SO MUCH GOOD STUFF, UPPER VALLEY!
Friday
A “Fairlee Good” Art Show opens in… Fairlee. Eleven local artists, including Ria Blaas, Antoinette Jacobson, Wayne Burke, Pace Kendall, and others, throw an opening for their pop-up exhibition of sculpture, paintings, drawings, collages, and jewelry. 4-7 pm, with live music, in the old barn at 1985 US Rt 5.
NH Humanities streams “First in the Nation: NH's 1776 Constitution to the Present.” It’s a rebroadcast of a sold-out February panel with Yale Law prof Lorianne Updike Schulzke, Rutgers law prof emeritus Robert Williams, and NH Superior Court Judge N. William Delker moderating. That will be followed by a live Q&A with the three panelists. 5 pm—no charge but you’ll need to register.
Lara Herscovitch and the Highway Philosophers at Roots & Wings. It’s the last concert until fall at the coffeehouse, and indie singer-songwriter Herscovitch—once Connecticut’s official troubadour—is bringing along the rest of her trio. 7 pm at the Unitarian Universalist Congregation of the Upper Valley in Norwich.
Granite Garden at Sawtooth Kitchen. Despite its name, the band’s from NYC: rock, theatre, film, and art tinged with grunge. Local up-and-comers Static open. 7 pm.
Samantha Fish at Lebanon Opera House. There are still some tickets left for the blowout guitarist, who “deals in her own unmatched brand of bravado, bringing both mind-blowing power and extraordinary emotionality to everything she creates.” With blues guitarist and singer Solomon Hicks opening. 7:30 pm.
Wing Walkers Stand-Up Comedy at the airport. NH comedian Matt Barry headlines, with Bitsy Biron and Jordan Corbin, at Bright Side Brewing at the Leb Airport. 8 pm.
Saturday
Billings Farm’s Family Sheep and Wool Celebration. You can clean fleeces, card fibers, see drop spindle and wheel spinning demonstrations, explore felting, knitting, and crocheting, watch border collies at work in live herding demonstrations, check out sheep’s cheese, and more. 10 am to 5 pm.
Vital Communities celebrates the 30th anniversary of Valley Quest. As they write, “Valley Quest has helped people of all ages slow down, look closely, and build meaningful connections across the region—to the land, to local history, and to one another.” The celebration—starting at AVA Gallery at 10:30 am—will offer a chance to learn more, meet other Questers, make your own stamp, and participate in one of two guided Quests in Lebanon.
Upper Valley Music Center presents “The Pure Drop: Irish Sean-Nós Singing.” It’s the traditional, unaccompanied vocal music of Ireland with soprano and storyteller Jennifer Pomeroy singing love songs, laments, ballads, and lullabies in both English and Irish. 2 pm at the First Congregational Church of Lebanon.
The Center for Cartoon Studies kicks off Vermont Reads 2026 with Tillie Walden, Marek Bennett, and Joel Christian Gill. Tillie Walden’s new book Charity and Sylvia, which tells the true story of two women who carved out a life for themselves in small-town Vermont in the first half of the 19th century, is this year’s Vermont Reads pick. She’ll be talking over non-fiction comics with fellow cartoonists Bennett and Gill. 2 pm at CCS both in-person and livestreamed, no charge but you’ll need to register.
Crossmolina Farm’s Pizza Night returns. The regular Saturday night pizza-and-music event on the West Corinth farm starts up for the summer: food at 5 pm, music with Devonian Hot Club at 6 pm. You’ll need to reserve a spot.
CraftStudies in WRJ throws itself Frocktails. As they write, it’s “a celebration for makers and non-makers alike where you can drink fancy drinks, screenprint and bedazzle new accessories, walk the runway, and dance the night away. Wearing something you've made is encouraged, but definitely not required.” It’s a fundraiser to help CraftStudies make its classes, workshops, and camps available to all. 6-10 pm.
The Granite State Ringers at Plainfield Town Hall. “Pirates of the Caribbean,” “Hava Nagila," “Dry Bones," “Nocturne in C Minor,” and more on handbells. 7 pm.
Coast Jazz Orchestra at the Hop. Coast Jazz’s graduating seniors, under director Taylor Ho Bynum, perform original works and their arrangements of pieces by Isham Jones, Béla Fleck, Charles Mingus, Bynum, and others. 7:30 pm in Spaulding.
Sunday
Finding Our Stride’s Community Color Splash-and-Dash. The untimed, family-friendly walk/run celebrates the nonprofit’s 15 years, with a chance to get doused along the way with bursts of bright (non-toxic) color. At the Thetford Academy woods trail, with day-of registration and bib pickup starting at 10 am, the 3K and 5K courses starting up at 11 am, and a 300M “lollipop” start for kids 5 and under at noon.
Ninja Wizard’s Bluegrass Brunch returns to River Roost Brewery in WRJ. Fiddler Jakob Breitbach, banjoist Steve Hennig, and Kit Creeger on guitar, noon to 2 pm.
Hop Film screens the Met Opera in HD’s El Último Sueño de Frida y Diego. Gabriela Lena Frank's new magical-realist opera about Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera, with libretto by playwright Nilo Cruz, features mezzo-soprano Isabel Leonard leaving the underworld on the Day of the Dead to reunite with Diego Rivera, portrayed by baritone Carlos Álvarez. 1 pm in Spaulding.
Seven Stars Arts in Sharon presents Elizabeth and Ben Anderson with Noah Fishman and Conor Hearn. For their While the Sun Shines Scottish-music album release show, the sibling fiddle and cello Anderson duo are joined by Noah Fishman on bass and Conor Hearn on guitar, performing everything from 18th century tunes to originals. 3 pm.
Claremont Makerspace hosts a “We the People” community quilt-making event. They’re inviting community members to create quilt squares of foreign flags from the country of their or their ancestors’ birth as a way to celebrate the city’s wide-ranging immigrant history. You just need to bring a photo, they’ll provide the materials. The finished quilt will be unveiled July 3. More on the event and the city’s immigration waves in Patrick O’Grady’s Valley News writeup. Free, registration required. 3 pm.
Dartmouth’s music department hosts a violin recital with Omar Chen Guey and pianist Victor Cayres. Guey, who teaches violin at Dartmouth, and Cayres, a soloist, accompanist, and recording artist, will perform Ravel’s Violin Sonata No. 2 and his Tzigane concert rhapsody, Brahms’ Violin Sonata No. 3, and Bernstein’s West Side Story Suite arranged for violin and piano. 4 pm in Morris Recital Hall.
Burger Night at Flying Dog Farm in Tunbridge. It was postponed last weekend because of rain. Beer by Brocklebank, food by Flying Dog, and music by Bluephonics. 4-7 pm.
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