Black Angels Photo: Briana Purser

Living in Austin, sometimes you almost have to wonder what you’ve done to deserve weekends like these, as a bevy of stellar local bands with far-reaching reputations drop new CDs with release shows this weekend.

A party that actually started with Shearwater’s curtain-pulling magic at The Parish on Thursday, where Jonathan Meiburg reached full wingspan. No longer biding his time with Okkervil River, Meiburg’s Shearwater unveiled Rook  (Matador Records) in its woodwind, brass, and harp entirety. With penetrating vocals equally haunting and beautiful, Shearwater’s Rook is a no-brainer to appear on nearly every pundit’s Best Of lists to come at year’s end.

But we digress. Two days that could be billed the Great CD Release Weekend await us:

Memorial Day weekend offers a bounty of recreation activities, and they don’t all have to revolve around grills and lakes. For folks with air conditioning on their minds, you can get your sizzle from the celluloid screen. The ornate Paramount Theatre packs a weekend of classic films (Casablanca, Key Largo, Grease) while the Alamo Drafthouse Lake Creek presents Citizen Kane, complete with a live music orchestra recreating the renowned Bernard Herrmann score along with the film.

 Could there possibly be better timing for a grand wine festival than a three-day weekend? Not that we’re endorsing imbibing too much wine or anything, but with 27 Texas wineries (21 from the Hill Country), great music, delectable food…let’s just say it’s satisfying to know you can while the day away (or whole weekend) like a Roman senator and have nothing to worry about.

 Unlike any other wine festival in Texas, the Austin Wine Festival—Saturday, Sunday, and Monday at The Domain in northwest Austin—allows you to purchase bottles or cases to take home with you. So that robust Super Tuscan you fall in love with—but won’t remember the name of later—buy some to take with you.

After many years of planning, and searching, playwright Manuel Zarate and the HBMG Foundation are finally ready to set their baby free to the waiting arms of Austin. InLove Sonatas, the HBMG brings together three directors and 25 actors, as well as plenty of artists, animators, filmmakers and musicians in one of the biggest events to hit town this season. The play cycle combines live theater, film and digital 3-D animation, so at the very least it’s sure to be one of the most unique.

Love Sonatas  is a five-play cycle chronicling the inter-mingling lives of 20 people, each trying, in their own way, to discover what love is about. The plays will “explore the brutality that lives inside all relationships—how they can destroy us and build us back up again.”