Relatives and Ryan Jay.

The Michigan Lottery Stage will spotlight Turner Porter, The Bores, Alise King, Delaney Morgan, RJ Redline, Stonelore, The Warped Tourists, Glencoe, The Twisted Lemon Blues Band, The Ruiners, Thunderbuck, SHÜ, Carley Lusk’s, Kayfabe: thepplsband, and the Martin Chaparro Trio.

The JARS Stage will feature Reeds & Steel, Metawav, Good Folk, The Outfit, DJ Dirty White, Dru Ruiz, Ernesto Villarreal and Friends, Esshaki, TWIZT, Rebecca Cameron and DJ Cisco.

The Royal Oak Downtown Development Authority Kids Stage, where laughter, learning and live entertainment come together all weekend long. Juggler Tim Salisbury, Zippity 2 Guys & A Guitar and experience the mind-blowing vocal talents of Beatbox Jake. Cool Tricks & Funny Stuff, interactive hula hoop fun with Nat Spinz, and a special appearance by the Michigan Science Center, whose “Amazing Astronomy” show launches kids on an out-of-this-world adventure through the stars. With hands-on experiences and crowd-engaging acts throughout the day, the Kids Stage is the ultimate destination for curious minds, big imaginations and endless smiles.

The Royal Oak DDA Kids’ Zone, located in a lot by the district courthouse, will feature a variety of free, family-friendly fun. Enjoy bounce houses featuring a giant slide, while older kids can test their skills at basketball double-shot and quarterback blitz challenges. Budding artists will appreciate the creative stations that include face painting and hands-on crafts like DIY luchador masks, maracas, walking paper tacos, and colorful sombreros. With even more surprises ahead, the Kids’ Zone promises an unforgettable adventure for families at Royal Oak Taco Fest.

The JARS Cannabis Lounge returns as one of Michigan’s few festival-based cannabis retail and consumption experiences. Dubbed “The Trap,” this 21+ space offers a relaxed, curated environment for adult guests, set apart from the festival buzz, main family and food areas but very much a part of the vibe.

Participants who believe they can eat three tacos as quickly as possible without drinking water are invited to join the taco eating contest presented by Condado Tacos Royal Oak. Contestants who manage to eat all three tacos completely, leaving no scraps of lettuce or cheese behind, will receive vouchers for food trucks at the festival and two VIP tickets to Soaring Eagle Arts, Beats & Eats 2025 concerts for the night of their choice.

The vibrant sounds of Mariachi Jalisco, one of Detroit’s most celebrated mariachi ensembles, will bring the heart of Mexico to the festival streets. With rich harmonies of trumpets, guitars and violins, these strolling performers will serenade guests throughout the festival footprint, creating an authentic and joyful atmosphere steeped in tradition, culture and spirited celebration.

The Motley Misfits, Michigan’s premier troupe of circus-style performance artists, return with an electrifying lineup designed to dazzle audiences of all ages.

Advance tickets for the Royal Oak Taco Fest are now available. The event’s hours are 4-11 p.m. Thursday, July 3; 11 a.m.-11 p.m. Friday, July 4 and Saturday, July 5; and 11 a.m.- 8 p.m. Sunday, July 6. For more information and to purchase tickets in advance, visit RoyalOakTacoFest.com or call 248-541-7550.

Few of music’s icons are, or have, demonstrated the art of aging with grace — and defiance — than Willie Nelson and Bob Dylan.

The two Mount Rushmore-caliber singers, songwriters and song interpreters have logged more than 60 years of performing and recording each. On Friday night, June 20, at the Pine Knob Music Theatre they reprised their 2024 pairing at the top of Nelson’s annual Outlaw Music Festival bill, each of 65-minute their sets acknowledging the ravages of time (Nelson’s 92, Dylan 84) but still tapping into the creative drive that has kept each consistently on the road (again) throughout those decades.

Their methods are similar; both Nelson and Dylan (still basking in the triumph of last year’s biopic “A Complete Unknown”) have stripped their presentations down to stark core that frames the songs and their vocal performances within rudimentary arrangements. They still deploy sophisticated nuances and occasional bursts of virtuosity, but their approaches allow them to treat even their best-known tunes as living, breathing material open to re-interpretations both dramatic and subtle.

It’s not always crowd-pleasing; it wouldn’t be a Dylan show, after all, if some of the 13,000-plus fans at Pine Knob weren’t grumbling about the changes he made to favorites such as “Simple Twist of Fate” or “All Along the Watchtower.” But the ovations were strong throughout the night, in recognition of legendary stature as much as artistic adventure.

Earlier sets from Nathaniel Rateliff & the Night Sweats and Trampled By Turtles showed that Nelson and Dylan have passed those lessons down to those following in their wake, while Kalamazoo’s Myron Elkins opened the nearly seven-hour show with a half-hour set that highlighted his just-released new album “Nostalgia For Sale” and brought Michigan-bred blues guitarist Larry McCray on for a number.

The sun came out for the first time just before Dylan, in a dark suit and open-neck white shirt, led his quintet on the stage for a mostly low-key 15-song exposition that found him in confident voice and showcased his acumen on piano (and occasionally harmonica) as the other musicians meandered around the melodies and loose structures that were delicate but never tentative. Dylan would often start a song on his own and let the band members work their way in — which worked particularly well on renditions of “Forgetful Heart,” “Under the Red Sky,” “Desolation Row,” “Love Sick” and a sinewy “Gotta Serve Somebody.”

As is his wont, Dylan sampled beyond his own songbook as well, covering George “Wild Child” Butler’s “Axe and the Wind” and Charlie Rich’s “I’ll Make It All Up to You” and slotting Bobby “Blue” Bland’s “Share Your Love With Me” in front of Dylan’s own blues-celebrating “Blind Willie McTell.” The concluding “Don’t Think Twice, It’s All Right,” meanwhile, sent its own message — not to overthink what was being played, or how it was being performed, but to enjoy the music on its own merits, as well as another opportunity to experience a legend and his legendary work.

Nelson, meanwhile, hewed to the familiar as he and his acoustic quintet rolled through a spirited 21-song performance that also embraced his colleagues’ music and was loaded with hits; in fact, favorites such as “Whiskey River,” “Mamas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys,” “On the Road Again” and “You Were Always on My Mind” were played within the first 10 songs and 20 minutes, a mark of just how deep a well Nelson was drawing from.

Despite battling an obvious cold (lots of coughing and nose-blowing), Nelson picked his shots throughout and delivered sturdy renditions of “Still is Still Moving to Me,” “I Never Cared For You” and “Angel Flying Too Close to the Ground,” wringing solos from Trigger, the battered acoustic guitar whose tone at times also showed signs of wear and tear. And even when guitarist Waylon Payne took over lead vocals on songs such as Merle Haggard’s “Workin’ Man Blues,” Hank Williams’ “Move It On Over” and Kris Kristofferson’s “Me and Bobby McGee,” Nelson stayed present and engaged, while longtime harmonicist Mickey Raphael provided accents and solos — as well as accordion during Tom Wait’s “Last Leaf.”

Defiance and celebration were themes as Nelson promised during that latter that “if they cut down this tree I’ll come back as a song.” He offered his wish to “Roll Me Up and Smoke Me When I Die” and admonished music executives to “Write Your Own Songs,” then brought Rateliff, some Night Sweats and members of Trampled By Turtles back for a joyous medley of “Will the Circle Be Unspoken?” and “I’ll Fly Away.” And if there was a finality intended with “The Party’s Over” and Hank Williams “I Saw the Light,” there was no question Nelson will fly away on nothing but his own terms.

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It was a chance of scenery for Billy Corgan when the Smashing Pumpkins frontman performed Thursday night, June 19, at Saint Andrew’s Hall in Detroit.

Less than 10 months ago — last Sept. 4 — he was on stage with the band a few blocks away at Comerica Park, playing for nearly 41,000 fans in an opening date for Green Day. On Thursday Corgan performed for about 40,000 fewer — but was even more exciting over the course of the two-hour-and-five-minute set.

This time the show was with a quartet Corgan dubbed Machines of God, which includes recent Smashing Pumpkins guitarist Kiki Wong. It was almost all Smashing Pumpkins, however, celebrating the 30th anniversary of its diamond-certified “Melon Collie and the Infinite Sadness” album as well as the 25th of the “Machina”/”The Machines of God and Machina II”/”The Friends & Enemies of Modern Music” package and further promoting last year’s “Aghori Mhori Mei.” That made it Smashing Pumpkins by another name, or the most valid Pumpkins tribute band in the world.

Either way it was a bona fide special night, and perhaps the most satisfying Corgan-related performance since perhaps the original “Melon Collie” shows back in 1995.

It was certainly a special night for Corgan, who sported his trademark ankle-length frock and was visibly relaxed in and charged by the intimate setting. “Standing on this stage brings back a lot of memories,” he told the packed Saint Andrew’s crowd, noting that his first time was in 1989 and also recalling the start of 1999’s Arising Tour there, “one of the greatest moments in Smashing Pumpkins history.”

“Detroit was the first city in the world to embrace my band, Smashing Pumpkins, so I will always be grateful for that,” noted Corgan, who shouted out original Saint Andrew’s booker Vince Bannon. “This is an amazing, wonderful city with such an incredible history, so it’s an honor to be here tonight, playing these songs.” (He later recalled a guitar was stolen from another show, in 1992, but subsequently recovered.)

You’d be hard-pressed to find anyone at Saint Andrew’s who didn’t feel the same on Thursday, as Corgan and company shredded through a high-octane set that demonstrated his gift for knitting together power and melody, nuance and ferocity. It was also a demonstration of his guitar acumen, particularly with extended solos on epic treatments of “Porcelina of the Vast Oceans” and the main set-closing “The Aeroplane Flies High (Turns Left, Looks Right).”

Following a grungey half-hour from Los Angeles’ Return to Dust, the Corgan crew tore into the night with the pummeling triplet of “Glass’ Theme,” “Heavy Metal Machine” and “Where Boys Fear to Tread,” the former declaring “I betrayed rock and roll” even as the group well-served its punky furor. The tour has included some first-ever performances of “Machina II’s” “Here’s to the Atom Bomb” and “White Spyder” — as well as “Aghori’s…” “Sighommi” and “Edin,” while bassist Jenna “Kid Tigrrr” Fournier sang lead on a rendition of Nancy Sinatra’s “You Only Live Twice” and joined Corgan for an acoustic duet on “Tonight, Tonight.”

Corgan also surprised the crowd by picking up the bass himself for “Glass and the Ghost Children.”

The real highlight came mid-show, however, with a trio of “Melon Collie” favorites. “Bullet With Butterfly Wings” and “Muzzle” practically melted the walls at Saint Andrew’s, while during “1979” Corgan’s two oldest children — Augustus, nine, and Philomena, six — came onstage for a Sumo-style wrestling match “won” by the devil’s horn-flashing latter in a take-down.

Corgan kept the pedal down throughout the night, finishing with an encore of “Zero” and “Everlasting Grace.” There was nary a negative to be said — save by Corgan, who cracked that “it wouldn’t be me if I didn’t say something negative.

“It may sound small, it may sound trite, it may sound petty, but since I’ve been playing this stage for 36 years, it is the same stage,” he explained, pointing out a center-stage spot “that they’ve never fixed in 36 (expletive) years. And I want to say that’s not a Detroit thing; it’s a Midwestern thing, where if it ain’t broke, don’t (expletive) fix it. But it is broke, and I wish they’d fix it so when I come back here in 36 years it’ll finally be proper.”

And you can bet everyone at Saint Andrew’s on Thursday will be happy to be back to see that.

Corgan performs again on Saturday, June 21, at the Intersection, 133 Cesar E. Chavez Ave., Grand Rapids. 616-723-8571 or sectionlive.com.

More than 50 years on, these are fresh times for “The Wiz” — if not entirely a brand new day.

The current touring production of the seven-time Tony Award-winning musical — which staged its first preview performances in Detroit during 1974 — straddles a line between revival and reimagination, with changes both substantial and subtle but still staying true to the spirit of a Big Broadway Musical.

Proof of that is in the extravagant dance production pieces, primarily during Act II, and Dana Simone’s lung-busting performances, as Dorothy, of torchy anthems such as “Soon As I Get Home,” “Wonder, Wonder Why” and “Home.”

But this take on “The Wiz” — directed by Schele Williams, with music supervision by Joseph Joubert and “new material” by Amber Ruffin — streamlines and contemporizes the African-American take on Frank Baum’s 1900 novel “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.”

There are crisp new sections of dialogue, particularly smack talk that blends 1970s and 2020s attitudes and modern musical flavors — the latter particularly evident as the “Matrix”-like “The Emerald City” sequence that opens the second act moves from disco to clubby EDM flavors. There’s also a little more steam-punk in the scenery this time, with a floor-to-ceiling video screen that gives the production greater visual depth.

Weighing in at a tidy hour-and-50-minutes, plus intermission, the new “Wiz” loses a few scenes and songs (bad news for fans of the Funky Monkeys) without compromising the narrative. And, of course, you’d still be hard-pressed to find a more joyous moment in all of theater than the Luther Vandross-composed “Everybody Rejoice”/”Brand New Day” couplet after the death (is that really a spoiler alert?) of evil witch Evillene — staged this time as a “Hair”-like exposition of hippie bonhomie.

The good news is that this tale as old as (post-industrial) time still works, from the bullet-proof story itself to the original songs from Charlie Smalls and others. And it has a solid cast, from Simone’s Dorothy to the 14-member dance company, to deliver those goods with theater-filling charisma.

They fill “The Wiz” with a series of show-stopping moments, starting with Simone and Kyla Jade’s (Aunt Em) “The Feeling We Once Had.” Tin Man D. Jerome’s “What Would I Do If I Could Feel” is a soulful highlight, while Kyla Jade, as Evillene, lights things up with the tambourine-shaking New Orleans romp through “Don’t Nobody Bring Me No Bad News.” And Alan Mingo Jr. is, as he’s supposed to be, a scene-stealer as Wiz, channeling his inner Samuel L. Jackson during performances of “Meet the Wiz” and “Y’all Got It.”

Coming on the heels of the successful movie adaptation of “Wicked,” “The Wiz” is a reclamation of the first iteration of the story — as familiar now as it was audacious during the mid-70s. And it proves that you can go “Home” again, even if the place has been remodeled a bit since the last time we were there.

“The Wiz” runs through June 29 at the Fisher Theatre, 3011 W. Grand Blvd., Detroit. 313-872-100 or broadwayindetroit.com.

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Counting Crows have been in flight for since 1991 and have logged 20 years with its present lineup, which still includes three original members..

And the San Francisco Bay Area-formed group has no plans for nesting any time soon.

The sextet started with a band by performing in honor of Van Morrison at the 1993 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame induction ceremony, eight months before the release of its seven-times platinum debut album “August and Everything After.” Since then Counting Crows has released seven more full-lengths and an EP, scoring hits such as “Mr. Jones,” “Round Here,” “A Long December,” “Hanginaround” and “Accidentally in Love” from the “Shrek 2” film soundtrack.

Frontman Adam Duritz and company have also logged a ton of time on the road — which is where it is right now to support its latest release, “Butter Miracle: The Complete Sweets!” Its show this week at the Michigan Lottery Amphitheatre will be its 26th in the metro area, dating back to a September 1993 debut at Saint Andrew’s Hall…

* “Butter Miracle: The Complete Sweets!” features four songs from the 2021 EP “Butter Miracle: Suite One” plus five additional tracks Counting Crows recorded subsequently. “It’s definitely thematically tied together,” says Duritz, ??. “I wasn’t trying to write a specific story, but (the songs) just sort of fit together for me. I just felt like this was a little world I was creating, and it felt very fertile. I wanted the connection to be there, ’cause I was vibing on that”

* Duritz adds that he had planned to have a follow-up to the EP out sooner but encountered songwriting issues after contributing vocals to Gang of Youth’s 2022 album “Angle in Realtime.” I really thought I’d finished the (new songs)…(but) I was suddenly thinking these songs I just finished aren’t good enough, They were missing some stuff. I kind of had lost confidence in them, and I sat on them for a good two years. Then I wrote ‘With Love, From A-Z’ here (in New York) and thought, ‘That’s great — now I have to figure out what to do with this, ’cause it needs to go on a record right away!’ I’ve got to s*** or get off the pot on these songs.”

* He ultimately came up with satisfactory renditions of the songs by inviting some of his bandmates — multi-instrumentalist David Immergluck, bassist Millard Powers and drummer Jim Bogios — to New York to work on the material. “The problem was that my sort of ambition for what they should sound like outstripped my ability to actually play them on the piano. I’m great at being in a band, but I’m not the player some of other guys are, or that a lot of other songwriters are. So the guys came to the house and we went through them one by one and we loved them. They became great…and then we went into the studio only a few weeks later and knocked the record out in 11, 12 days — It’s by far the fastest we’ve ever recorded (an album) — but it took forever to do it!”

* The finished product, Duritz adds, has infused and refreshed Counting Crows once again. “We’re on our way again. Things feel good. Everyone seems in a really good place. It’s a happy time. There were points where I was having more trouble with myself emotionally, and the band’s stress was just too much. But our manager’s great now. Our lawyer’s great. I totally trust everybody. All that stress is gone. The band is so stable and great, and we’re still killing it.”

* Counting Crows is also happy to be marking 20 years for the current lineup, since “new guy” Powers joined in 2005. “I always wanted to be in a band and stay together,” says Duritz. “I`m not tired of it at all. I never wanted to be a solo artist. I have no interest in that. It’s a hard thing to stay together as a band, and it’s not surprising to me we’ve lost a couple people over 30 years, but right now it feels like we can go on forever — except I know that nothing works that way, y’know?”

Counting Crows and Gaslight Anthem perform at 7:30 p.m. Tuesday, June 17 at the Michigan Lottery Amphitheatre, 14900 Metro Parkway, Sterling Heights. 313-471-7000 or 313Presents.com.

The last time The Weeknd was in town, during July of 2022 at Ford Field, he promised that the end of the night, “I’m gonna come back soon, Detroit. Next time we’ll do Ford Field two nights, back to back!”

And on Saturday, May 24 at the stadium, the multi-hyphenate Canadian entertainer made sure to acknowledge that the promise had been kept. “I said that, right?” The Weeknd crowed before performing his 2022 hit “Out of Time.”

That was, of course, just fine with the 45,000 or so fans — quite a few of whom had come from out of town and even out of the country to catch the nearly two-hour and 15-minute concert, ostensibly a continuation of The Weeknd’s After House Before Dawn Tour but with enough new elements to make it a fresh experience. (He performs again on Sunday, May 25.)

Much has happened, and not all good, since the Toronto native also known as Abel Tesfaye’s last appearance at Ford Field. His HBO series “The Idol,” was critically panned, while his feature film “Hurry Up Tomorrow,” which opened two weeks ago, has been a box office bomb (though trailers were shown between acts to remind the OOXO faithful that it’s still in some theaters). But the album companion to the latter, released at the end of January, was his fifth straight to debut at No. 1 on the Billboard 200, giving him plenty of familiar fresh material to play on Saturday.

And he added plenty of new fare to the visual extravaganza, a dizzying and action-packed presentation on par with other groundbreaking stadium performances by the likes of Pink Floyd, U2, Madonna and, yes, even Taylor Swift and Beyonce.

Saturday’s show was even more stadium-filling (not to mention a half-hour longer) than its predecessor. The stage still stretched nearly the entire length of the Ford Field floor, with three distinct performance spaces as well as catwalks. To that The Weeknd added another section that crossed the stage in the middle, allowing him to get closer to fans on what would be the sidelines as he sang, often directly to the camera, through a series of large gold hoops. During “Out of Time” he came down to floor level, singing into fans’ phones and even letting a couple of them sing some of the song’s lines.

The backdrop of a post-apocalyptic Toronto on one side has crumbled since The Weeknd’s last stop, opening up more space for the huge video screen behind it and making his four-piece band — including artist-producer Mike Dean, who opened the evening with his own half-hour set — more readily visible. A rotating gold Sorayama statue with lighted eyes sat in the center of all this, and The Weeknd deployed lasers and fire effects — the latter prodigiously during “The Hills” and “Sao Paulo” — throughout the night.

Also back was an enlarged corps of masked, red-cloaked extras — 32, up from 24 three years ago — that walked and posed in formation during about a third of the more than three-dozen songs, occasionally breaking into poses and dance moves. And glittering hand-out bracelets The Weeknd used last time, as well, kept Ford Fields sparkling throughout the show.

Amidst all this, however, The Weeknd was still the star of the night, in good voice and even better mood as he continually teased the crowd — “Detroit, are you warmed up yet?” he asked several times — but also sang his gratitude for its support, also on several occasions. He offered up 11 songs from “Hurry Up Tomorrow” — including the opening dramatic couplet of “The Abyss” and “After Hours” and the live debut of “Reflections Laughing.” The show also brought “The Morning” back into the set after a two-year absence, while Playboi Carti — whose 40-minute opening set had enough energy to power the Movement festival down at Hart Plaza — joined for romps through The Weeknd’s “Timeless” and his own “Rather Lie.”

And there were plenty of hits, ranging from shortened versions of “After Hours,” “Starboy” and “Kiss Land” to full-length and even extended stadium-banging renditions of “Can’t Feel My Face,” “Call out My Name,” “Less Than Zero” and “Blinding Lights.” “Sacrifice” and the show-closing “Moth to a Flame,” meanwhile, were delivered ala the remixes done by Swedish House Mafia.

The latter was also accompanied by a barrage of grand finale visual effects to send fans home dancing, singing and perhaps a little (temporarily) hearing empaired. The Weeknd — who has talked about dumping that stage name in the near future — said nothing about coming back for three nights at Ford Field, but it’s likely that anyone at Saturday’s show, even the world travelers, would be happy to return and see what new he could cook up for that.

Tickets still remain for The Weeknd’s concert at 6:30 p.m. Sunday, May 25 2000 Brush St., Detroit. 313-262-2008 or fordfield.com.