In a look ahead at a week of Cambridge and Somerville events led off by the Inman Eats & Crafts festival, authors Ben McGrath, Robert Kuttner and Elif Batuman come to town, there’s a Moth Story Slam and plenty of music and dance, including an MIT-sponsored International Festival and four days of Campfire. Festival at Club Passim.

Cambridge singer-songwriter Alisa Amador is the winner of the year’s Tiny Desk Contest, NPR Music announced this week. She is expected to headline an “On The Road” tour of contest participants.

In a look ahead at a week of Cambridge and Somerville events, “Intimacies” author Katie Kitamura is in town, “inTENtion” dance gets a two-night stand, the Night in Bloom Gala seeks to raise funds for Somerville’s armory and there’s art, poetry, jazz and a Cambridge-Somerville Asian Festival for AAPI Heritage Month.

The revived ManRay nightclub in Central Square is being held up by red tape from city inspectors, an insider told the audience at “Central to It All: A Look at Central Square, the Nightclub ManRay and 20 Years of Change,” a Wednesday panel discussion held at the Cambridge Main Library.

The coming of spring and fading of Covid concerns – if not of Covid itself – has a very literal sign in the window of Clover HFI, the Central Square branch of the locally born no-meat fast-food eatery: an offer for bands to eat free when they perform in one of the nearby clubs. The offer isn’t new, though.

Inman Eats & Crafts, the East Cambridge Business Association’s annual celebration of “everything Inman Square,” returns May 22 for its fifth year with even more emphasis on the crafts end of the event.

People thronged a Central Square intersection Wednesday for a free, open-air block party headlined by the hip-hop star Doug E. Fresh. The party marked the grand opening of the city’s first recreational cannabis shop, Yamba Market.

The Cambridge Arts River Festival is canceled for a third year by the coronavirus pandemic. Its replacement for 2022 announced Tuesday is a yearlong series of events presented under the umbrella of a “Ripple Festival.”

The Boston Philharmonic closes out its 43rd season Friday, performing Mahler’s Symphony No. 3 at Boston’s Symphony Hall with some strong contributions from Harvard Square.

Spoken-word fans don’t yet have the Sunday night Poetry Jam and Jeff Robinson Trio back at Lizard Lounge, but they can get their Jeff Robinson fix monthly at Lilypad in Inman Square. On Wednesday he performs with poet and singer Iyeoka Okoawo.