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New Year’s Eve NYC 2022

Celebrating New Year’s Eve on December 31st is one of the great New York City traditions, but New Yorkers actually celebrate many different New Years.

New Year’s Eve 2022

New Year’s Eve 2022 is Fri, Dec 31.

In Manhattan

The Times Square New Year’s Eve Ball Drop is live with social distancing at Times Square in the Theater District at midnight (3pm doors). Free.

The Metropolitan Opera premieres a new staging of Verdi’s “Rigoletto” at the Metropolitan Opera House in Lincoln Center on New Year’s Eve, Fri, Dec 31 at 6pm. From $52. 🇮🇹

Chris Botti plays Jazz Pop at the Blue Note in Greenwich Village at 7 & 10pm (5 & 9:30pm doors). From $75. 🇮🇹

The Carlos Henriquez Nonet celebrates New Year’s Eve at Dizzy’s Club in Jazz at Lincoln Center on Fri, Dec 31 at 7:30 & 11pm. From $285. 🇵🇷

Papote Jimenez (Los Hacheros) celebrates New Year’s Eve at Mi Salsa Kitchen in the Lower East Side on Fri, Dec 31. 🇵🇷

La Sonora Dinamita celebrates New Year’s Eve with Colombian Cumbia at Sabor Latino in Elmhurst, Queens on Fri, Dec 31 after midnight (9pm doors). From $35. 🇨🇴

Celebrate New Year’s Eve with the Hottest Desi Bollywood Beats at SOB’s in Hudson Square, Manhattan on Fri, Dec 31 at 10pm. $50. 🇮🇳

In Queens

The Carlos Jimenez Mambo Quintet plays Latin Jazz at Willy’s The Cuban in Bayside, Queens on Fri, Dec 31 from 9:30pm – 12:30am. @mambodulcet 🇵🇷

Colombian DJ Camilo spins a reggaeton dance party at La Boom in Woodside, Queens on Fri, Dec 31 at 10pm. $50. 🇨🇴

New Year’s Around the World

Gregorian (Roman), Jewish and Muslim New Year are pretty obvious, but there are also Yoruba, Hindu and Chinese New Year’s, and probably others that we don’t know about yet.

Looking at New Year’s around the world is instructive on how Yoruba culture, the dominant African Diaspora culture in the Americas, blended European traditions into its African roots.

Yorubaland is in parts of Nigeria, Benin and Togo. In Africa, Yoruba New Year is June 3. In Cuba and the Americas, Yoruba New Year is January 1st. The original African tradition blended with European traditions.

Another fun consideration is that many New Year’s traditions are set in winter, the slow time in the agricultural cycle. But winter happens at opposite times in the northern and southern hemispheres. So Andean New Year’s is in June. Oy vey!

The Winter Solstice on the longest night of the year was probably a prehistoric form of New Year festival. Even that happens at opposite times of the year in the northern and southern hemispheres.

To respect our ancestors in the Americas, we acknowledge Aztec, Maya and Inca New Year. There are some claims of a Taíno New Year, but we don’t really know.

We are taught to see “other” cultures as monoliths, one big thing. The reality is that Indigenous culture is very local. Literate cultures write down their traditions, but pre-literate cultures pass their traditions orally. So traditions vary from one community to the next and even from one family to the next. That is still true. No two families celebrate the holidays in quite the same way.

Some cultures make a big deal out of New Year’s and other’s don’t. Muslim New Year is not traditionally acknowledged, though it can be in modern times. Manahatta’s Indigenous Lenape don’t seem to have had a New Year celebration, but were more in tune with the changing seasons than we are today.

We have to thank #BlackLivesMatter for helping us to see our world in a completely different, more inclusive way.

However and whenever you celebrate, Happy New Year!

New Year's Eve in Times Square NYC (Rob Corbett/Dreamstime)
New Year’s Eve in Times Square NYC (Rob Corbett/Dreamstime)
Winter Festivals

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