Arts & Culture in Philadelphia

Beethoven's father was supposedly so strict that little Ludwig often cried salty tears all over his sheet music. According to legend, trying to read the waterlogged notes made Beethoven deaf and blind in his old age when he composed the magnificent music you’ll hear with this Groupon. Hear three of Orpheus Chamber Orchestra's five Carnegie Hall concerts at a deep discount. Click here to see the schedule. The lineup includes the principal oboist of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra playing Strauss's Concerto for Oboe , one of the world's foremost Bach pianists performing Bach's Concerto for Piano & Strings as well as a new piece by Sir Peter Maxwell Davies, and Beethoven's heartbreaking violin concerto in D major. You get seats in the parquet section (that's close to the orchestra on the ground floor); click here to see a seating chart.

Today's side deal gets you a hefty discount to see the Broadway debut of David Mamet's Oleanna, starring stage and screen actors Bill Pullman and Julia Stiles. Go to www.broadwayoffers.com and enter code OLGRN0925 for $50–$60 mezzanine tickets (a $116.50 value) to preview performances (Sept. 29–Oct.10) of Mamet's spellbinding and controversial drama.

Winner of the 2006 Improv Theatre Award for Best Interactive Show, The Awesome 80s Prom whisks would-be-seniors back to 1989 to re-live the decade of excess in all its stonewashed glory at the Wanaget High Senior Prom. The dance kicks off at 7:30 p.m. (the show starts at 8:00 p.m.), where taffeta-clad guests will get to moonwalk and pop 'n' lock alongside the captain of the football team, the geek, the head cheerleader, the rebel, and other teenage archetypes, before casting their vote for prom king and queen at the end of the dance. A best-dressed contest held every night will bestow one lucky dancer with the coveted title, so competitive guests will want to don their best studded glove and skinny tie before bathing in a bucket of blue eye shadow and donning a Frankie Says Relax T-shirt sewn together from Members Only jackets and Rubik's Cubes. The prom ends at 9:45 p.m., but ticketholders can dirty dance their way over to the after-party free of charge as Webster Hall transforms from a high school gymnasium into a nightclub where modern beats reign supreme over ear underlings.

There are many times when hilarity hides and withdraws, but with today’s side deal, it ensues. For $15, you get a ticket to the preview showing of The Foreigner on Tuesday, January 26, or Wednesday, January 27, at the Bristol Riverside Theatre (a $29 value for a regularly priced ticket; student tickets are $10 with a valid ID). Called “a hilarious farce, full of loopy jokes” by the New York Times, The Foreigner has also received glowing critical acclaim from the Village Voice, among others.

Deemed "one of the city's leading cultural centers" by New York magazine, the 92nd Street Y has sparked nonprofit projects and engaging performances since its founding in 1874. Eight programming centers, including The School of the Arts, and the May Center for Health, Fitness & Sport interweave lectures, exercise and academic classes for adults and children, film screenings, and long-distance learning into a pursuit of shared wellness. During lectures, such special guests as Bill Gates, Woody Allen, and Bill Clinton have taken the stage to talk about their careers or debut new tap dancing routines. Centers for art, creative writing, and educational outreach flex the muscles of the mind while the May Center for Health, Fitness & Sport molds physiques on multiple floors of advanced workout arenas. Visitors might ease into a jazz or dance series at the Theresa L. Kaufmann Concert Hall, whose seating accommodates 915 people or 450 musicians on take-your-bassoon-to-work day, or watch a concert and other 92nd Y events from the personal monitors perched on the gym's cardio machines.

Dazzling audiences since 1911, Plays and Players boasts a troupe of talented thespians ready to take on Lost in Yonkers, a play that has won four Tony Awards, a Pulitzer Prize, and countless fist pumps. The complex and sharp-witted coming-of-age story follows two brothers sent to live in Yonkers, New York. Written by Neil Simon and directed by Betty Chomentowski, the approximately two-hour comedic drama depicts the struggles the brothers face after their father sends them to live with their immigrant grandmother, simple-minded aunt, and hooligan uncle. During the performance's 15-minute intermission, audience members can wipe tears of laughter from their eyes or mend the tears in their skulls incurred while thinking too deeply about the play's lessons on family relationships.