1) Celebrate with music! The New York Philharmonic puts on its free annual Memorial Day Concert, this year featuring a performance of Mahler’s epic Symphony No. 9.
2) Or hang with nerds at the three-day chip-music Blip Festival. Costumes aren’t required, but we’re pretty sure nobody would mind …
3) Have a tween (or harbor a secret love for shaggy-haired boy bands?) U.K. dreamboats One Direction play twice on Saturday, with one show at 3 p.m. for those with early bedtimes.
4) Or you can treat yourself to a musical mind explosion with experimental knob-twiddlers Black Dice at Secret Project Robot.
5) It is the weekend, after all, so why not go outside? If you have a bike (which you may or may not be intimately attached to) check out Bicycle Fetish Day in Williamsburg, with an after-party at the City Reliquary.
6) Or hit up Governors Island for the first weekend of the summer. There are two festivals to partake in: the Boro PicNYC, with food, craft beer, and tunes, or for more family-friendly fare, the Governors Island Alliance Family Festival, with music, crafts, face-painting, and more.
7) On Monday, crowds will gather in Queens and Brooklyn, when they both throw parades, and at Rockefeller Plaza, when Bobby Brown plays the Today show …
8) Or hang indoors when the Met opens their doors for special holiday hours.
9) For arcade aficionados, the Beeb Skeeball tournament at the Knitting Factory is an opportunity to throw balls into holes …
10) Or show off dancing skillz at the final Voodoo Funk at Zebulon (for at least four years), or the I Love Vinyl three-year anniversary shindig at the Gallery at LPR. Or your singing skillz at the Big Band Hot 100 cover show at the Ace Hotel.
11) How about a play? Death of a Salesman and Lonely, I’m Not close next week.
12) Or art lovers can catch Jeremy Kost’s Polaroid collages or Ryan McGinley’s portraits of music fans, both of which also close soon.
13) Last but not least, remember the men and women of our military at the plethora of Fleet Week events. And have a happy Memorial Day!