From the courtroom to the underworld, the classic arts scene in New York is never quiet. Here is just a sampling of some of the classic arts events happening this week.

The Queens Summer Vocal Institute presents its students in three operas and a gala concert this week at Queens College’s Aaron Copland School of Music. Gilbert and Sullivan’s Trial by Jury will be performed August 4 and 5. The comic one-act drawing on Gilbert’s experience as a barrister will be paired with a program of operatic scenes. Engelbert Humperdink’s Hansel and Gretel will be performed August 7 and 9, and Offenbach’s Orpheus in the Underworld August 8 and 9. The humorous take on the Orpheus myth reimagines Orpheus and Eurydice as a married couple who are thoroughly sick of each other, but dare not separate for fear of Public Opinion, the abstract concept of which is personified as a character in the opera. The week of performances will conclude August 10 with a gala concert.

The Festival Orchestra of Lincoln Center presents Music of Exile and Remembrance August 5 and 6. Conductor Joana Carneiro will lead the program of works by Gabriela Lena Frank, Dmitri Shostakovich, and Maurice Ravel, with violinist James Ehnes joining as the soloist for Prokofiev’s second violin concerto. The orchestra then closes out its summer season with In Sickness and In Health, a concert program exploring the work of Robert and Clara Schumann. Led by conductor Jonathon Heyward, the orchestra will perform Robert’s Overture, Scherzo & Finale, and Symphony No. 4, as well as Clara’s Konzertsatz in F minor for Piano and Orchestra, with pianist Yeol Eum Son as the soloist. The program will also include the world premiere of James Lee III’s Connected Perceptions. These season-closing concerts will occur August 8 and 9 at Lincoln Center’s David Geffen Hall.

The 44th annual Battery Dance Festival kicks off August 9 at Wagner Park at the lower tip of Manhattan. The festival, which runs through August 16, will feature performances from over a dozen international dance companies, including the Bulareyaung Dance Company from Taiwan, Platforma 13 from Romania, and Wan Dance from Indonesia. All performances other than the August 9 kickoff will take place in Rockefeller Park, and all performances will start at 7pm.

The JACK Quartet will present the world premiere of Nursalim Yadi Anugerah’s Aphid and a Palm on the Top of Orange Cliff August 10 at the Dimenna Center for Classical Music’s Mary Flagler Cary Hall. The work for string quartet and computer-controlled kadedek (a type of bamboo gourd mouth organ) is a JACK Quartet commission.

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