The Berkshire summer is heating up, and I’m not just talking about the weather. We’ve been running around as if the season is already in full swing – and now that the Fourth of July is upon us, it is!
Here’s the rundown on this past week.

• Tuesday:  release party for the July issue of Berkshire Living magazine at Alluim, the new Great Barrington restaurant from the folks who brought us Mezze and Café Latino (summer cocktail of choice: the Pimini -- I’m a sucker for Pim’s).

• Wednesday: the free performance of “Scapin” at Shakespeare & Company was rained out, but we did get to see Tom Stoppard’s, farce “Rough Crossing,” in which the quips flow faster than the cognacs.

• Thursday: a very special night for us, our first night of the summer at Jacob’s Pillow, and a performance that merited the honor; “Aurelia’s Oratorio,” a surreal sequence of magical, clever vignettes starring winsome Chaplin descendant Aurelia Thierré.

• Friday: more dance, this time at Tanglewood’s Seiji Ozawa Hall, for Mark Morris’ take on Purcell’s “Dido and Aeneas.” Before the show, we ran into two of my Berkshire Living colleagues, one of whom told us that during his picnic an hour earlier he heard James Taylor rehearsing the set he would be playing for Garrison Keillor’s annual “Prairie Home Companion” radio broadcast.

• Saturday: afternoon dog hike at the Tryingham Cobble with G, who works at Berkshire Theatre Festival (where the current Main Stage production of “love! valour! compassion!” is sure to make many Top Ten of the Summer lists), then clean up pretty for the 30th anniversary gala at Shakespeare & Co., including scenes from the company’s production “A Midsummer Night’s Dream,” with the surprise participation of three Pucks from the past: Jonathan Epstein (sporting newly dyed red hair for his upcoming role as McMurtry in BTF’s “One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest;  Jason Asprey (Puck in the company’s final production outdoor at The Mount), and Tony Simotes (the evening’s MC and the company’s first Puck). S & Co. has much to celebrate; the company just announced that it is building a $5 million state-of-the-art performance center on its campus, with space for all aspects of its mission: rehearsal; recording and archival preservation; costume and set design, fabrication, and storage; education and training; and performance well beyond the summer season.

• Sunday: another gorgeous day, another morning dog hike, this time to Jug End Reservation. Then off to Kripalu for the annual Cultural Survival Bazaar, where we were tempted by fairly traded crafts by indigenous artisans in Africa, Asia, and Latin America while enjoying music, dance, and food from around the world. Dinner from Bombay Bar & Grill, where they mix up another great summer drink – an Indian twist on the Cosmopolitan, with more than a hint of fresh ginger.

The holiday week offers so many options it’s difficult to decide what to do, but it began the way each week of the rest of my summer will begin and end: on the mat for a morning Pilates class at Jacob’s Pillow, part of their community programming, which also includes ballet, modern dance, and yoga classes at 8 a.m. each weekday.

On the docket for sure are the press opening of  “Calvin Berger” at the Berkshire Athenaeum, Barrington Stage Company’s first production of the summer under the auspices of William Finn’s Musical Theatre; lunch at Hancock Shaker Village’s café, where you can see exactly where and how your food was grown and raised, and which now has a license to serve beer and wine; another night at the Pillow for Club Guy and Roni, part of the countywide cultural program “NL: A Season of Dutch Arts in the Berkshires,” along with the concurrent appearance of Nederlands Dans Theater II on the Ted Shawn stage; a trip north to Williamstown Theatre Festival’s production of “Dissonance” on the Nikos Stage (must find time to see the main stage production of “The Front Page,” which opens this week, as does the festival’s “Fridays @3” series of free readings of new plays, kicking off with the first-ever reading of “LEVENTHAL” starring Roger Rees as the title character ); the official opening of the Pittsfield Ferrin Gallery on 7/7/07 – and we’ll make it a double with the opening reception for the new group show at Storefront Artist Project, “Selections from the Cultural Corridor II,” on the same evening; and the shaggy-dog monologue “My Pal George” in a workshop production at Berkshire Theatre Festival.

I’m hoping to get to MASS MoCA’s July 6 courtyard film and music event featuring Electra, an acclaimed ensemble of four women of different nationalities  We’ve also got to find time to get to the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute’s summer exhibition, “The Unknown Monet,” as well as the “Dutch Dialogues” show (with works by Van Gogh, Renoir, Millet, Frans Hals, and contemporary Dutch artist Robert Scholte, juxtaposed with Impressionist paintings from the Clark’s collection) and highlights from the Manton Collection (including work by Gainsborough, Constable, and Turner), which was recently donated to the Clark, along with $50 million. We’ll try to time our visit on a Tuesday, when the Clark presents free outdoor concerts on the lawn (which move indoors in case of rain).

But the big question remains: what to do on the Fourth of July? There’s so much to choose from, including the annual afternoon reading of “The Declaration of Independence” at Shakespeare & Co. (and maybe catching up with Scapin, Part 1); the Independence Day concert (The New Cars!) and spectacular fireworks at Tanglewood; or maybe an evening of political satire – and there are at least two to choose from: “The News in Revue” at Bousquet’s Mountainside Playhouse,; and new this year, “The Capitol Steps” in an exclusive engagement at Cranwell through Labor Day.

On top of that, we’ve been invited to several parties, and still we can’t decide. So as you can see, even though the weather keeps us guessing – vacillating between summer heat and autumn cool – it’s a hot time in the Berkshires!

About Bess Hochstein
Buzz chronicler Bess J.M. Hochstein came to the Berkshires as a second-homeowner before deciding to move here full time. Previously a communications executive, she's now a freelance writer living in Tyringham with her corgis Duffy and Hobbs and K. She writes for several publications, including Berkshire Living, the Boston Globe, New England Wine Gazette, and Healing Lifestyles & Spas magazine.