Regional arts and entertainment events

Sunday

Sound and vision The Pennsylvania Ballet presents Robert Weiss' Messiah, an interpretation of Handel's masterpiece, with guests the Philadelphia Singers featuring soloists Suzanne Ramo, soprano; Jamie Van Eyck, mezzo-soprano; Steve Sanders, tenor; and Levi Hernandez, bass. The program goes on at the Academy of Music, Broad and Locust Streets, at 2 p.m. Sunday, 7:30 p.m. Friday, and 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday. Tickets are $20 to $140. Call 215-893-1999.

Chamber music The dynamic Daedalus Quartet plays Fred Lerdahl's structurally thrilling First String Quartet, plus works by Haydn and Dvorak at 2:30 p.m. at Eastern University's McInnis Auditorium, 1300 Eagle Rd., St. Davids. Tickets are $20; $15 for seniors; students free. Call 610-649-2517. . . . The Wister Quartet performs Cherry Hill composer Frank James Staneck's My Suite for Ursula. The piece was written in 1994 as a Christmas gift for the wife of composer Ralph Vaughan Williams before her death in 2007 at the age of 96. The recital, also including works by Mozart and Borodin, is at 3 p.m. at the Glencairn Museum, 1001 Cathedral Rd., Bryn Athyn. Tickets are $15; $10 for students. Call 267-502-2600.

Monday

Got the blues The one-man blues band J.J. Culpepper - playing drums, bass, and harmonica all at once - teams with blues-rockers Trotta & Ronstadt on a double bill at 8 p.m. at the North Star Bar, 2639 Poplar St. Admission is free. Call 215-787-0488.

Tuesday

Things to come In Stanley Kramer's 1959 downbeat, dystopian drama On the Beach, a submarine crew lands in Australia after a nuclear holocaust and becomes entwined in the lives of the survivors waiting for the radioactive fallout to enter their hemisphere and wipe everyone out. The film, once dated but these days looking more prescient, screens at 7:30 p.m. at the Chestnut Hill Library, 8711 Germantown Ave. Admission is free. Call 215-248-0977.

'Tis the season This seems like a good time to have a live listen to the great Irish rock combo the Saw Doctors, we think. They play at 7 p.m. at the Theatre of Living Arts, 334 South St. Tickets are $28. Call 215-922-1011.

Wednesday

Sublime and monstrous Hans Werner Henze's 1961 opera Elegy for Young Lovers, with a libretto by W.H. Auden, tells the tale of a ruthless poet who uses and abuses those around him at a mountain lodge, all in the name of his work, with deadly consequences. The Curtis Opera Theatre performs the work at the Kimmel Center's Perelman Theater, 260 S. Broad St., at 7:30 p.m. Wednesday, 8 p.m. Friday, and 2:30 p.m. next Sunday. Tickets are $50 to $130. Call 215-893-1999.

This is not a band Self-described as "the all-girl conceptual art-punk band of women artists who can't play any instruments," the group Disband first formed amid the chaotic, cacophonous, confrontational ethic of New York's no-wave scene in the late 1970s. Their songs mix performance art, a cappella, and comedy in a fractured pop aesthetic. The core trio of Ilona Granet, Donna Henes, and Martha Wilson performs new and old works at 9 p.m. at Vox Populi Gallery's Aux Performance Space, third floor, 319 N. 11th St. Admission is free. Call 215-238-1236.

Thursday

Jazz at the Playhouse The organ trio Three Blind Mice plays at 7:30 p.m. at Society Hill Playhouse, 507 S. Eighth St. Tickets are $10; $5 for students. Call 215-517-8337.

Dance styles The Washington, D.C.-based dance troupe

Dakshina/Daniel Phoenix Singh Dance Co.

, known for blending traditional Indian dance forms such as Bharata Natyam with modern movement, performs on a bill with spoken-word duo

Yellow Rage

at

Asian Arts Initiative

, 1219 Vine St., at 7:30 p.m. Friday. Tickets are $5 to $10. Call 215-557-0455. . . . The hip-hop troupe

Rennie Harris Puremovement

presents a program of all-female works at

Bryn Mawr College's

Goodhart Hall, 101 N. Merion Ave., Bryn Mawr, at 8 p.m. Friday. Tickets are $20; $18 for seniors, $10 for students. Call 610-526-5210. . . . Philadelphia choreographer/dancer

Gabrielle Revlock

performs on a bill with Holly Johnston's

Ledges & Bones Dance Project

of San Francisco at

Temple University's

Dance Theater, Broad Street and Montgomery Avenue, at 7:30 p.m. Friday and 2:30 p.m. Saturday. Tickets are $10 to $20. Call 484-469-0288

With strings The excellent violist Emily Rideout plays works by Vaughan Williams, Rebecca Clarke, Bach, and Astor Piazzolla with pianist Kristin Ditlow at the Community Music School, 775 West Main St., Trappe, at 8 p.m. Saturday. Tickets are $12 to $16. Call 610-489-3676.