New Orleanian Ian Carney takes on the role of Tony in the Wednesday performance of the Broadway in New Orleans presentation of Billy Joel's musical Movin' Out, at the Saenger. Photo by Hassan Kinley Multidimensional wunderkind SAVION GLOVER first wowed critics and audiences alike at age 12 in his 1987 debut on Broadway with the aptly titled The Tap Dance Kid. His moves in that show proved enough to score Glover a role in the film Tap, starring alongside legendary hoofers Gregory Hines and Sammy Davis Jr. Since his smashing debut, Glover's career carries forth on upward momentum found in a flurry of lauded film, television and stage work. Glover brings his new hit show, Improvography II, to the Orpheum Theater (129 University Place, 522-5555; www.ticketmaster.com) on Thursday evening. Glover's latest work is a mix of choreographed tap dance and searing improvisation, melding tap with the sounds of jazz, hip hop, R&B, neo-soul, rock and funk. A six-piece band accompanies Savion, and they perform various improvised numbers as well as selections from 2003's Improvography. Glover scored his first smash hit in the 1996 Broadway sensation, Bring in 'Da Noise, Bring in 'Da Funk, for which he won a Tony Award for Best Choreography. On television, Glover was a series regular on Sesame Street for five seasons, and reached a wider audience through varied appearances like Puff Daddy's video for "All About the Benjamins" and the ABC special Savion Glover's Nu York. In his film work, Glover most recently starred in Spike Lee's Bamboozled in 2000. Glover collected his reflections and inspiration for an autobiography, Savion: My Life in Tap (HarperCollins), a book written for young adults published in 2000. The book's forward is an effusive love letter from Hines, beginning the book with, "He's the greatest tap dancer to ever lace up a pair of Capezios or any other tap shoes." With so much success already behind him, it's stunning to consider Glover is only 31. Tickets for Thursday's show range from $44.50-$49.50. -- Frank Etheridge

Movin' Out 8 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday, April 5-9; 2 p.m. Thursday, Saturday-Sunday, April 7, 9-10 Saenger Theatre, 143 N. Rampart St., 522-5555; www.saengertheatre.com Billy Joel may be in rehab, but the music lives on! Joel scored a remarkable hit with Movin' Out, a review of his often New York-centric songwriting career. The Tony Award-winning musical is an onstage interpretation of Joel's pop catalogue, which includes characters from many of his jukebox classics: 'Scenes From an Italian Restaurant,' 'Just the Way You Are,' 'She's Got a Way' and, most unfortunately, 'We Didn't Start the Fire.' The stories and the songs create a narrative for a generation (that didn't start the fire, apparently) as the musical follows five friends from Vietnam to the late 1980s. The work flows without dialogue and lends itself to something of a new ballet as told through jazz dance. New Orleanian Ian Carney takes a short sabbatical from the Broadway production to fill the lead role of 'Tony' (a character from the title tune) for the Wednesday showing only. Tickets range from $22-$62. -- Ian Manheimer

Cake, Gomez and Robbers on High Street 8 p.m. Wednesday, April 6 Tulane University, McAlister Auditorium, 865-5141 The Virgin College Mega Tour brings to Tulane's campus a school-night shindig featuring a trifecta of bands, and it's arguable who should be the headliner on this bill. Cult favorite Cake has developed a devoted fan base from years and years of touring, though in November frontman John McCrea said the band is 'culturally irrelevant' and that he finds touring 'rootless and depressing.' British sextet Gomez's earnest, acoustic blues- and boogie-infused sound commanded immediate attention in its native England, where the band took home the Mercury Music Prize in 1998 for its debut album, Bring it On. Stateside, the band is often lumped into the jam band category, the cred coming from a well-received Bonnaroo performance in 2004 and work with Phish producer Tchad Blake on its latest, Split the Difference (Virgin). Up-and-coming pop band Robbers on High Street earned local fans after several recent shows in town supporting indie acts like VHS or Beta. Tickets $15 students, $20 general. -- Etheridge

Your Arms Too Short to Box With God 8 p.m. Friday-Saturday, April 8-9; 3 p.m. Sunday, April 10 Anthony Bean Community Theater, 1333 S. Carrollton Ave., 862-PLAY; www.anthonybeantheater.com Subtitled 'A Soaring Celebration of Song and Dance,' Your Arms Too Short to Box With God promised much in its title and delivered after its 1976 premiere at the Lyceum Theatre followed by the Eugene O'Neill Theatre. The musical earned four Tony Award nominations -- including Best Book and Best Director of a Musical, both by Vinnette Carroll -- and scored a win for Delores Hall for Best Featured Actress in a Musical. With lyrics by Alex Bradford, Arms Too Short is a two-act musical based on the Gospel of St. Matthew in the guise of a church service, following Jesus Christ from his arrival in Jerusalem to his resurrection. Anthony Bean directs a cast that includes Leo Jones, Paulette Wright and Althea Tines Williams, while Jones handles the choreography and vocal arrangements with musical orchestration by Jeremi Crump. Tickets $18 general admission, $16 students/seniors. -- Simmons

Johnny Sketch & the Dirty Notes 10:30 p.m. Friday, April 8 Tipitina's, 501 Napoleon Ave., 895-TIPS; www.tipitinas.com This CD-release party gig celebrates the band's new Pain, Pleasure, Fear and Opera (Full Frontal), which as the liner notes admit, captures the band trying to change its sound a bit. Even for this genre-busting band -- are they rock, or are they funk? -- the change can be a bit jarring at times. The band's latent Zappa-esque tendencies show as it dabbles in a number of genres and complicates arrangements, not always for the best though some work well. The spaghetti-western instrumental 'Sherm' moves organically from the stately to the raucous, and Andre Bohren's 'Mission: Inter' is a string interlude that would sound at home in a '40s melodrama. When the band's jazz-funk roots show, as on 'Hey!' and 'Dürnt Dürnt,' it's on its most solid footing and good fun. Admission $8. -- Alex Rawls

Pinocchio 9:30 a.m. and 11 a.m. Monday, April 4; 2 p.m. Saturday, April 9 Rivertown Repertory Theatre, Imagine Theatre for Children, 325 Minor St., Kenner, 468-7221; http://www.rivertownkenner.com/theatre.html For 20 years, the Porta-Puppet Players have existed as a contingency of musical and entertainment professionals banded together to spread their brand of storytelling across Louisiana. This week the troop remixes Carlo Collodi's famous Italian bildungsroman Pinnochio to the delight of local children. Much like the way a team of comic book superheroes is formed, mastermind Wayne Daigrepont handpicked his players to represent different skill sets. The posse contains a clown, bagpiper, a house designer and a psychic to name a few. The Porta-Puppet Pinocchio is a presentation of 23 original and comical songs from the Big Easy Entertainment Award-winning thespian Wayne Daigrepont. Vatican Lokey -- fresh off appearances in Chicago and Evita -- takes on the role of the creator Geppeto, and David Lizana and Daniel Rigamer switch off playing the title role. Tickets $12 general admission, $8 children. -- Manheimer

Lyrics Born 9 p.m. Monday, April 11 The Parish at House of Blues, 225 Decatur St., 529-BLUE; www.hob.com Lyrics Born raps by stressing the syllables in his flow to bounce with the rhythm, often sustaining the notes like a singer. His style is unique even for underground hip-hop, and because he is a rapper who sings, he easily crosses genres. He cut two tracks on blues guitarist RL Burnside's 2004 CD, A Bothered Mind (Fat Possum) that fit the theme of his famous track, 'I Changed My Mind.' This song is remixed along with 10 others from Lyrics Born's last album, Later That Day on his upcoming album, Same !@#$ Different Day (Quannum), which includes five new tracks. He is touring with a five-piece band this spring, including the Quannum crew's back-up singer, Joyo Velarde. Heiruspecs will open. Tickets $12. -- Reuben Brody

Drew Galloway and Arthur Price: A Collaboration Through April 30 Peligro, 305 Decatur St., 5811706 Forget canvas. Drew Galloway is an artist known for his paintings on tin. No, make that rusty old corrugated roofing tin. And if it looks like it came off of an old barn, that's because it probably did. But he doesn't just paint it with Rustoleum, he torments the stuff, burning, pickling and torturing it with harsh treatments until it finally does what he wants it to. Then he paints serene Southern landscapes on it, incorporating the rusty patches into the overall design. Not satisfied with solitary pleasures, he now has Arthur Price, a painter known for canvases depicting "mythic and ethereal beings who inhabit this world but are not of this world," doing it too. A collaboration in corrugation, it's a new vision for an old material, a whole new ripple in the landscape. -- D. Eric Bookhardt