Circus in town

If all goes as planned, this weekend will be the last call for Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey at Mellon Arena.

The circus always comes around in early November, and by that time next year, the new Consol Energy Arena will be open down the street.

Ringling is traveling with a production called "Over the Top," in which Ringmaster Chuck Wagner and clown eccentric Tom Dougherty engage in a tug-o-war for the possession of a magical top hat that brings to life their fantastical imaginations. That includes a flying dog, Asian elephants that skip and hop, and a man who stands eye to eye with Bengal tigers.

Also scheduled are equestrian stunts, high-altitude feats on a double-decker trapeze, and motorcycle madness on a high wire.

Times are 10:30 a.m. and 7 p.m. today; 7 p.m. Friday; 11 a.m. and 3 and 7 p.m. Saturday; and 1 and 5 p.m. Sunday. Tickets are $11 to $65; call 1-800-745-3000.

Ten Plays

Ah, the G-20 summit -- so much buildup, so much hoopla, so much material.

The G-20 was used as inspiration for 10 new short plays, featured tonight through Saturday and Nov. 12-14 in the sixth annual Future Ten Play Festival. This year's theme: "F-10 Play Summit ... We're Causing a Riot!" The way it works: 10 plays, 10 minutes, 10 dollars.

The festival also plans a "Protestor Challenge," during which audience members will compete with each other for the designation of "World's Wackiest Protestor."

The festival schedule:

• Program A (today through Saturday): "30 Year Old Dora" by Blaise Miller; "The Unknown Artist" by Philip Real; "Turning Trixie" by Carol Mullen; "Let Go" by Steven Korbar; "Public Transportation" by John C. Davenport.

• Program B (Nov. 12-14): "All the Answers" by Mark Cornell; "The Waiting Room of the Gods" by Arthur M. Jolly; "Trench Coat" by Joseph Lyons; "People Like Us" by Chris Shaw Swanson; "Faith in the Super Bowl" by Dean Lundquist.

Get advance tickets (recommended) at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/84549.

PSO Mozart premiere

You read that right. The Pittsburgh Symphony will perform Mozart's Symphony No. 30 for the first time this week. The wunderkind wrote this one while he lived in Salzburg, Austria. The year was 1774, which means Mozart was still a teenager. Actually he had already written several masterpieces by then, such as the "Little G minor" Symphony No. 25, but No. 30 has fallen between the cracks and isn't played much anywhere.

It's not as potent or musically mature as other orchestral works, but there is plenty to recommend the work. And it can be enlightening to hear Mozart as a working composer. He occasionally had to provide music for use; he wasn't always blowing our minds with new directions as an entrepreneur in Vienna.

On the other end of the spectrum is a piece we hear just about every season at Heinz Hall, the Mendelssohn Violin Concerto. It's a great work, however, and the soloist will be Chee-Yun. Dvorak's boisterous Symphony No. 7 ties up the program conducted by Marek Janowski. 1:30 p.m. today and 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday. Tickets are $12.50-$83; call 412-392-4900 or visit www.pittsburghsymphony.org.

Polka fest

Nine national bands will converge on Seven Springs Mountain Resort Friday through Sunday for the Fall Polka Festival. It begins with a Welcome Party in the Bavarian Lounge Friday at 4 p.m. with DJ Ken Olowin followed at 7 p.m. by Ray Jay & The Carousels and Jimmy K & Ethnic Jazz.

Saturday starts at 11 a.m. with Olowin spinning a Bloody Mary Party in the Matterhorn Lounge. The Saturday band lineup, beginning at 1:30 p.m., features Henny & The Versa J's, Eddie Blazonczyk's Versatones, The Knewz, The Dynabrass and Buffalo Concertina All Stars.

On Sunday, there's a Morning Polka Mass with music by the Polka Family Band at 10 a.m. and then more music from 12:30 to 8:30 p.m. from the Versatones and Stas Golonka and the Chicago Masters.

Admission ranges from $12 to $17 with discounts for teens; 12 & under free with an adult. For more details, go to www.versatones.com/7springsfallfestival.htm.

Talkin' 'bout love

Just not that into love? You may be in need of an evening with Amiira Ruotola and Greg Behrendt, who will be at the Byham Theater at 8 p.m. Friday to ask the question: "So You Think You Want to Be In Love?"

Behrendt (whose resume includes TV host, musician, comedian and co-author of the best-seller "He's Just Not That Into You") and his wife, Ruotola, "bring a voice of reason and inspiration to all of us negotiating, and sometimes drowning in, the treacherous waters of romantic relationships in their lecture." The couple's books together include "It's Called a Break Up Because It's Broken" and "It's Just a Bleeping Date."

It's not all straight talk and tough love -- Behrendt is, after all, a stand-up comedian -- and there's a Q&A session when it's all done.

Tickets to the Trust Presents series event: $20-$32; www.pgharts.org or 412-456-6666. Behrendt's latest DVD, "That Guy From That Thing," will be released Tuesday. Visit post-gazette.com for an interview with Behrendt just before his appearance in April 2008 at Pittsburgh Improv at the Waterfront.

Get Up, Get Out

The Get Up Kids, one of the most influential emo bands of the past decade or two, are on the reunion circuit, touring to coincide with the 10th anniversary re-release of their breakout record, "Something to Write Home About," with bonus tracks.

The Kansas City band, playing Mr. Small's Saturday, had a pretty good run from about 1995 to 2005, before it collapsed due to internal tensions. Over the past several years, the members busied themselves with such bands as The New Amsterdams and Reggie and the Full Effect.

Upon reforming guitarist Jim Suptic stirred the waters, telling Drowned in Sound, "The punk scene we came out of and the punk scene now are completely different. It's like glam rock now. We played the Bamboozle fests this year and we felt really out of place. ... If this is the world we helped create, then I apologize."

A comeback album is in the works, so there could be a taste of that at the show, which begins at 7 p.m. with Kevin Devine and The Life and Times. Tickets are $22. Call 1-866-468-3401.

Jill and Mia

Calliope assembled an unlikely double bill of clever singer-songwriter Jill Sobule with Delta blues improviser Kelly Joe Phelps. But Phelps isn't going to make it, and will be replaced by Australian blues rocker Mia Dyson.

The first thing to say about Sobule is that the quirky folk rocker had a song called "I Kissed a Girl" over a decade before Katy Perry did. "When Katy Perry's version came out," she recently told The Rumpus, "I started getting tons of inquiries about what I thought. Some folks (and protective friends) were angry, and wondered why she took my title and made it into this kind of 'girls gone wild' thing. Others, including my mother, were excited because they thought I would somehow make some money out of it. Unfortunately you can't copyright a title ... bummer."

Perry claims that the title came in a dream, but if she's looking for more ideas, she might want to turn to Sobule's latest record, "California Years," an elaborately fan-funded effort (she raised more than $85,000) that documents her move to the West Coast with songs like "Palm Springs," "San Francisco," "Where Is Bobby Gentry?" and "Nothing to Prove," a funny song about meeting a young faux-punk-rock chick at a record company meeting.

The show is at 7:30 p.m. at Carnegie Lecture Hall. Tickets are $35 advance, $40 at the door. 412-394-3353; www.proartstickets.org.

Crayon adventure

You can do a lot with a crayon, and few people have done more than Harold, who can join the circus and jet to Mars or anywhere else his imagination takes him.

Pittsburgh International Children's Theater puts him on local stages starting Sunday in a musical adaptation of "Harold and the Purple Crayon," presented by The Enchantment Theatre Company.

Enchantment, a Philadelphia-based group founded in 1979, will combine life-size puppets, masks, music and large-scale video animation to make Harold come alive for kids. It will be followed by a "Talk Back" session.

Performances are at the Byham Theater, Downtown, Sunday at 2 p.m.; Marshall Middle School, Marshall, Tuesday at 7 p.m.; Gateway High School, Monroeville, Wednesday at 7 p.m.; Pine-Richland High School, Pine, Nov. 12 at 5:30 and 7:30 p.m.; Quaker Valley High School, Sewickley, Nov. 13 at 7 p.m.; Keystone Oaks High School, Mt. Lebanon, Nov. 14 at 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Ticket are $11; 412-456-6666; www.pghkids.org.

• "June Is Bustin' Out All Over," "Soliloquy (My Boy Bill)," "If I Loved You," "You'll Never Walk Alone" ... Rodgers and Hammerstein's "Carousel" has 'em all. The new production by Point Park University's Conservatory Theatre Company is directed by Jack Allison, who also staged "Carousel" during his tenure as resident director for Pittsburgh CLO. The show at Pittsburgh Playhouse in Oakland runs Friday through Nov. 15. Times are 8 p.m. Thursdays through Saturdays and 2 p.m. Saturdays and Sundays. Tickets: $18-$20; www.pittsburghplayhouse.com or 412-621-4445. The Saturday matinee on Nov. 7 is "pay what you will" ($1 or more at the Playhouse box office).

• Rodef Shalom and the East Winds Symphonic Band join forces again for Music with a Mission, a benefit for the Squirrel Hill Food Pantry on Sunday at 2:30 p.m. at the synagogue in Oakland. The concert is free, but guests are encouraged to bring a bag of kosher groceries or a monetary donation. Reservations are not required, but seating is limited.

• The Pittsburgh Opera continues to explore how it can use the theater space at its new digs in the Strip District. One idea is art song recitals, and it offers one with two of the company's Resident Artist singers, Danielle Pastin and Dan Kempson at 2 p.m. Sunday at its headquarters, 2425 Liberty Ave., in the Strip District. Free. 412-281-3480.

• Comedians John McIntire and Gab Bonesso headline the Lunatics On Parade show Saturday at the Cabaret Theater. This performance isn't part of the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust's monthly late-night Pittsburgh Pundits series at Cabaret, in which both are regular featured comics. Instead, it's straight-ahead edgy stand-up comedy, minus the panel discussions on topical issues they tackle with the Pundits shows. Show time is Saturday at 10 p.m. at the Cabaret Theater, Penn Avenue, Downtown. Admission is $5.

Critics Andrew Druckenbrod and Scott Mervis talk about music on "The Beat," available exclusively at PG+, a members-only web site of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. Our introduction to PG+ gives you all the details.