The free, weekly all-age disco at Nectar’s is continuing every Sunday, from 5:30 to 7:30 p.m. into mid-October. These popular events, called Family Dance-o-Ramas, are produced by the nightclub’s previous co-owner, Mona Rosenthal (aka Deejay Shizz), who spins tunes and puts on special lighting effects and bubbles at the dance floor not far from the Martha’s Vineyard Airport.
An Island of Women, an original musical, looks at life on the Vineyard between 1850 and 1852 when much of the male population was off whaling. It was created by Island historian and director E. St. John Villard. It’s music was composed by retired Methodist minister of music Phil Dietterich, who is well know to Vineyard audiences for his original compositions for many local groups, as well as his work for the Scottish Society.
The Chappaquiddick Summer Music Festival continues on Thursday, August 6, with a performance by the Jupiter String Quartet. The quartet will perform Shostakovich’s Quartet No. 7, Dvorak’s Quartet in F Major “American,” and Beethoven’s Quartet in E Minor, the “Razumovsky.” The concert begins at 8 p.m. at the Chappaquiddick Community Center. A reception follows the concert and everyone is invited to attend.
Jazz afficionado Leslie J. Stark is offering his popular jazz appreciation series at Featherstone Center for the Arts again this winter, with classes meeting from 6:30 to 7:30 p.m. on Wednesdays in February and March
Pluck Some Summer Music in a Bargain With Cattle Drivers
Who better than the songwriter of Road Rage to kick off the summer concert series called Sounds Like Summer in Edgartown?
Kevin Keady and his high-energy acoustic band The Cattle Drivers play at 6:30 p.m. Tuesday on the lawn at the Edgartown Public Library for the recession-busing price of “free.”
The Martha’s Vineyard Regional High School was founded in 1955, making 1959 graduation year for the inaugural class. Half a century and countless diplomas later, the Class of 2009 readies itself to be the 50th class to fling their mortarboards in the air. In recognition of this, the Minnesingers annual spring show will be titled The Beat Goes On, and will feature a medley of tunes from the last five decades.
Acoustic folk group the Woods Tea Company presents a concert in the Tabernacle in Oak Bluffs on Saturday, July 18, at 8 p.m. The Woods Tea Company performs Celtic tunes, bluegrass, sea shanties and American folk songs on instruments including banjos and bouzoukis, guitars and bodhrans, and traditional whistles. Tickets are $20, online MVCMA.org or at the door. For details, call 508-693-0525.
Have you ever wondered what is the story behind a favorite pop music tune? Every song has a writer, and they aren’t often in the foreground. The stories behind the songs can be far more interesting if told by the writer — and that is the idea behind the first ever Martha’s Vineyard Songwriters’ Festival this weekend.
The two-night event will showcase the writer-performers. The festival opens tonight at the Katharine Cornell Theatre, and there will be a second show tomorrow night at Union Chapel in Oak Bluffs.
Jersey Shore-based musician Pat Guadagno will perform two shows on Friday and Saturday, June 5 and 6 at the Dive Bar on Circuit avenue in Oak Bluffs, located between the Ritz and the Lampost. The club, formerly known as the Rare Duck, has been a tour stop for Guadagno for over 15 years. “I stopped in this little club and met John Cruz, we played together, and I have been coming back every year since,” he says.
