Sax Machine
“There was a time where we did six shows per day at the Apollo,” says funk legend Maceo Parker of his time with James Brown, whose band he joined at 21 in 1964. “That’s a lot!” he laughs. But it taught him endurance. The 70-year-old saxophonist, who started his family in Brooklyn before they moved to his native North Carolina, is back in the city for 12 shows at the Blue Note next week.
‘‘I was just born to do exactly what I do: to play the saxophone,” says Parker, who looks and sounds like a much younger man. He also wrote a memoir last year, simply because, he says, he thought “it’d be really nice to have written a book.” The title? “98% Funky Stuff: My Life in Music” — which pretty much says it all.
Tuesday through Feb. 2, 8 and 10:30 p.m., at 131 W. Third St.; 212-475-8592, bluenote.net. Tickets, $20 and $35.
— Charlie Heller
Icy & Chili
More frigid temps are in the forecast for this weekend, making it the perfect time for a nice warm bowl of chili. But Jacob Dickson, owner of Dickson’s Farmstand Meats, which is co-hosting Sunday’s NYChiliFest, says, “What isn’t perfect chili-eating weather?”
The meaty stew is especially delicious when made by professionals. Twenty-five top city restaurants, including Roberta’s and the Dutch, will be participating in the fest and vying for the coveted “Golden Chili Mug” award. Live bands and beer will round out the fun.
“Most chefs really like to cook chili, even at high-end places,” says Dickson. And when it comes to eating the super soup, “I’ve met very few people who don’t like [it].”
7 to 9 p.m. at Chelsea Market, 75 Ninth Ave. For tickets, which must be purchased in advance, go to foodsystemsnyc.org; $50 for unlimited chili; $55 for unlimited chili and beer.
— Hailey Eber
Poe-Pourri
It seems only fitting to hail the master of the macabre with a fragment from his own coffin. “Terror of the Soul” — the Edgar Allan Poe show now in its final days at the Morgan — displays part of the crumbling box that held the man who gave us “The Raven” and much more after he died, age 40, in 1849. As the Baltimore Evening News reported breathlessly when Poe’s body was exhumed for better burial elsewhere: “The flesh and funeral robe had crumbled into dust and there was nothing left but the bare bones . . . to tell that a body had once been there.” Less grisly are the dozens of etchings, manuscripts and posters about Poe and the artists he inspired, from Oscar Wilde to Stephen King. Here, too, are letters from E.A.P. himself, most ending — in his clear cursive — “Truly yours, Poe.” Through Sunday at 225 Madison Ave., at 36th St.; 212- 685-0008, themorgan.org.
— Barbara Hoffman
Thin Line
Love or hate Sarah Michelson’s dances, you’ve got to admire her guts, making pieces that test the endurance of her dancers — and sometimes the audience. Her new piece, “4,” premiering today at the Whitney Museum, should be just as demanding.
“It’s anti-spectacle,” says Michelson, whose last work in her series “Devotion” had six dancers doing the same step for 90 minutes. “I keep being surprised by my own unending drive, and right alongside me, or leading me on, are the dancers,” Michelson says.
Her work isn’t for everyone; a few people flee in frustration. She’s taken the less-popular, lessprofitable road, but no one’s dances look quite like hers. “I think if I became a millionaire, my work might just suck,” Michelson laughs. Through Feb. 2, at 2 p.m., at 945 Madison Ave.; 212-570-3600, whitney.org. Tickets, $25.
— Leigh Witchel
We’ll Always Have Paris
One of the all-time great screen musicals — 82 years after it reinvented the form by tightly integrating song and story — Rouben Mamoulian’s witty “Love Me Tonight’’ (1932) stars Maurice Chevalier as a randy Parisian tailor who’s mistaken for a nobleman by a princess (Jeanette MacDonald).
Modern-day audiences still respond to the film’s irresistible pre-code charms, beginning with street sounds (on a studio set) evolving into Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart’s “Isn’t It Romantic,’’ which the swooping camera captures being performed in bits and pieces by various people around Paris. A 35mm print of this masterpiece is showing Sunday at 3:30 p.m. at the Museum of the Moving Image, 35th Avenue and 36th Street, Astoria. Info: movingimage.us.
— Lou Lumenick