Daybreak's Weekend Heads Up, 11/12/26

The Poor Cousins at the Howe Library in Hanover. Naomi Morse (fiddle) and Emmet McGowan (guitar) play roots music including American old time, New England, Irish, Quebecois, and Scottish, as well as their own arrangements. 3:30 pm in the New Books Area.

At AVA Gallery, Kate Conley on “I Dream Therefore I Am: Women Artists in Surrealism.” Conley, who taught French and comp lit at William & Mary and Dartmouth, will talk about “a series of women artists linked to the surrealist movement from the 1930s to the present day, all of whom sought to define what surrealism was for themselves.” 5:30 pm.

The world premiere of William Grant Still’s Costaso at the Chandler Music Hall. Opera Vermont’s production is the second in its effort to bring the neglected composer’s works to a wider audience: “a sweeping three-act opera set in the Spanish-ruled American Southwest, with a story of passion, betrayal, and tragic sacrifice that recalls the intensity of Puccini’s Tosca.” Friday at 7 pm, Saturday at 4 pm.

The Mascoma Drama Club’s production of Romeo and Juliet hits the stage. You may have heard of the play. “A little love, passion, revenge, puffy pants, and swords,” they write, “make for a show you won't want to miss!” In the Mascoma Valley Regional HS auditorium Friday and Saturday at 7 pm, Sunday at 2 pm.

The Matt Flinner Trio at Artistree in S. Pomfret. Mandolinist Matt Flinner, guitarist Ross Martin, and bassist Eric Thorin “cover a wide variety of musical styles—all with the common ground of American roots music.” 7 pm.

Hop Film screens Digger. In Alejandro G. Iñárritu’s 2026 film, Tom Cruise “takes on the role of aging oil tycoon Digger Rockwell, whose endless quest for wealth and supreme hubris are directly responsible for an impending ecological disaster”—which he sets out to fix himself. 7 pm in the Loew.

The Fab Faux at Lebanon Opera House. A quintet of music industry veterans who’ve worked with a Who’s Who of big names takes on the Beatles catalog. 7:30 pm.

The Lowe Down Dirty Trio at Sawtooth Kitchen in Hanover. The Keene-based band led by Dennis Lowe “delivers a refreshingly diverse set of tunes spanning the best eras of rock and roll and beyond.” 9 pm.

Pop-up market at Honey Field Farm in Norwich. Over 35 vendors—growers, herbalists, bakers, cooks, and craftspeople—line the farm’s greenhouses. 10 am-1 pm.

Second annual Cranksgiving starts in WRJ. Sponsored by Vital Communities and the Haven, it’s a bike ride in which riders receive a list of Upper Valley stores and a list of the items the Upper Valley Haven needs most. Race, take your time, whatever: the point is to collect those items. There are varying routes, including a 40-miler. Starts at the Haven at 10 am.

The Hanover Conservancy celebrates the opening of a new trail. Adair’s Erratic Trail at Hewes Ravine was completed this summer with help from the Upper Valley Trails Alliance’s high school corps and follows the “dramatic headwater stream of Hewes Brook, leading to a stunning quartz glacial erratic.” 1 mile out and back, relatively flat, 2 pm at the 6 Iby Road trailhead.

Contra dance at Norwich’s Tracy Hall. With caller Steve Zakon-Anderson at the mic and Dave Langford (fiddle) and Amy Englesberg (piano and accordion) with the tunes. Intro/refresher at 7:15 pm, dance starts up at 7:30.

John Scofield’s Electrospective at Lebanon Opera House. The three-time Grammy-winning guitarist (a veteran of Miles Davis’s band) is touring with a concert of his classic fusion groove compositions with a heck of a backup band. 7:30 pm.

Johnny Folsom 4: A Tribute to Johnny Cash at the Claremont Opera House. “While nobody really sounds like Johnny Cash, nobody sounds more like Johnny Cash than Johnny Folsom 4,” they write. 7:30 pm.

Hop Film screens an encore Met Opera in HD production of Bizet’s Carmen. As they write, it’s a “special encore of Richard Eyre's 2010 production of Bizet's masterpiece starring soprano Elīna Garanča as opera's timeless man-eater.” 1 pm in Spaulding.

Cellist Marie-Élaine Gagnon and pianist Alessandra Feris in Woodstock. In the final concert of their fall chamber music series, the UU Church features the duo performing classical music pieces by Latin American composers, including Heitor Villa-Lobos and Astor Piazzolla. Admission is free, but donations are encouraged. 2 pm.

In Hanover, “Fascinating Rhythms: A cabaret of American and Ukrainian music.” A concert of classical and popular music by legendary American composers (Leonard Bernstein, Richard Rodgers, and others) alongside works by their Ukrainian counterparts. Sponsored by Common Man for Ukraine, at the Church of Christ at Dartmouth College, 3 pm.

The Upper Valley Symphony Orchestra at Lebanon Opera House. Under conductor Mark Nelson, the concert opens with Aaron Copland’s Fanfare for the Common Man, moves on to Brahms’s Symphony No. 4, and includes Samuel Barber’s First Essay for Orchestra, “a work which shares stylistic similarities with the composer’s famous Adagio for Strings.” 3 pm.

At Sawtooth Kitchen, “I Was Never Here: There Is No Spy Show.” Leo Lion’s “part escape room, part chaotic clowning” show debuted at Edinburgh Fringe and has been touring since: “A blundering sleeper agent has lost his memory. You -- an audience of initiate spies -- must help him get it back. No two shows are the same. Crack codes, defuse doomsday devices, and try to follow one simple rule: Don't talk about spy show.” 7 pm.

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Written and published by Rob Gurwitt 

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