Best of the Week: Cecile McLorin Salvant, 'Indecent,' Lila Downs, Demi Lovato, St. Paul Ballet, more

As her brilliant young career continues, Cecile McLorin Salvant, 28, just picked up her second Grammy for best jazz vocal album for only her third project. Part live and part studio recording, the double-disc "Dreams and Daggers" talks about romance and heartbreak as Salvant sings with slyness, restraint and beauty, at turns sounding girlish and mature. She's supported by a top-notch ensemble, led by expressive pianist Aaron Diehl.JON BREAM

7 & 9 p.m. Wed. Dakota Jazz Club, Mpls., $30-$42, dakotacooks.com

Based on actual events, Paula Vogel's "Indecent" follows a controversial play, "God of Vengeance," over five decades, from a successful European tour to a Broadway run that was prosecuted for indecency (the play has lesbian themes) to a return to Europe, where the familiar play comforts its actors during the tragedies of World War II. This theater experience is by turns hilarious and heartbreaking.

CHRIS HEWITT

7:30 p.m. Tue.-Sat., 1 p.m. Sat.-Sun., Guthrie Theater, Mpls., $29-$77, guthrietheater.org

Lucky for us, Grammy-winning Mexican American singer and genre-blender Lila Downs is the daughter of a University of Minnesota professor and comes here more often than most major Latino artists do. Her new album, "Salón Lágrimas y Deseo," offers a modern feminist theme alongside her usual vibrant whirl of ranchera, norteño and folkloric Mexican music. She's always a theatrical entertainer with a stunning voice.

CHRIS RIEMENSCHNEIDER

Former Disney star Demi Lovato has become a hero as much for overcoming struggles in her life as for recording pop songs. The 25-year-old has personally dealt with depression, self-harm, bullying, eating issues, substance abuse and bipolar disorder. In documentary movies and her activism, Lovato has helped educate young people about these and other issues. She also reaches them with her dance-pop, including last year's "Sorry Not Sorry," her biggest hit single. DJ Khaled opens.

JON BREAM

7:30 p.m. Sat. Target Center, Mpls., $30-$150, axs.com

The weather is warming but the exhibition "Vanishing Ice: Alpine and Polar Landscapes in Art" is always super-chill. The broadly themed show traverses icy territory, from antique stereograph imagery of a glacier in 1902, to Paul D. Miller (aka DJ Spooky) inkjet prints "Manifesto for a People's Republic of Antarctica" (2011-12), created in the style of Chinese Communist propaganda posters, and meant as a play on the politicizing nature of climate-change debates.

ALICIA ELER

The Rose Ensemble marks Women's History Month with a program of vocal music by Hildegard von Bingen, Caterina Assandra and Chiara Margarita Cozzolani, female composers of the medieval and renaissance periods. Also featured is a new work by Minnesota composer Abbie Betinis.

TERRY BLAIN

7:30 p.m. Fri. Colonial Church, Edina; 7:30 p.m. Sat. Church of the Holy Cross, Mpls.; 3 p.m. next Sun., St. Mary's Chapel, St. Paul Seminary, St. Paul; 8 p.m. March 16, St. John's University, Collegeville; 3 p.m. March 18, St. Mary's University, Winona; 7:30 p.m. March 19, College of St. Scholastica, Duluth; $10-$38, roseensemble.org

What a difference five years make. In 2013, St. Paul Ballet faced dire financial straits and considered closing. Instead, they restructured and flourished under a new artist-led model. Now the company celebrates its success with an evening of fan favorites, including the commedia dell'arte-inspired "Bella Luna" (2014) and artistic director Zoé Emilie Henrot's psychological "Locked Key" (2015). Each concert also features one work selected by online voters.

SHEILA REGAN

Jazz saxophone giant Charles Lloyd will celebrate his 80th birthday with a four-night residency at the Dakota Jazz Club working with three different ensembles. Sangam features Zakir Hussain on tabla and Eric Harland on drums. The Marvels include guitarists Bill Frisell and Greg Leisz plus vocalist Lucinda Williams, among others. Lastly, it's Lloyd's New Quartet, starring Jason Moran on piano. It should be four fabulous nights.

JON BREAM

Thu.-Sun., Dakota Jazz Club, Mpls., prices vary, dakotacooks.com

Long before name-brand maple syrups flowed over French toast, Indians produced maple sugar and shared their knowledge with frontier settlers. Walk outdoors and learn how to choose trees to tap, collect the sap and watch it boil down to syrup. Indoors watch the syrup transform into sugar and sample maple candy.

MELISSA WALKER