Daily Choices: What to do on Thursday, May 23 

Special Event: The Roc City Ribfest runs today, 5-11 p.m., through Monday, May 27, and includes live music, the YMCA kids zone, food and retail vendors, a variety of cook-off competitions featuring teams from across the nation, and even Canada, and the World Bacon Competition. Additional festival hours are Saturday-Sunday 11 a.m.-11 p.m., and Monday 11 a.m.-9 p.m. Tickets are $5 to ages 12 and over, and free to kids younger than 12. Weekend passes are available for $10. The ticket price includes admission, music, and kids' activities; food costs are on a per-vendor basis. Parking on site is free, and there is a shuttle running from a lot at 123 Ling Rod. with round trip tickets for $1. You can vote for your favorite vendor each day, and each vote earns you a chance to win a meat smoker. No outside food, booze, or pets are allowed on site. For more information, call 1-888-ROC-BBQ8 or visit roccityribfest.com.

Music: Tala Vera (155 State St., tala-vera.com) is hosting a Singer-Songwriter showcase tonight, featuring the Kevin Plane Band, John Bornheimer & Jack McCarthy Bornheimer, Joan Burch, Arhen Henby and Nick Lord, and Cole Michaels. Music starts at 8 p.m., tickets run $5-$7.

Art: The final art show before High Falls Fine Art Gallery (60 Browns Race) closes its doors will be presented tonight through June 30. "Snaps: Retrospective Images from the Xerox Rochester International Jazz Festival," features photographs of the festival and its musicians by Frank de Blase, Jim Dolan, Mark Druziak, Tom Flint, Tom Frizelle, Tim Fuss, Garry Geer, Kelli Marsh, Peter Parts, Michael Riebesehl, Fresd SanFilip, Son Ver Ploeg, and Kelly Yost. Today's hours are 11 a.m.-5:30 p.m. A public reception will be heldSunday, June 2, 3-6 p.m. For more info, visit centerathighfalls.org.

Music: Ready to put on those fancy pants? Nashville’s own Fancytramp will be at the Bug Jar (219 Monroe Ave., bugjar.com) tonight, with The Red Lion (the king of?) and Sexy Teenagers opening up. Music starts at 8:30 p.m., cover runs $6-$8, and Cultr Club will keep the party going after the bands at 11 p.m.

Comedy Enjoy a night of comedy at Mayoral Candidate Lovely Warren's "Lovely Laughs" comedy fundraiser, held tonight, 7-10 p.m. at Club Network (420 Central Ave.). The candidate will host a meet and greet 7-8 p.m., followed by enterainment by Uncle Trent, Joel James, and G-Funk; the evening will be hosted by comedian JayReal. Admission is $5. For more info, call 232-1390.

Music: It’s still hard to believe that the Grateful Dead is history. Following Jerry Garcia’s death in 1995, the Grateful Dead dissolved. The band’s remaining members toured as The Other Ones and The Dead, or formed new groups including Furthur, RatDog, and Phil Lesh & Friends. Ex-Dead drummer Mickey Hart is no exception, and has kept on truckin’.Hart first perked my ears with his 1991 world-percussion “Planet Drum” CD that was one of my bachelor-pad soundtracks back in the day. Hart’s latest group, Mickey Hart Band, features eight talented musicians, including Rochester-native Joe Bagale on lead vocals. Mickey Hart Band ain’t the GratefulDead or Planet Drum, but you can hear some familiar elements of both. Either way, you’re gonna groove. Mickey Hart Band performs tonight, 9 p.m. at Water Street Music Hall, 204 N Water St. $30-$35. waterstreetmusic.com.

Music: Let’s see. If it’s two hands, that’s 10 fingers. That’s 8.8 keys per finger. That’s…that’s too many unplayed notes! The work-around is to add more pianists, and that’s exactly what the piano faculty at the Hochstein School of Music & Dance will do in its 2nd Annual Celebration of the Piano. Performing music for two to 16 hands will be pianists Paula Bobb, Wenginq Bouché-Pillon, Yi-Wen Chang, Richard Delaney, Vanessa Fadial, Doleen Hood, Willie LaFavor, Gary Palmer, Lourdes Santiesteban-Mora, and Olexsandra Yurchenko. Composers on the program include Schumann, Schubert, Sousa, Lecuona, Cervantes, Lavignac, and Milhaud. Not to be missed, the Mozart Piano Concerto in A Major, K. 414. Don’t let the formality of the title put you off — as arranged by Hochstein’s Tom Acquaviva, it’s written for solo toy piano with eight supporting pianists.The event takes place tonight, 7 p.m. at the Hochstein School of Music & Dance, 50 N. Plymouth Ave. $5 individual/$10 family. Hochstein.org, 454-4596.