4704 Virginia Avenue, wildfruitprojects.com

Wildfruit Projects is an art gallery with a mission to build community, which is inarguably something that both the city and the gallery's Dutchtown neighborhood needs. Owners Nate Lucena and Kentaro Kumanomido are building that community both with the gallery's exhibits, which trend toward local artists, such as illustrator Caitlin Metz or multi-modal artist Dail Chambers, as well as events, which started off (as did the gallery) with a Pride party in June 2022. It set the tone, Lucena told the RFT in March, to create a space that is welcoming to all but also "safe and prioritizes lifting up St. Louis' queer, artistic and creative community." The location is equally thoughtful, as the gallery is meant to get people to come and engage with Dutchtown. —Jessica Rogen

counterpublic.org

The triennial exhibit Counterpublic returned to St. Louis this year, with an iteration that covered a six-mile stretch of Jefferson Avenue. With 30 artworks in total, four of which are permanent installations, the 2023 Counterpublic cohort aimed to "reimagine civic infrastructures towards generational change." Exhibits grappled with Indigenous and Black displacement, inequality and the future of the city using Jefferson, a street dividing some of the city's more affluent neighborhoods from downtown, as its main artery. Counterpublic garnered the attention of the national art scene, with the New York Times writing that the exhibit "pushes the public art envelope." Forbes furthered the praise, asserting "no one place more completely embodies the American experience than St. Louis." The exhibit closed in July, but the collective hope for a better city created by Counterpublic still pulses throughout St. Louis. —Scout Hudson

She's been going viral since her freestyle cover-song videos back in high school almost 10 years ago, but the last year has seen Big Boss Vette, the St. Louis rapper named after one of her first hits, take off into the hip-hop big leagues. Vette is everywhere: "Pretty Girls Walk" spawned a TikTok craze; "I Can't Stop" landed on the Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse soundtrack; her performance at a Clippers playoff game pushed the limits of clean-version edits and her set at California's Rolling Loud festival showed off her high-octane performance style and irresistible hooks. Vette is at once tough, playful, raunchy and vulnerable, flexing a sharp, elastic flow that emphasizes crisp elocution over locked-in meters, but for all her explicit sexual boasting (see "Snatched"), Vette's new Resilience EP emphasizes a deeper emotional range. No matter where it all takes her, Vette remains true to St. Louis. As she says, "I'm from all of St. Louis, and all of the Lou is me." —Steve Leftridge

Don't call it a comeback: Thomas Owens, the 75-year-old father of acclaimed local soul singer Brian Owens, has been singing his ass off his whole life. But this year, the elder Owens is ready for his closeup. The year marks the tenth anniversary of the viral father-son duet of Sam Cooke's "A Change is Gonna Come," a video that recently crossed 100 million YouTube views. Now the pair is set to release a full album, Duets With Dad, along with a making-of documentary featuring father and son blending their emotive tenors on standards such as "Stand By Me" and "Bridge Over Troubled Water." In the run-up to the releases, Thomas stole the show with his high-register gospel-powered harmonies on the pair's appearance on the Today show in June and during a Touhill concert showcase on Father's Day. Here's to a fresh spotlight on a seasoned pro. —Steve Leftridge

750 Casino Center Drive, Maryland Heights; centenecommunityicecenter.com/saint-louis-music-park

Saint Louis Music Park is the coolest new outdoor venue in the area and our current favorite place to see a concert. It offers a fun experience even before you arrive. The parking is orderly, the staff is friendly, the stage is set high, the bathrooms are clean, the floor is open to the breeze and the bleacher seats are steep enough to give everybody a great view of the action. This place is set up to chill out all evening, too. It has a huge (and adorable) Astroturf outdoor lounge/play area with free games to play while you have a beer or three. And best of all? The sound is great from every corner. If you've been bored or annoyed by the concerts you've gone to lately, you'd be wise to take a trip to Saint Louis Music Park and enjoy a little slice of music venue paradise instead. —Jaime Lees

If you've been to a classic-rock concert in St. Louis over the last three years, you've likely delighted in the presence of Ralph Morse, the diminutive, white-bearded, star-spangled, decorated-pork-pie-hat-wearing super fan in the front row who worships at the altar of arena rock's golden era. How Morse continually secures the best seat in every venue is a mystery, but through his ecstatic, arm-waving rapture, Morse is the ultimate '60s through '80s rock cheerleader in costumed exhilaration. He's a throwback in every sense: He owns no mobile device of any kind, so he waves a lighter at shows instead of a phone, and your only chance to say hello to him is in person. That is, if he has not already entered his fugue state, lost in the glory of the music. —Steve Leftridge

musicattheintersection.org

Music at the Intersection's 2022 iteration — its second ever, and the first that was not encumbered by a global pandemic — was a smash hit, a boutique festival that brought large crowds to Grand Center and proved that St. Louis can be a destination for this kind of event. With a lineup that included Erykah Badu, Gary Clark Jr., Buddy Guy, Robert Glasper and Kamasi Washington, the fest perfectly occupied the space where neo-soul, jazz and hip-hop intersect, making for an inclusive affair that attracted a rich diversity of attendees. This year's lineup proved decisively that such success was no fluke, with people once again flocking to Grand Center in droves to catch sets by such luminaries as Smino, Masego, Snarky Puppy, Thundercat and Herbie Hancock, as well as dozens more. Organizers promised in the run-up to the event that they'd double down on what made the previous year such a hit, saying that they had no desire to mess with success. That strategy proved to be most wise, resulting in a full weekend of fun for blissful music lovers from St. Louis and beyond. As long as they keep delivering on all these fronts — and there's no reason to think they won't — we'll celebrate every year they decide to grace us with one of the city's finest events. —Daniel Hill

A lot of people thought Opera Theatre of Saint Louis' plans to adapt a long-lost Scott Joplin show would provide the opera season's biggest impression — and yes, Treemonisha won new fans, while artistic director James Robinson also made a huge splash with his naughty, and brilliantly faithful, Tosca. But it was Susannah, a new production of the 1955 chestnut by Carlisle Floyd, that had opera fans agog this summer. It was one of those shows where everything seemed to come together brilliantly, from Janai Brugger's star-making turn in the title role to the wonderfully evocative sets and gorgeous video projections to Patricia Racette's sympathetic direction. Herself a former Susannah (at no less than the San Francisco Opera), Racette has an affinity for the material that shone through in details both big and small. No wonder this production was the talk of the town even in a year with plenty of worthy contenders. —Sarah Fenske

A well-respected performer, Courtney Bailey has turned to playwriting with equally impressive success. Her plays imaginatively slip between time periods historic and fictional with snappy dialogue and playful plots, creating refreshingly spirited stories that resonate with audiences. Bailey deftly mixes literature, pop culture and complex philosophies into worlds that are plausibly absurd. And she possesses an uncanny talent for teaching and provoking thoughtful discussion even while making audiences laugh out loud. Bailey's locally developed script, Brontë Sister House Party, recently won the St. Louis Theater Circle's awards for Outstanding New Play and Outstanding Production of a Comedy. Bailey also curated and framed work from Prison Performing Arts programs to create The Golden Record and co-wrote the darkly funny and subversively weird The Brechtfast Club with Lucy Cashion. She's currently working on Margaret Fuller Magick Show — and smart theater fans eagerly await its premiere. —Tina Farmer