The annual conference of the Americana Music Association (AMA) hits town again this week, and with it come dozens of club acts, many of them familiar names, others not so much. Included in the picks below are highlights from the conference, along with all the other noteworthy shows happening around town this week. To find out more about who’s playing the AMA event, and where, along with capsule descriptions of those acts, check our online listings. Our Pick of the Week CIRCLE * Sunday, 11th With its days of endless night and its nights of endless day, Scandinavia seems a foreign, mysterious place. Each country has its own peculiar musical subcultures—Norway’s black metal scene most notorious among them—but Finland’s may be the most singular of all. This week sees a rare and thrilling convergence of Finnish performers coming to town, first with a bill of musicians from the avant-folk collective Kemialliset Ystävät, who perform Thursday at Radio Café (see the story on p. 39). A few nights later, Circle represent another outgrowth of the country’s indefinable underground, which encompasses everything from ramshackle bands who can’t even follow a simple beat to arty, transgressive ensembles who wed high concept and low culture. Going on 15 years, Circle may embody this freewheeling scene better than anyone: their expansive sound incorporates pummeling metal riffs, chilly sheets of synthesizer, spooky chants and a whole range of rock sensibilities into an instrumental oeuvre that will appeal to noise addicts, punks, Rush fans and anyone who’s ever tuned into Echoes or Music From the Hearts of Space. (If you happen to be all of those things, boy, are you in luck.) This is their first trip to Nashville, and there’s no telling if or when they’ll come through again. Opening the show, which takes place in a former record-pressing plant, is Providence’s Urdog, whose own psychedelic prog will complement the bill nicely. 310 Chestnut Ave. —Jonathan Marx MUSIC Thursday, 8th SHARON JONES & THE DAP KINGS Just listen to the funking good time of “How Do I Let a Good Man Down.” Never mind the singer for a minute; without the riffing and honking hits from the saxophones, trumpets and trombones, there’d be no groove. Like the Memphis Horns and Maceo and the Horny Horns, Brooklyn’s Dap Kings take you back to a defining moment in soul, when horns ruled, and the rhythm section never stood alone. They also remind us what makes Sharon Jones, by way of Etta James and Jean Knight, such a superb singer: she understands that, without the glorious brass of the Dap Kings, she’d be like a fish in a dish with no water. Exit/In —Makkada B. Selah CHARLIE HUNTER When Hunter plays in a trio, it’s a quartet by default, as he covers the bass, chords and lead parts on his eight-string guitar. This is no gimmick, but an indirect tribute to one of his inspirations, free-jazz saxophonist Rahsaan Roland Kirk, who could play two horns simultaneously. In a literal sense, Hunter marries the rhythm and melody in one instrument, making his guitar a funk machine, but also taking on the harmonic explorations more typical of a Hammond B-3. When he tours with his trio partners, John Ellis on sax and Derek Phillips on drums, the percolating grooves of an old-school organ combo vie with a jam-band’s insouciance in letting a running motif stretch into new shapes. Like Medeski, Martin & Wood, Hunter democratizes a free-jazz aesthetic and keeps the familiar hooks and riffs of popular music in sight, even as they’re shaken up and blurred. Belcourt Theatre —Bill Levine GRAYSON CAPPS This singer-songwriter’s music examines the grittier realities of life in the South, candidly capturing the best and worst of derelict people and places on his recent solo debut, If You Knew My Mind. His rustic folk ballad, “Love Song for Bobby Long,” which is based on a character he grew up around in Bruton, Ala., was featured, along with three of his other originals, in last year’s movie of the same name starring John Travolta and Scarlett Johansson. His gruff vocals riding atop greasy, bayou-bred country, roots-rock and blues, Capps shares plenty in common with Tom Waits, especially when it comes to shining a light in life’s dark and dingy corners. His delivery, though, is entirely his own. 6 p.m. at Grimey’s; 10:30 p.m. at Americana Tonight at The Sutler; noon  Sat. at Robert’s Western World —Jewly Hight CHRIS STAMEY The veteran North Carolina rocker rarely tours because of a busy schedule at his farmhouse studio near Chapel Hill. As a producer, he’s provided audio know-how and early career guidance to Ryan Adams, Tift Merritt, Caitlin Cary and Thad Cockrell, while also being hired by such cutting-edge visitors as Yo La Tengo, Le Tigre and Alejandro Escovedo. Fans of power pop continue to exalt his ’80s work with the dBs, and, 20 years on, his solo work has a puckish, tossed-off vibe. His 2005 collaboration with Yo La Tengo, A Question of Temperature, might be inconsistent but at its best shows that Stamey remains an intellectual who rocks with quirky abandon. The Basement —Michael McCall SOLOMON BURKE Living proof that Philly soul neither started nor ended with Gamble & Huff, King Solomon Burke cut a hit gospel record at age 14 in 1954, and he’s been testifying ever since. In a much deserved late-career renaissance, he’s getting loads of mileage out of material by Bob Dylan, Van Morrison and Elvis Costello—but considering his performances, most recently on the self-deprecatingly titled Make Do With What You Got, the honor is theirs. (See the story in Music.) Mercy Lounge —Jim Ridley Friday, 9th QUANTIC Too many soul-jazz-electronic hybrids sound like hipster Muzak—so breezy and diffuse that they lose the verve that each of those genres ought to bring to such an intermingling. But British musician Will Holland is so thoroughly grounded in the funk and soul of the late ’60s and early ’70s that it remains at the core of everything he does. Under the name Quantic, he’s released a series of CDs that graft styles in a way that sounds light and airy, yet full of punch—chillout music that keeps brain and body active. His most recent release with the Quantic Soul Orchestra, Pushin’ On, is a full-band affair that shows off his hardest funk edges. When he comes to town, though, he’ll be here to headline with a DJ set that shows off his omnivorous appetite, which encompasses hip-hop, bossa nova, African and other global musics, and the deepest of deep-soul grooves. Opening are Los Angeles’ Jamie Thinnes, Denver’s Matt Bandy and members of the local Audity Central crew. Kazu —Jonathan Marx EVERETT GREENE Even when Duke Ellington began to compose extended liturgical works late in his career, there were few vocalists who were right for the solo parts. With a classical form that embraces the spiritual depths of gospel and the blues, these compositions call for both the serious manner of an oratorio and the spirited freedom of an improviser. At recent meetings of the International Association of Jazz Educators, Greene has continually impressed some of the toughest judges with his renditions of the baritone and bass solos from Ellington’s Sacred Concerts. Having learned his art in Indianapolis when it was the home of the Montgomery Brothers and still a hub town for major jazz artists on tour, Greene sustains an art of vocal stylization that’s now all but lost. The deep, sonorous tones of Johnny Hartman and Joe Williams were complemented by their impeccable phrasing, influenced by British actors. These vocalists could make the room swing, and they wore their elegant manner as lightly as a perfectly tailored summer suit. Indeed, when Greene performs, the Jazz Cave audience might be reminded of the late Charles Dungey, Nashville’s own representative of this bygone era, when classiness, well-honed vocal dynamics and canny crowd-pleasing were the standard. Nashville Jazz Workshop —Bill Levine THE REPUTATION After spending a few hectic years at the edge of next-big-thingdom with her band Sarge, guitarist and singer Elizabeth Elmore needed some time off, so she disbanded the group, went to law school and, when rock inevitably came calling again, formed The Reputation. Sarge fans will recognize the hooks and snappy arrangements. New recruits will find that their new album, To Force a Fate, is everything you’d want from a pop-punk record (unless you want maudlin melodrama about the end of innocence)—and that Elmore probably wears less eyeliner than your average American idiot. The End —Steve Haruch CHIP TAYLOR & CARRIE RODRIGUEZ Taylor’s musical contributions down through the years form a substantial slice of American pie. The prolific songwriter lists discovering and producing a young James Taylor and composing standards like “Wild Thing” and “Angel of the Morning” among footnotes in a career spanning four decades. Rodriguez stubbornly embraces her sharp twang and self-described “Texas fiddle.” Her voice mirrors her expressive playing, and both tools exude warmth and confidence. Together, the duo lend balance to each other’s strengths, and the result radiates cozy reflections of American life. Cannery Ballroom —Elisabeth Dawson DOUG HOEKSTRA “We’re so far under the radar,” Hoekstra whispers in the opening track of his new EP, Six Songs. Yet his prolific career, which has included a record of compelling new material each year for the last decade, proves that the returns can be worth the effort for an under-the-media-radar artist this persistent and talented. New tunes like “Bottomless Pit” are as gripping and well-crafted as the best of his previous work, which remains remarkably consistent. Like a Midwestern Lou Reed, Hoekstra writes hip, diaristic tunes while perennially toying with enlivening his barebacked, rock-influenced sound. His album release party will include a performance by guitarist George Marinelli, a former collaborator of Bruce Hornsby and Bonnie Raitt who co-owns the indie label Wingding Records with Hoekstra. Marinelli’s recent Postcards From Kuala Lumpur reveals him to be an adult pop-rock songwriter akin to Bill Lloyd and Joe Jackson. The 5 Spot —Michael McCall Saturday, 10th THE PRIVATES Plenty of hardworking local rock groups come and go, and often without much fanfare. But in the case of The Privates, they haven’t seen a million places or rocked them all. Due to Features drummer Rollum Haas’ increasing tour demands and singer-guitarist Dave Paulson’s stint as second guitarist with The Pink Spiders, they play local shows when everyone’s in town and feels like it, and there is but one recording, a bombastic self-titled release from February of last year. The Privates exist in rarefied air, it seems—keeping supply low while the demand is high as ever, playing the occasional but always ferocious set of gun-slinging dissonance that stops you in your tracks while being totally danceable. It’s an adrenaline head rush, with visceral, whip-smart songs that collapse and reassemble at breakneck speed. There’ll be a new EP out soon—maybe—called Louder Than Lightning on local indie Fictitious Records, and the band plays its first show in months, opening for former Spongebath darlings Self at the second benefit for the children of the band’s late guitarist Mike Mahaffey. Exit/In —Tracy Moore DEAN MILLER That this veteran Music Row striver would call his new album Platinum suggests he’s inherited some of his father Roger’s playful wit. Now on his third record deal, with Koch Records, his maturity shows in the new material he’s written. His sound has remained consistent over the years—ramped-up, straightforward honky-tonk delivered with dry wit and an eye for detail. He sometimes gets hung up trying to update traditional country themes, which makes him sound like hundreds of other credible but undistinguished honky-tonkers. But on Platinum, Miller hires a hot band and, despite a few clunkers, sets himself apart with snappy tunes like “I’ve Been a Long Time Leaving,” while “Music Executive” uses insider knowledge to lampoon those who stand between the wannabes and what they want. Besides this Americana Music Association showcase, Miller will play a record-release party Monday at 12th & Porter. The Basement —Michael McCall THE DITTY BOPS Why do two cute young women from L.A. want to play ragtime, bluegrass and hot jazz and generally make like it’s 1925? It all makes sense when you hear Abby Dewald and Amanda Barrett crank up a sound usually heard coming from a Gramophone (but without the pops and scratches). Dewald plays guitar, Barrett plays mandolin, banjo, washboard and other instruments, and the pair’s propulsive rhythms keep their buoyant harmonies popping. Expect costume changes, props and some fleet-footed flapper-style shimmying. The Ditty Bops are currently on tour opening for Tori Amos, but are swinging by to perk up the Americana Music Conference this week. Mercy Lounge —Chris Neal Saturday, 10th–Sunday, 11th SACRED HARP CONVENTION Forty years have passed since the United Sacred Harp Musical Association, a traveling convention of the largest surviving branch of traditional American Shape Note singing, has met in Nashville. That assembly, which convened at Ellington Agricultural Center, marked one of only two times in the association’s 102-year history that it has gathered outside Alabama and Georgia, the two states that have steadfastly nurtured the idiom, which has roots in the Singing School Movement of the 19th century. Democratic and participatory, Sacred Harp singing involves participants taking turns leading each other in stirring, three- and four-part harmony renditions of selections chosen from The Sacred Harp, a compendium consisting of folk songs and hymns using four-shape notation dating back to the 18th and 19th centuries. Sponsored by the Harpeth Valley Sacred Harp Singers and the School of Music at Belmont University, both sessions of this year’s convention take place at Belmont from 9:30 a.m. to 3:30 p.m. For information, call Tim Reynolds at 646-6484 or Seth Holloway at 790-6959. —Bill Friskics-Warren Sunday, 11th JUDD & MAGGIE This brother-and-sister duo from Maryland harmonize on smart, melodic, slightly offbeat songs that would fit nicely into the storylines of a hip teen drama like The Gilmore Girls. Playing against modern teen-music stereotypes, these twentysomethings augment Judd’s acoustic guitar and piano with Beck’s rhythm section for a timeless sound that could be programmed inconspicuously alongside Carole King and James Taylor. Their stripped-down, folk-influenced singer-songwriter vibe (live show covers have included Paul Simon’s “Kodachrome” and the folk/blues standard “We Shall Not Be Moved”) might not have been popular on the radio since before the two were born, but it’s also never gone away. 3rd & Lindsley —Michael McCall UNWED SAILOR Featuring Pedro the Lion alum Johnathon Ford, this instrumental combo play hushed compositions in which the guitars are so delicately plucked at times that sounds of fingers moving along the strings share nearly equal volume with the notes. The group’s latest record, The Marionette and the Music Box, is the soundtrack to a fairy-tale narrative told through a series of paintings that accompany the CD and also can be viewed online. The album’s gently stepping waltz-time figures, often repeated in circular, trancelike progressions, evoke dark landscapes and, at times, a childlike innocence and wonder befitting the story’s characters. The End —Steve Haruch Monday, 12th DAVID RYAN HARRIS Harris is a rock superstar in need of an audience. He’s had several opportunities, from his 1991 frenetic punk-funk band Follow for Now and his soulful ’97 solo LP, to fronting the Brand New Immortals and making hits for Dionne Farris and Mariah Carey. He’s everything rock critics wanted Prince to become, and everything pop fans believe Lenny Kravitz to be—a talented R&B singer with a bluesman’s soul who can write great rock songs. In the off chance you’ve wondered what “Subterranean Homesick Alien” would sound like if done by Stevie Wonder, you’ll want to check out this show. Exit/In —Mark Mays Tuesday, 13th CAPLETON Before the recent influx of dancehall artists on the pop charts, urban music producers introduced a few deejays to radio listeners in the early ’90s. Def Jam picked Capleton as their first dancehall artist probably because his thunderclap vocals, “rude bwoy” raunch and Rastaman consciousness fit into what was happening in rap music at the time. Some of his best work came out on Def Jam, including the classic “Tour” and some smoking remixes with Capleton chanting over canonical hip-hop samples. Subsequently, he returned to Jamaica, got deeper into Rastafarianism and became more influenced by traditional reggae, singing Haile Selassie’s praises and cursing Babylon (and, unfortunately, engaging in gay bashing). Level 88 Jazz Bistro —Mark Mays DANA COOPER Though he’s hardly a household name, Cooper has been making a living as a singer-songwriter—the old-fashioned way, with a guitar, a car and a tireless spirit—for about three decades. This show is a release party for his latest album, Made of Mud, a collection of folk-rock musings on love, death, childhood memories and the folly of humankind. Cooper is more of a poet-philosopher than a storyteller, balancing a somewhat dark view of the current state of the world (is any other view possible?) with a determination to find love and meaning wherever he can. Blessed with a warm, lovely voice and far more guitar chops than your typical folkie, he’s a great live performer, and his arrangements, which feature odd time signatures, unusual chord voicings and extra measures, will keep you on your toes. 5:30 p.m., The Basement —Jack Silverman Wednesday, 14th PERNICE BROTHERS Joe Pernice’s melodies are so delicate that at times they threaten to vanish. But they’re also remarkably resilient, lodging themselves deeper in the mental jukebox than many of their more immediately arresting peers. Similarly, his band’s fellow feeling is so plainspoken, that even seemingly apt titles, such as humanist, feel ill-fitting—it’s merely second nature. 2001’s The World Won’t End offered sanctuary and reassurance in hard times, while on their latest album, Discover a Lovelier You, Pernice vows to “leave this room better than I found it.” Whether such tender mercies will register in concert is debatable, but at the very least, the band gets credit for trying. Mercy Lounge —Scott Manzler CLASSICAL THE SONATAS OF BRAHMS FOR VIOLIN AND PIANO Christian Teal, the first violinist for the Blair Quartet, and Mark Wait, dean of the Blair School, continue to explore selected chamber works by Brahms in this Friday’s faculty recital at Blair’s Turner Recital Hall. Rarely programmed together in the same concert, the three sonatas for piano and violin were composed during the height of Brahms’ career in the 1870s and ’80s. Credited with the revival of chamber music in the late Romantic era, the composer expresses the core of his artistic personality, his balance of classical restraint and energetic breadth, in these sonatas. In a more compact but no less compelling way, the sonatas reflect the innovations of the symphonies between which they were composed: the quoting of his folkish lieder, sweeping pastoral movements, somber contemplations of loss and an economical mastery of subtle lyrical variation. —Bill Levine THEATER THE GIN GAME D.L. Coburn’s Pulitzer Prize-winning drama has had a long shelf life since its premiere in Los Angeles in 1976. Further exposure by way of The Actors Theatre of Louisville eventually propelled the play onto Broadway, where the co-starring husband-and-wife team of Jessica Tandy and Hume Cronyn made theatrical history. A card game is the metaphorical hook, as two octogenarians in a retirement home discuss the vicissitudes of their almost discarded lives, the choices they’ve made throughout and how they’ve dealt, responsibly or not, with the luck of the draw. Under the direction of Melissa Williams, two of Nashville’s finest veteran actors, Anne Tonelson and Hank Gibson, grace the Darkhorse Theatre stage in a production that kicks off ACT I’s fall season, with performances running Sept. 9-17. ACT I has also announced new audience-development incentives, including free admission for children; for information and tickets, visit www.act1online.com. —Martin Brady ART TIM DOOLEY/JONATHAN FENSKE/ROB LENTZ Zeitgeist’s transition into the fall begins with a show of three artists with complementary approaches. Tim Dooley, Jonathan Fenske and Rob Lentz all share the same pop aesthetic, employing child and adolescent imagery in adult climates. Dooley is a printmaker from Iowa whose work at the Fugitive in 2004 helped transform the space into a vat of candy-colored surrealism. His clean graphic techniques and large-scale installations are enticing on a fundamental level. Fenske is an Atlanta-based artist whose recycling of toy imagery to emphasize the complexities of adult life seems too removed to reflect any of the artist’s personal ideas, but perhaps the minimalist, nostalgic quality will hold some viewers’ interest. Originally from Nashville, Lentz currently resides in Chicago. Pieces from his recent show “Lives of the Artists,” featuring American music icons reincarnated through craft-based processes, will be on view. His tongue-in-cheek humor makes his work accessible to all audiences. In formal terms, these artists are sure to provide an aesthetically cohesive exhibit, which also allows for the flow of open dialogue among all the pieces, rather than an artist-specific focus. Zeitgiest will begin the show with an opening this Saturday from 6-8 p.m. —Julie Roberts FACULTY ART EXHIBITION AND ART:21 PREVIEW Watkins kicks off the school year with a reception for its annual faculty show, 6-8 p.m. Friday, Sept. 9, in the Brownlee O. Currey Jr. Gallery. Robin Paris, Kristi Hargrove, Leslie Haines, Rob McClurg, Barbara Yontz, Terry Glispin, Colleen McCormick, Cheryl Gulley, Joy McKenzie, and Nancy Roche are among the two dozen instructors exhibiting their work. Lesley Patterson-Marx’s “The Four Seasons,” a multimedia assemblage that represents the seasons with four antique baby photos, symbolizes the weeks of the year with 52 numbered seeds dangling from strings, tracing a delicate catenary. Beginning the sequence on number 51, Patterson-Marx reminds us that the cycles of our lives are not deterministic, repetitious circles, but are instead spiraling patterns wrapping around themselves, full of novel possibility. In “Danny Box 4: Patient Bunny,” Dan Brawner gathers images of animals, toys and elementary school quizzes into his multimedia design. As with the work of contemporaries Tara McPherson and Mark Ryden, his cuddly subjects evoke unease and creepiness as much as sentimentality. The composition brings to mind a magical circle, the childish, repeating scrawl of “Danny” becoming a mystical name of power. Immediately following the reception, the Tennessee Arts Commission and Metro Nashville Arts Commission present a special preview screening of the PBS Series Art: 21, Art in the Twenty-First Century in the Watkins Theater. The series, now entering its third season, is a who’s who of working contemporary artists. Preciously self-important or startlingly enlightening depending on which artists are profiled in a given episode, Art: 21 nonetheless represents that rarest of things: television capable of changing the viewer. Entitled “Memory,” the segment to be screened at Watkins includes profiles of Josiah McElhaney, Susan Rothenberg, Hiroshi Sugimoto and Mike Kelly, the Detroit essayist, musician and anti-artist who was a founding member of the seminal pre-punk band Destroy All Monsters. —Joe Nolan “A WOMAN’S WORLD VIEW”: JOAN ALMOND & SUSAN BRYANT In its latest show, Cumberland Gallery features photography of two artists’ travels, offering views of exotic landscapes, architecture and people. Bryant’s background as a painter informs her hand-colored gelatin silver prints. A photography professor at Austin Peay, she’s interested in capturing spaces such as streets and churches that should be heavily populated, but are devoid of people, suggesting that the structures themselves are evidence of human existence. In contrast to Bryant’s unpeopled civic areas, Joan Almond, a California artist, crafts intimate portraits of the inhabitants of remote North Africa and India, her narrative works instilled with an affection for her subject matter. The opening reception is Saturday from 6-8 p.m. —Nicole Pietrantoni IRENE RITTER About 30 miles west of Nashville, the small town of Dickson is home to the impressive Renaissance Center, which this Friday opens an exhibition featuring Nashville sculptor Irene Ritter. Ritter began sculpting in 1995 after an intensive stone-carving workshop at Arrowmont School of Crafts. Now in her 60s, she is fully dedicated to her art after a career as an interior designer, magazine editor and deputy mayor of Nashville. Her beautifully crafted carvings alternate between meditative, minimalist constructions and assemblages of stylized figures and animals; she often incorporates wordplay into her sculptures, creating a playful interaction between viewer and object. Her exhibit runs Sept. 9-Oct. 15; an opening reception for the artist takes place on Friday from 6-8 p.m. —Nicole Piertrantoni ANNIE FREEMAN: “VESSEL” A longtime presence in Nashville’s creative community, Freeman steps out with a solo show at Plowhaus Artists’ Cooperative. In oil pastel drawings, sculptures and clothing-based assemblages, she explores the vessel in both literal and metaphorical terms, creating visual rhymes in several diptychs. She finds the richest connections in the ways that people—and the human anatomy—may either carry an object or idea, or serve as a vehicle for communication. Though her work is informed by a resolutely feminist sensibility, it leaves room for seriousness, playfulness and spiritual inquiry. Witness her choice of images, which range from Nat King Cole to Aung San Suu Kyi, the Nobel Peace Prize-winning leader of the democracy movement in Burma. The show opens with a reception, 7-11 p.m. Saturday, and runs through the following weekend. —Jonathan Marx MARC CIVITARESE: “THE HUSHED LANDSCAPE” Boston painter Civitarese’s landscapes are so hushed as to seem diffuse, but the effect isn’t so much to create an abstraction as to convey a scene as envisioned or experienced by the artist. In “Things You Dream,” in which a faraway sun pokes hazily through white clouds while a distant funnel cloud bisects the frame, both the title and the scene suggest that we’re not even looking at a moment pulled directly from reality. We don’t feel the sense of menace we typically get from the charged image of a twister, but a quiet sense of awe, and that same spirit moves through all of Civitarese’s oil paintings, which modulate earthy tones with soft whites and blues. Gallery One in Belle Meade Galleria hosts an opening for the artist’s solo show, 6-8:30 p.m. Sept. 10, and will display the works through Oct. 3. —Jonathan Marx RALPH SMITH Washington, D.C.-based painter Smith is the subject of a retrospective at Harpeth Hall’s Marnie Sheridan Gallery, which will exhibit 60 of his oils and watercolors—the largest ever single showing of his work. Recipient of numerous awards, including a bronze medal in the American Watercolor Society’s annual exhibit, Smith is known for his stylistic breadth and his keen attunement to the use of color on his canvases. He’s also well-known as a teacher, and more than 50 of his students will be in attendance at the opening reception for this show, 3-5 p.m. Sept. 10. —Jonathan Marx FILM YES The adulterous lovers of Sally Potter’s latest feature, set mainly in London, are identified simply as She (Joan Allen) and He (Simon Abkarian)—the former an Irish-born, American-raised biologist trapped in a loveless marriage, the latter a self-exiled Lebanese surgeon-turned-chef. As in Fassbinder’s Ali: Fear Eats the Soul, the seemingly mismatched pair fashion an intimate, erotic haven only to have their oasis upended by external realities. Yes, their tumultuous relationship is intentionally allegorical; moreover, the dialogue is delivered in rhyming iambic pentameter. But the resultant work is hardly the belly-flop its detractors claim. Think of this as a daring, often beautiful, sometimes cracked formal experiment: Potter invites ridicule even as she challenges the accepted limits of cinematic discourse. And though the poetic conceit can sometimes be maddening, more often the verbal weave achieves a light, buoyant grace. The director’s innovative play extends to her filmmaking, from a spatially precise dining room confrontation to a closing blur of image and song. Originally scheduled to play at Green Hills, the film opens Friday at the Belcourt. —Scott Manzler THE BEAT THAT MY HEART SKIPPED Thomas (Romain Duris) is a disaffected thug working the same low-end real estate scams his father (Niels Arestrup, in a pitch-perfect portrait of faded potency) built a career on. Once an aspiring concert pianist, his dreams effectively died with the passing of his mother a decade earlier. This soulful remake, or rather reworking, of James Toback’s celebrated 1978 debut Fingers lacks the original’s manic energy and edge, but French director Jacques Audiard’s more restrained, introspective effort proves deeper and ultimately more satisfying. And his additions—notably, the relationship between Thomas and a Vietnamese piano teacher played out across the keyboard—are often inspired. Though several plot threads feel underdeveloped or tacked on, Audiard’s commitment to character guarantees an emotionally coherent whole. Even his peripheral characters, from a colleague’s estranged wife to a Russian mob boss’s disillusioned arm-candy, seem fully realized and three-dimensional. Cool and lush, with intermittent eruptions of violence, this favorably recalls Mike Hodges’ moody neo-noirs Croupier and last year’s underrated I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead. It starts Friday at Green Hills. —Scott Manzler CROSSING TOWN: BROWN’S LEGACY IN NASHVILLE Though the Supreme Court ruled in favor of desegregating public schools in its 1954 Brown vs. Board of Education decision, change did not happen overnight—except, perhaps, in the proliferation of private schools. Nashville become the first major Southern city to follow the new policy by instituting the so-called “Nashville Plan,” under which schools were integrated one grade per year. Nonetheless, de facto segregation remained until busing began in 1971. This is the focus of Ansley Erikson’s new documentary, Crossing Town. “I originally thought I would focus on the first, very small group of black students to desegregate Nashville schools in the fall of 1957,” the Atlanta native says. “But I became interested in the expansion of desegregation into the lives of nearly every student and family in Nashville through court-ordered busing.” Her research and interviews led her to concentrate on McGavock High School and three generations of the Dixon family. “I had to leave out significant parts of the story in order to go in depth at one school and with one family,” she says. “I felt this trade-off was worthwhile.” One point Erikson hopes to make is that, given the demographics of its public school system, “Nashville could yet succeed at a challenge that many other cities have had to abandon.” Crossing Town premieres 2:30 p.m. Sept. 11, at the downtown Main Library. —MiChelle Jones 2046 At the end of Wong Kar-wai’s Days of Being Wild, in 1991, a dandy played by Tony Leung Chiu-Wai stepped out for a night on the town. Fourteen years later, this is where he wound up—in Wong’s gorgeous sci-fi romantic reverie, whirled together from strands of Days and Wong’s unforgettable In the Mood for Love. Co-starring Zhang Ziyi, with a cameo by Maggie Cheung, it opens Friday at Green Hills; see the review in Film. —Jim Ridley DARWIN’S NIGHTMARE How a fish called the Nile perch—an insatiable predator that cannibalizes its spawn once it has devoured everything else available—turned a Tanzanian village on the shores of Lake Victoria into an inferno of murder, poverty and prostitution, with help from gluttonous Europeans and arms dealers. Hubert Sauper’s chilling account of an ecological perfect storm opens Friday for a week’s run at the Belcourt; see the review in Film. —Jim Ridley THE SEVENTH SEAL Ingmar Bergman’s 1957 drama—a.k.a. “the one where the guy plays chess with Death”—is almost synonymous with art movies in the public imagination: perhaps no highbrow movie has ever prompted so many lowbrow parodies. In truth, it’s much more entertaining (and less forbidding) than its reputation suggests. If nothing else, it’ll give you a new appreciation for the scene in Bill & Ted’s Bogus Journey where the dudes ponder the eternal verities with the Grim Reaper—over a game of Battleship. The film screens Friday as part of the “Masters of World Cinema” series at the Frist Center, co-sponsored by the Belcourt. —Jim Ridley